Found at: http://www.anguillaguide.com/article/articleprint/5895/-1/140/
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HUGHES CALLS FOR POLICE TRAINING ABROAD Fighting Crime A Major Reason
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The Anguilla House of Assembly gave its approval on Tuesday, April 29, to a motion introduced by Opposition Member Hubert Hughes in which he called for the appointment of “suitable police officers for requisite training abroad.”
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Hon. Hubert Hughes
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In moving the motion, Mr. Hughes said crime was becoming more sophisticated on the island and called on the Government to use its training needs policy programme to train police officers at a level where they could handle the sophistication of criminal elements in Anguilla.
“I think it is no doubt that crime on this island is not only increasing, but is becoming more sophisticated,” he told the House. “We have embarked on a very fragile industry for driving our economy – the tourism industry. It is therefore important that we have a stable society…We cannot survive on this island without people observing the law. We owe a lot to the police as without them all of us would be in jeopardy and we have to encourage a very efficient, respectable and qualified police establishment.
“Let us identify suitable candidates to send off to train in the respective areas of need in the police force. I am certainly not happy to see Anguilla paying out large sums of money to police officers from the United Kingdom…I feel very much hurt that Britain will not even give us technical assistance in the form of providing police if they were needed…The Governor is responsible for the police force and, we being a British colony, as far as I am concerned, I think that if a county in England needs police and it does not have the technical and financial resources, the Government would provide that help without cost to the county. We are like a county in England and yet we have to pay the full price; and the full price for a British police officer is several times over the full price of providing our own police officers in the same capacity.”
The Opposition Parliamentarian reiterated his call for the specialised training of local members of the force and called for the support of his colleagues in the Assembly.
The motion was seconded by the other Opposition Member, Edison Baird. He said the measure “carried the implication to beef-up our local police force so that they can effectively fight the rising level of criminality in Anguilla.” He stated that while Anguilla valued the assistance of outside police officers, “the time has clearly come for us to train our locals to the extent where they can handle any act of criminality that breaks out in Anguilla.”
Mr. Baird thought that with the high level of salaries now being paid to police officers, it was an attraction for suitable persons to join the force and to be in a position to be trained abroad and to take advantage of that training. He referred to a number of crimes in Anguilla which had not be solved. “Is it because police lack the wherewithal, or is it because crimes are so sophisticated in Anguilla that our police have not risen to the level where they can comprehend these matters?” he questioned and added that “this comes back to the essence of the motion that we have to train our police so that they can tackle the crime.”
Chief Minister, Osbourne Fleming, commended the police officers for doing a good job despite their limited resources. “I am not saying that we are getting the same effect from everybody, but overall I think that recently we have seen a serious improvement in the functions and work of the police,” he said.
“For many years we have not seen the brazenness and boldness of certain persons in Anguilla. When see them tying up people, putting them in the back of cars and taking money from them, this is unusual in Anguilla.”
The Chief Minister assured Mr. Hughes that the Government “has not been blind in looking at providing funding for training.” He stated that some four hundred thousand dollars was approved under the police vote, for the training of officers. “On our general vote which also addresses the needs of the police, we have provided 7.3 million dollars in 2008. We realise that with the kind of happenings today, we have to prepare our policemen and our police women to be able to stand up to the crimes that we are confronted with,” he told the Assembly.
In condemning crime on the island, Mr. Fleming threatened to deport persons who come to Anguilla to fill various positions in the job market but some of whom become involved in acts of crime. He also called on such persons to show respect for Government officials and the people of the island in general and warned that failure to do so could lead to their expulsion from Anguilla.
Minister of Social Development, Evans Rogers spoke on Government’s training programme and gave full support to the motion to train local police officers in the fight against crime.
The motion was passed by the House of Assembly without amendment.