Opposition Jamaica Labour Party caretaker for West Portland, Daryl Vaz, has blasted National Security Minister Dr Peter Phillips and his junior minister, Dr Donald Rhodd, for the challenging conditions under which the police in Portland are made to work, saying they demonstrated the Government’s neglect of the parish.

“The Portland police are severely constrained by a critical shortage of resources and deplorable working conditions,” Vaz said in a statement issued last week.

According to Vaz, the Portland police have been transporting prisoners 20 miles to the Buff Bay Courthouse from Port Antonio because of the temporary closure of the court in Port Antonio.

He also said that due to the critical shortage of service vehicles, some policemen and women have been forced to utilise their personal vehicles to carry out a number of duties, including taking prisoners to court.

Vaz levelled his criticisms at the Government ministers after a recent visit by both men to Port Antonio.

The visit included an address to a group of supporters of the ruling People’s National Party at a local school. Vaz said he had expected the ministers to report on and outline plans to address the very challenging and sad circumstances faced by the parish’s hard-working policemen and women.

Instead, he said, they announced a plethora of plans they have on stream for the parish.

Vaz scolded both men for the shortage of police vehicles, noting that three police stations – Castle, Orange Bay and Marine – do not have service vehicles, and of the few vehicles in the parish, the majority are more than 12 years old.

“The Port Antonio Police Station only has three vehicles in addition to two old SUVs for the Criminal Investigation Branch,” said Vaz. “Grossly inadequate for the multiple divisions at the station.”

He noted that the Public Health Department had condemned the Buff Bay and Hope Bay police stations, which are now located in what he described as “grossly inadequate rented houses” and said that the old stations “are in desperate need of immediate repair”.

The Portland Motorised Division, Vaz said, has 15 police personnel with nine motorcycles, six of which are reliable and three unreliable.

Vaz also expressed concern that no Portland police personnel were among the 86 cops promoted last week “despite Portland’s comparatively low crime rate, the very challenging circumstances faced, and the general dedication of the constabulary in the parish.”

He reiterated his claim that the current administration has neglected Portland, and pointed to what he said was “the dreadful state of the parish’s infrastructure” to support his argument.

He said the state of the constabulary was particularly worrying, given that Dr Donald Rhodd is a long-standing Portland MP and the administration’s most senior representative in parish.