OT 282: Letter from Gordon Barlow: Cayman Islands

With the greatest respect to its members, I am obliged to ask whether the Foreign Affairs Committee is quite sure it is being kept fully informed of the sharply deteriorating state of relations between native Caymanians and immigrants in Grand Cayman.

The FCO has traditionally chosen to support the aspirations of the "native" ethnic Caymanians, including their plans for permanent political dominance.  That made sense when they comprised a majority of the population, but today they are barely a third of it.  Today, there are outnumbered 40,000 to 20,000 by non-natives who are denied what could be called basic civil rights.

Your Committee will no doubt be aware that all local politicians are by law required to be native Caymanians, and that the current representatives of that segment have declared their intention to frustrate whenever possible the recognition of the "human rights" set out in the Universal Declaration and the European Convention.

The FCO's determined preference for the permanent political dominance of a minority ethnic community has alienated the entire immigrant community to a degree that was scarcely imaginable only four or five years ago.  I am embarrassed to find myself in the position of questioning the FCO's strategy for this colony ("Overseas Territory", these days), but it is important that your Committee be aware of the risk to Cayman's economic base.

I think it was ten or eleven years ago that some UK official (the Auditor-General, it may have been) warned in a published report of the contingent liabilities that existed in respect of the colonies.  If I may say this with respect: it would be worth your Committee members' while to give that report another quick read.

The FCO has invited the native Caymanian community to send nine representatives to London to discuss Cayman's next Constitutional Order-in-Council.  The several and disparate interests of the 40,000 first-generation immigrants and migrant workers will not be debated, except by their declared enemies.  As a former Manager and sometime Director of the Cayman Islands Chamber of Commerce, I say with fervour that nothing is more likely to destroy our economic base.

We have been a very successful tax haven for forty years now (there are fancier names for tax havens, I know, but this is no time for euphemisms), and we are not nearly strong enough to survive as one if the FCO withdraws its support now.