A GENDER LENS ON THE LAWS OF TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO FOR ACHIEVING EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW

Author(s)/editor(s)

(Author): Tenesha Myrie, (Legal Editor): Beatrice Duncan (PhD)

Trinidad and Tobago has ratified key international human rights conventions related to gender equality, in particular, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and Eradication of Violence against Women (Belem do Para Convention), some International Labour Organization (ILO) Conventions and other core human rights treaties.22 By virtue of these commitments, Trinidad and Tobago is taking all appropriate measures, including law reform, to identify and eliminate all forms of discrimination against women. The State is further committed to engaging in positive actions to promote and secure gender equality in both public and private life and in the political, social, economic, and cultural fields of life.

In its Concluding Observations on the combined fourth to seventh periodic reports of Trinidad and Tobago in 2016, the CEDAW Committee expressed concern at “the absence of an inventory of laws that are discriminatory towards women, with a view to amending or repealing them” and accordingly requested the State Party to develop such an inventory.23 This review of the laws of Trinidad and Tobago from a gender perspective represents a broad-based assessment of the country’s legal and policy framework, touching on all relevant laws and related policies, to determine how they impact on the achievement of gender equality. The overall goal of this review is to aid in securing equality in law as well as in practice for women and girls.