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Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine is pledg­ing to cre­ate a “ba­by trust fund” as To­ba­go bat­tles an alarm­ing drop in births.

But econ­o­mist Dr Vanus James says the an­nounce­ment is emp­ty, un­de­vel­oped and ir­re­spon­si­ble. He said no Gov­ern­ment should float a plan like this with­out ev­i­dence, re­search or a sin­gle con­crete de­tail.

Speak­ing dur­ing a meet­ing in Belle Gar­den on Wednes­day night, Au­gus­tine told sup­port­ers, “We are propos­ing that for every per­son born in To­ba­go… we will put in­to a trust fund some monies for you that you can on­ly draw down on from the age of 21.”