Former Attorney General Dale Marshall today demanded that Government do all in its power to provide police with increased resources to end the recent spate of criminal activity.
In a statement issued this afternoon, the Barbados Labour Party’s shadow attorney general said the current state of affairs was “threatening to destroy our way of life to which we have become accustomed over many generations”.
The St Joseph MP pointed to this morning’s murder in the constituency he represents, last night’s robbery at the Speightstown branch of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC), other recent gun crimes and incidences of violence, as well as brazen break-ins and robberies, as “unmistakable signs of a society that is falling apart”.
Although saying the BLP did not want to cause undue public alarm, he insisted that the Freundel Stuart administration had to do something about the crime situation and give lawmen all the tools they needed.
Opposition MP Dale Marshall
“The reality is that where combatting crime is concerned, Barbados cannot afford for Government to exhibit towards it the same kind of insensitivity and slowness of reaction it has shown towards our economic difficulties. For as difficult as our economic conditions might be, there are some things that are simply not optional or negotiable, such as the state of crime,” he said.
“The Barbados Labour Party is convinced that there can be no fallback or second best position on the crucial matters of public safety and security. Public safety is one of the fundamental pillars on which a society rests and grows. Without this, no efforts by the Government to promote growth and development will have any possibility of success.”
At the same time, the Opposition gave credit to the Royal Barbados Police Force (RBPF) “for its continued fine crime fighting work in these trying and demanding times, with stretched and limited resources available to its valiant personnel”.
Marshall said while the professionalism of the RBPF was “undoubtedly of some comfort”, Barbadians at home and at work were not fully reassured and were demanding more of their Government.