The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

A Cabinet minister yesterday argued the liberalised work permit regime introduced by the former Minnis administration “has to be repealed” because it is “an impossibility” to conduct the necessary due diligence within the deadlines. 

Keith Bell, minister for labour and immigration, said ahead of this week’s Cabinet meeting that he and the Immigration Department will “not be following the Commercial Enterprises Act” because the timelines for approving work permits for the industries specified simply cannot be met.

“The former administration passed the Commercial Enterprises Act of 2017…. and the legislation says the director of immigration… shall determine any work permit applied for not later than 14 working days after the filing thereof, and the payment of the application fee, failing which the work permit shall be deemed to have been granted pursuant to this Act and may only be later revoked if the director has reasonable grounds for so doing on the basis of public safety, public morality, or national security,” he asserted.

While acknowledging that the Act indicates Immigration-related issues were as much a problem for the Minnis administration as its Philip Davis-led successor, Mr Bell argued that this administration would never never bypassed “due diligence” to fast track work permits in such a blanket fashion. 

He argued: “I would submit that the problem of Immigration is an age-old problem. We all know that we have our challenges or concerns, but in the face of all of this, we have had the former administration pass the Commercial Enterprises Act in 2017, which mandated that 14 days after the date of an application to work, a permit will be issued regardless of due diligence.

“I know having sat in the chair now, as the minister of immigration, that it is almost an impossibility for an application to be submitted today and, within 14 days, that the Immigration Department would have done its due diligence. It is impossible.

“It has always been the policy of the Government, collectively, but it has always been a policy of Immigration and, certainly, this government, that when a person applies for a work permit we have to ensure that they have a medical record, we have to make sure they have a police record,” Mr Bell continued.

“We have to ensure that a labour certificate is issued, we have to make sure that the documents issued are not fraudulent. We have to check with the country from which the individual came. How could that possibly take two weeks to do?” 

Thus the Commercial Enterprises Act “has to be repealed”, Mr Bell asserted, adding that he is in talks with the Attorney General’s Office to achieve this. He did not give a timeline for its repeal, whether the Act will be replaced or when this is likely to make it to Parliament.

“It is again before the Office of the Attorney General. What I will tell the Bahamian public is, as minister of labour and immigration, I will not be following this particular thing and that there will be due diligence under this administration in respect of all of the applications,” Mr Bell said. 

Responding to questions about what he believes is an appropriate time for work permits to be processed and approved, the minister replied: “In my estimation, I would say between six and 12 weeks. But even then, even now, have regard that the Government of The Bahamas issues approximately 15,000 work permits per year and, from all indications, that is the approvals and not the applications, which are being made every year.

“The Department goes through approximately 30,000 applications per year. So, when a person applies for a work permit, when they present all of the requisite documents etc… you have to do due diligence for all of those applications, and so a significant number of those applications I, in fact, refused. So I can assure the people that it isn’t as though it’s a carte blanche. Overall, you make the application, it is [vetted] and it is approved.”

Michael Pintard, the Opposition’s leader, who yesterday defended the intent behind the former administration’s passage of the Commercial Enterprises Act (see other article on Page 20), argued that Mr Bell “should not confuse” this specific matter with “broader Immigration issues in the country”.

“He should be ensuring there is efficiency in the system and that we are not frustrating opportunities for Bahamians,” he said of the minister, “and that we define the terms of entry for persons wanting to establish businesses in The Bahamas. 

“We must define the terms they come in on so that Bahamians are consistently at the front of the line to benefit the most from their country, but those investors who cast their lot with us long-term we get to define the rules and how we integrate them into the system and society. We need to be careful that, in protecting Bahamians, we are not feeding xenophobia.”

The process contained in the Commercial Enterprises Act allows senior foreign management and key personnel to enter the Bahamas and establish physical businesses - but only in the targeted industries identified by the legislation - without first possessing a work permit.

Such a permit must be applied for within 30 days of their entry, and the Bill mandates the Director of Immigration to make a decision on approval within 14 days of receiving the application. Should the Director not respond within that timeframe, the work permit is “automatically deemed to have been granted”.

Work permits issued under the Bill’s provisions were to be for a three-year period, and are renewable for the same duration. They can only be revoked on grounds of “public safety, public morality or national security”, but it is unclear how widely the Commercial Enterprises Act has been used to assist business and investment given the prolonged interruption caused by COVID-19.

The Act was designed to enable a ‘specified commercial enterprise’ to obtain an Investments Board certificate, granting it a specific number of work permits for certain positions. A special unit within the Investments Board, called the Commercial Enterprises Facilitation Unit, was to be created to oversee this process.

The ‘certificate’, which was to be initially issued for one year and can be renewed, would allow key personnel to set up the company’s physical operations in the Bahamas before they obtained a work permit. The legislation was thus designed to bring certainty and predictability to the work permit approval process, something often cited as a major impediment to the smooth conduct of commerce in the Bahamas.

The Act is targeted at industries that are foreign exchange earners, and which were cited by the Minnis administration as part of its economic growth and diversification strategy. Financial services led the way with reinsurance; captive insurance; investment fund administration; arbitration; wealth management; international trade and international arbitrage included in the ‘fast track’ work permit sectors.

Also listed in the Bill were technology-related industries such as computer programming; software design and writing; bioninformatics and analytics; nano technology; and biomedical health facilities. Other sectors included boutique health facilities; data storage and warehousing; aviation registration and ‘approved’ aviation maintenance operations; call centres and manufacturing and assembly/logistics businesses.