The people of the Turks and Caicos Islands will soon no longer have to bear the costs of the US$7million per year corruption investigation by Helen Garlick and her Special Investigations and Prosecutions (SIPT) team and the Civil Recovery Unit (CRU).
That’s because the United Kingdom (UK) Government is in the process of refunding the Turks and Caicos Islands Government for all of the costs associated with the SIPT and the CRU so far, in addition to paying for all of the future expenses of the SIPT and CRU, which, combined, are in the range of close to one million dollars each month.
On February 9, 2011, in the House of Commons, Andrew Rosindell asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much funding his Department has contributed to the Turks and Caicos Special Investigation and Prosecution Team since its creation.
Mr Bellingham replied: “The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) covered the initial costs of the Turks and Caicos Special Investigation and Prosecution Team (SIPT). These were approximately £660,000 in the financial year ending March 2010. Since then, the FCO has continued to pay the accommodation costs for the SIPT office in London. From April 2010 to end of January 2011, the cost was approximately £104,000. We are considering whether we can provide further support.”
It was revealed that the initial costs of setting up the SIPT have been met by the FCO. This amounted to a total spend of approximately £435,000 to the end of January 2010 (including the fees of the five-strong senior management team, one researcher, the rental costs of offices and associated IT, and telephone and travel costs).
It was stated that the FCO “stretched the limited resources” of the Overseas Territories Programme Fund to cover the cost of the core team until 10 February 2010 and agreed to provide an additional £36,000 to allow Ms Garlick to begin to recruit the core intelligence and research unit and to rent more UK office space.
With regard to the longer-term funding of the SIPT, the Special Prosecutor noted that she signed her contract on the basis of a “distinct understanding” that while the UK Government “would not fund the investigation indefinitely, the most probable outcome would be that it would advance a loan to TCIG”. In her letter to Ministers of 24 November, Ms Garlick commented that:
“In October I learned first, that the UK Government would neither make a loan, nor guarantee a separate line of credit agreed by the TCIG. In the absence of any support from HMG, the only option open to TCIG was to negotiate one or more facilities backed by hypothecation of an identified stream of income. […] If it is agreed, the facility will be syndicated. I am informed that the facility is close to being agreed and that funds are expected to be in place by early January. In the meantime our initial two-month contracts have been extended to 10 February 2010 and we are being funded by the FCO. As from that date, we will be a charge on the budget of TCIG.”
The FAC report noted that Garlick expressed concern at the consequences of her investigation becoming a burden on the budget of the Islands Government.
