Cayman Islands Premier, Alden McNee McLaughlin Jr, MBE, has warned against UK Lawmaker’s unwarranted intervention into the affairs of British Overseas Territories (OTs), which according to him, will only drive a wedge between OTs and the United Kingdom Government. Photo: Internet Source

Just recently, Virgin Islands (VI) Premier and Minister of Finance Andrew A. Fahie has called for regional solidary in fighting EU and UK outside pressures at a special Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) meeting Basseterre, Guadeloupe, that saw the formal accession of Guadeloupe to Associate Membership in the OECS. Photo: Bria Smith/GIS

Premier McLaughlin Jr, who was at the time leading a small delegation to Monaco to meet with UK officials and members of the yachting community on Wednesday, April 24, 2019, further says that by intervening in local affairs, lawmakers are devolving responsibilities of the elected governments of those territories.

No Understanding of Local Affairs

The premier in a statement to local media house, Cayman News Service said, “My message also included a note of warning of the consequences of a UK Parliament, 4,500 miles from the Cayman Islands, interfering in local matters that are not only devolved but in circumstances where they have no real understanding of local people and local affairs,” he said, adding that his trip was a success.

Further, he says, his “Continued high-level engagement with MPs and peers is essential for the Cayman Islands to maintain a presence and understanding within the Houses of Commons and Lords,” the premier stated Friday in a press release about his trip.

Only recently—via a UK Parliamentary Report—UK lawmakers have indicated the need to legalise same-sex marriages and remove belongership status in British OTs, proposing force if the policies were not accepted.

In March 2019, Virgin Islands (VI) Premier and Minister of Finance Andrew A. Fahie (R1) had called for regional solidary in fighting EU and UK pressures at a special Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) meeting in Basseterre, Guadeloupe, that saw the formal accession of Guadeloupe to Associate Membership in the OECS.

One Struggle - Hon Fahie 

According to Hon Fahie in his address, “Our struggles in this Caribbean basin have always been one and the same and it manifests itself in the modern day through our shared interest in having to defend and protect our different financial services sectors from unfair and onerous demands from a few in the United Kingdom Parliament in particular in our case; and the European Union in all of our cases.”

He says that the VI will continue to seek solidarity in standing up to a new aggressive push from outsiders, “which seems determined to issue edicts to its overseas territories in the region, without paying attention to the expressed will of the people, and ignoring our own values and customs which are deeply fashioned by both history, geography and our Faith.”