PORT OF SPAIN Mayor Louis Lee Sing is warning Carnival revellers and spectators that they could be fined as much as $1,000 or jailed for up to three months if found consuming drinks in glass bottles during the celebrations.

Lee Sing made the statement at the Council Chamber of the Port of Spain City Hall yesterday. He said the "no glass bottles for Carnival" measure is real and proceeding apace.

The mayor said he held discussions with key stakeholders in the glass bottle beverage industry and it was already decided that no glass bottles will be sold in Port of Spain on Carnival Monday and Tuesday.

Asked by the Express yesterday to clarify his earlier statement, whether the penalty would apply to someone entering the city with a cooler filled with bottled drinks in the trunk of their car, Lee Sing said in a telephone interview: "We are hoping that good sense will prevail.

"I certainly enjoy Carnival and I can't remember going to a cooler fete with a glass bottle in my cooler. You will note that all the cooler fetes say 'no glass bottles' and we all comply. That is for our well-being and safety.

"People are asking questions from the ridiculous to the sublime on this matter. We are merely seeking to treat with a matter that is now a best practice. What we are doing is a worldwide approach to crowd control. Where you have large crowds gathered, you never sell drinks in glass bottles. When you go to international football games, and what have you, you could drink as much as you want but you are getting it in a plastic cup."

Lee Sing said individuals entering the city for Carnival should treat it as a big cooler fete and refrain from bringing any glass bottles.

"If the person comes into the city with a trunk-full of (bottled) drinks and they keep it in their trunk we have no quarrel with that. But if they open the trunk and distribute the bottles in a band, that is what we have a problem with because those very bottles could end up being instruments of death and destruction and injury.

"A lot of people use the Savannah as a picnic ground during the Carnival. They come with their drinks in their trunk. If they have glass bottles in their trunk and they open it in their trunk and pour the drink into a plastic cup and distribute it to a friend in a passing band, I have absolutely no problem with that. But you cannot serve drinks on the road in glass bottles."

Lee Sing said the measure is one which, he envisions, can save lives. He noted that it was a broken bottle which was used during the only killing during the revelry last year.

The issue was raised in March last year by Deputy Commissioners of Police Jack Ewatski and Raymond Craig who said the police intended to meet various stakeholders in an attempt to eliminate having drinks sold in glass bottles during Carnival.

—with reporting by Renuka Singh