Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar SC is defending the Municipal Corporations (Amendment) Bill, 2026, saying the proposed changes are intended to address long-standing inequalities in representation and the distribution of resources.
During her contribution to the debate on the Bill in the Lower House on Wednesday night, the Prime Minister pointed to figures from the 2025 Development Estimates, which she said showed that several larger UNC-controlled Corporations received less money in total than smaller PNM-controlled Corporations, despite having significantly more people to serve.
She highlighted that Point Fortin, under PNM control, was allocated TT$17.65 million to serve about 20,000 people. By comparison, the UNC-controlled Couva-Tabaquite-Talparo Regional Corporation received TT$78.15 million to serve 178,410 people.
“That is inequality.That is inequity that we have to fix and that is what we’re trying to do today. So Couva-Tabaquite-Talparo, almost nine times the population, but $500,000 less funding. Arima, PNM-controlled, $18.25 million for 33,606 people. That works to about $543.36 per elector. Look at Chaguanas. We’re talking a lot about Chaguanas today. UNC-controlled $17.25 million for 83,560 people. You know what that worked out to, Mr Speaker? $206.55 per person. That cannot be equity. That cannot be equality of representation or resourcing. We cannot give everybody every single thing that they want but at least we can have parity. We can have some kind of equity, some kind of equality in the resources, in the funding, in the representation per councillor.”
Mrs Persad-Bissessar made a similar comparison between PNM-controlled San Fernando and Penal-Debe, saying San Fernando received TT$20 million to serve 48,838 people, while Penal-Debe received TT$17.5 million for 89,392 people.
She said the figures showed that larger populations were not necessarily receiving greater resources.
She pointed to the Tunapuna-Piarco Regional Corporation, saying it had almost 195,000 more people than Point Fortin but received only TT$500,000 more in funding.
“When Point Fortin Borough had 17,000 electors, and then you had in Tunapuna 182,000 electors, where is the proportionality? Where is the proportionality? And what that meant for Point Fortin, you asked about how you get service, this is how you get it. For Point Fortin, 17,814, according to EBC count of electors. That then gave you 2,969 persons to be serviced by a councillor. And if you look at all these numbers, they were so gerrymandered and geared to the PNM areas and all the other areas, including one of their own, Tunapuna, with one of the largest electorates. You suffered them too and want to talk today about Tunapuna. Tunapuna, 182,000 people, one councillor had to service 11,378.”
Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar also argued that the size of municipal electorates affects the level of representation residents receive.
“If you have less electors, less burgesses to service, the service will be greater, better. You will get better representation and you will have equality of representation. That is one of the ills that this Bill is attempting to deal with.”
The Prime Minister also highlighted Chaguanas, saying she was proud that the Government would give the borough City status. She noted that, in 2003, Chaguanas had 66,532 voters, compared with 31,928 in Port of Spain and 13,601 in Point Fortin.
She said the issue was ultimately about giving citizens a fair opportunity to be heard and receive services from their representatives.
“I sincerely believe a person in a larger region should not have to compete with thousands more electors for attention from their representative. Equal citizenship must mean a fair opportunity to be heard and that was my argument then and that remains my argument today.”
Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar said the Government’s approach to local government reform is based on land area, voter numbers and fair boundaries.
She argued that changing the boundaries of Municipal Corporations is necessary to address inequalities that have existed for decades.
“Mr Speaker, if we don’t make boundary changes, the inequity, the inequality will continue as it has for almost 34 years.”
The Prime Minister said the Government was not promising to give every community everything it wanted, but said there should be greater parity in the distribution of resources and representation.
“It is clear. If you go through every single one of the Corporations, it is the same pattern of behaviour. It is the same discrimination as against the UNC-controlled Corporations and I don’t know what they had against Tunapuna but they also discriminated against Tunapuna. So there’s no equity, there’s no equality in terms of representation per voter in terms of the sharing of resources. So these estimates expose the disparity. Larger UNC Corporations were allocated less money to serve far more people. These are things that we will work upon.”
She also rejected suggestions that Property Tax would be used to fund the changes.
“You’re asking about the administrative, about the where’s the money coming from, not from Property Tax I can assure you and how it is that we’re going to allocate resources to these. Those are administrative matters which will be dealt with consequent upon our passing of the legislation.”
The Municipal Corporations (Amendment) Bill, 2026, proposes changes to the local government structure, including granting Chaguanas City status and creating three new Municipal Corporations: Barataria, St Augustine and Couva.
The Bill was passed in the House of Representatives with 27 Members voting in favour and 11 voting against.