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Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les trad­ed sharp ac­cu­sa­tions over the use of po­lice in schools, fol­low­ing a pri­vate mo­tion in the Low­er House on Fri­day.

The mo­tion, brought by St Ann’s East MP Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly, a for­mer ed­u­ca­tion min­is­ter, fo­cused on the use of armed po­lice of­fi­cers in schools and trig­gered heat­ed de­bate on the Gov­ern­ment’s School-Ori­ent­ed Polic­ing Ini­tia­tive.

In a state­ment af­ter the sit­ting on her so­cial me­dia pages, Per­sad-Bisses­sar ac­cused the Op­po­si­tion of seek­ing to re­move po­lice pro­tec­tions from schools, say­ing her ad­min­is­tra­tion “stands firm­ly in de­fence of stu­dents and teach­ers who sim­ply want to at­tend school to learn and teach in a safe and sup­port­ive en­vi­ron­ment.”