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Oil spill law still on Govt.’s agenda before Parliamentary recess – Minister Teixeira
Kaieteur News – With less than a month remaining before the National Assembly goes into recess, the Government of Guyana is still aiming to pass a key piece of legislation, an Oil Spill Act, to ensure the country is protected during the transportation of crude oil.
Minister of Parliamentary Affairs and Governance, Gail Teixeira
Minister of Parliamentary Affairs and Governance, Gail Teixeira in an interview with Kaieteur News earlier this week explained that the draft Bill is with the Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister, Anil Nandlall S.C as the objective is to present it to the House before the Parliamentary recess on August 10.
She said, “We have quite a lot of Bills to try to bring before we go into recess and that is one of them that is still in draft but is not ready yet for Parliament.”
Asked whether the law could still be passed before the recess, Teixeira explained, “Yeah, we have a number of Bills, we have to pass before recess. There are some that will have to layover to October and we’ll have to make judgments based on the urgency or the requirements. The oil spill one is one that has many interests and so I’m sure that once it’s ready and it has passed the Cabinet review and it fulfills what we want it to, then it will be tabled.”
Moreover, she made it clear that the House can push the Bill through one Sitting if there is an urgency to do so, as the Standing Orders permit this.
Government has been accused in the past of rushing through key pieces of legislation to manage the burgeoning petroleum sector. In 2021, the government moved to the National Assembly on December 16 to table the National Resources Fund (NRF) Bill to manage the country’s oil money.
That Bill was later debated and passed in the House on December 29. The government ignored calls for the Bill to be sent to a special select committee to scrutinize and refine the proposed law.
This led to the famous ‘Mace’ episode in the National Assembly that later triggered a Court matter on the validity of the passage of the Act.
The new Oil Spill Law according to Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo will cover Guyana from “all sorts of liabilities”.
He explained, “We have been working to have legislation in place, and those will come probably before the next recess to cover all sorts of liabilities. A law in place like they have in the US and some other countries that will cover also transportation because we have more crude being transported in our jurisdiction so it’s not just liabilities of the oil companies but transport companies, etcetera and that’s been in the works a long time so that we can protect this country.”
The updated Petroleum Activities Act passed in the National Assembly in August last year does not address such events.
Presently, Guyana is producing more than 640,000 barrels of oil per day in the prolific Stabroek Block, operated by US oil major, ExxonMobil.
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