ST THOMAS, Jamaica— Opposition spokesman on Education, Damion Crawford is appealing to the Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education (PATH) to add children living in Salt Lane, Morant Bay in St Thomas to the programme so they can receive help to attend school.

Crawford made the appeal in a video on Thursday while he was conducting a walk-through of the community. He hinted at the economic state of the community pointing out that the residents depend on the dump in St Thomas to earn a living.

The Opposition spokesman while making the appeal, queried why the children in  Salt Lane were removed from the programme.

“We just here with some of the people and we want to know… could the children in this community not be added to the (PATH) programme… on what basis could they have been taken off the Path programme,” said Crawford.

“So I am making this video appealing to the PATH to come down to this community and analyse every single house in this community so that the children can participate in school,” he added.

Crawford stated that the children are missing school as they cannot access the benefits offered by PATH.

“They are not going to school for the necessary amount of time because most have not been given the opportunity to be on PATH. So I am making another call for PATH to come and register the children in this community so that they can get a reasonable chance,” Crawford said.

According to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, PATH is a conditional cash transfer programme funded by the Government of Jamaica and the World Bank, aimed at delivering benefits through cash grants to the most needy and vulnerable in society.