{"id":41638,"date":"2018-05-02T13:27:50","date_gmt":"2018-05-02T12:27:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/?p=41638"},"modified":"2018-05-02T15:45:47","modified_gmt":"2018-05-02T14:45:47","slug":"cayman-and-bermuda-havent-a-legal-leg-to-stand-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2018\/05\/02\/cayman-and-bermuda-havent-a-legal-leg-to-stand-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Cayman and Bermuda haven’t a legal leg to stand on"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is interesting. The Guardian has reported that<\/a><\/p>\n

The Cayman Islands government said it was considering legal action in an attempt to stop the UK making the overseas territory open up its company ownership registers to public scrutiny, a day after MPs agreed they should do so by the end of 2020.<\/p>\n

Alden McLaughlin, the premier of the Cayman Islands, said the territory was keeping all options on the table including a legal challenge to the amendment and accused MPs of making a decision that was \u201creminiscent of the worst injustices of a bygone era of colonial despotism\u201d.<\/p>\n

The territory was joined by Bermuda, which questioned whether the newly passed legislation was constitutional. David Burt, the premier of Bermuda, said parliament\u2019s action was a retrograde step after 50 years of \u201cconstitutionally sanctioned self-government\u201d. He added that the island territory would take necessary steps to ensure its constitution was respected.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I wonder if they have thought this through?<\/p>\n

Whose law are they going to use?<\/p>\n

Theirs?<\/p>\n

Ours?<\/p>\n

I strongly suspect ours. But that concedes ours applies. And that they are subject to it. Which pretty much brings the case to a close.<\/p>\n

And what are they going to say? That they:<\/p>\n

a) Are British territories<\/p>\n

b) Have British passports (albeit with some limitations)<\/p>\n

c) Are subject to UK\u00a0foreign policy and defence<\/p>\n

d) Are represented by the UK internationally<\/p>\n

But:<\/p>\n

e) Their internationally impactful financial services industry is not subject to UK control<\/p>\n

And<\/p>\n

f) The fact that we have to pick up the tab if anything goes wrong does not prevent them doing anything they like without us having the right to interfere?<\/p>\n

That last point is worth elaborating. In 2007 the UK National Audit Office reported that<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The UK bears the ultimate risk of potential liabilities from its overseas territories<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Nothing has changed since then.<\/p>\n

So let's summarise the Cayman and Bermuda\u00a0approach. What they want is self-government without assuming any of the risk\u00a0of doing so and what they want to deny the UK is the right to manage the risk.<\/p>\n

I think I can see which side the Supreme Court might take on this.<\/p>\n

I'd offer for nothing the one-word advice a barrister once gave one of my clients: settle.<\/p>\n

If they want two words of advice it would be settle today.<\/p>\n

Sabre rattling will not work in the face of the reality of responsibilities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is interesting. The Guardian has reported that The Cayman Islands government said it was considering legal action in an attempt to stop the UK
 Read the full article…<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77,22,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bermuda","category-cayman","category-tax-havens"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41638\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}