The gov­ern­ment has can­celled the Safe To Work (STOW) cer­ti­fi­ca­tion re­quire­ment for ac­cess to the en­er­gy sec­tor, end­ing a sys­tem that, it says, im­posed un­fair costs and bar­ri­ers to lo­cal busi­ness­es, par­tic­u­lar­ly small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es.

En­er­gy Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal an­nounced the de­ci­sion yes­ter­day at a post-Cab­i­net news con­fer­ence, ex­plain­ing that the move gives ef­fect to a com­mit­ment made by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar in 2024, when she was Op­po­si­tion Leader.

Dur­ing the Bud­get de­bate for 2025 fis­cal year, Per­sad-Bisses­sar pledged that a fu­ture UNC ad­min­is­tra­tion would ter­mi­nate the STOW regime and re­vert to the oc­cu­pa­tion­al health and safe­ty codes that ex­ist­ed pri­or to its in­tro­duc­tion.