Shadow Minister for Immigration, Shawn Astwood has released the following to RTC on Immigration.
It is really disheartening to see the approach that we seem as a country to be taking towards Immigration. A few months ago in the House of Assembly we were told by the Minister of Border Control that a draft Bill was with the Attorney General’s Chambers. Since then the country has seen the Minister announcing bits of new policies that he and his Government intends to implement and now also having to defend its position regarding an alleged proposal from a Private Sector Organisation.
Whilst the Premier and his Cabinet are the leaders on policy design, there are rules that govern us which states that all major Policy must be announced in the House of Assembly first and also that there must be a consultation with the people of these Islands. Over the past 9 years, this country has been talking Immigration Reform and we believe that there must be some action in this area. The current Minister was the Chairman of the Blue Ribbon Commission on Immigration and subsequently the Change Manager. He is now the Minister and the responsibility yet again falls on him to bring a law and policies to this country that we can dialogue on and agree.
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