The following is the “spine” of an interview given on Heartbeat Radio by Dame Bernice Lake, QC.

They can only set free men free…
And there is no need of that………
Free men set themselves free.
- James Oppenheim, The Slave

The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.. JFK.

Dame Bernice Lake, QC

In recent times voices are rising in Anguilla. Voices of discontent with the draft Labour Code and the Physical Planning Act 2005, and the demand for a people’s proper say in a true participatory democracy Amid those voices the calls for vigilance have become the buzz word of Anguilla.

It is to that buzz that the Minister of Finance was responding in his usurpative address to the nation on the 13th October,2005.

That address was an abusive and vitriolic attempt by the Minister to undermine the self-confidence of the people in their expression of dissent, an attempt to set them back in their assertion of their right to a voice in the decision-making process in a truly participatory democracy which Anguilla is supposed to enjoy. It is an attempt to halt and put back to slumber and sleep that Great Awakening of Vigilance which is taking place in Anguilla to-day.

The first method which the Minister uses is one of abuse and denigration of the people’s efforts at self-expression and assertion. He wraps up and discards the people’s view on the legislation under consideration as mere “ chatter’
…”…… It would appear from the current chatter that the objectives and purposes of the Bill are being coloured by interpretations totally different to those of policy makers in Government.”

What is ‘Chatter?’ The Oxford dictionary tells you that it is a derogatory or disrespectful expression - The utterance of inarticulate, speech- like sounds.- In short it is the language of the apes and monkeys.

And that is the Minister’s description of the Anguillians expression of their demand for participation in the laws and policies which govern them. He looks upon the people with contempt. – Chatter like monkeys.

The second method by which the Minister hopes to blunt and halt the people’s march for freedom is to vilify and demean the integrity and good-faith of the local lawyers as the mentors of the people’s quest for self-expression He ascribes to those persons a dishonest intention and design to use the people to further their own personal causes -
.’So I cannot help but be cynical as to the motives of some of the leaders of this protest. It is interesting to note that most of them have land related issues with the Government and People of Anguilla. Some of them have active cases in Court – others have disputes about Government decisions on planning matters. These include reluctance to contribute land for infrasteructure development, rejections for planning permission, squatting on Government property, objection to government policy decisions on specific projects and general opposition th this newly elected Government.’
By this scurrilous attack upon the good-faith of the lawyers the Minister hopes to behead the leadership of the people’s new awakening and send them back to sleep. It is an insult to the intelligence of the people of Anguilla in that he declares them incapable of understanding for themselves what the legislation states and implies.

In face of the clarion call made by Teacher Vivien Vanterpool for the people to be extremely vigilant it is instructive to trace historically the vigilance of some of those lawyers which was exhibited by them in Anguilla long before they came into conflict in 2004 with the Government on the issue of their assertion of their fundamental rights to the enjoyment of their property.

That historical trace will disclose that the Minister of Finance has always been out of joint and at odds with the true spirit and integrity of the people of Anguilla.

LAND BANK.

1. The 1994 Manifesto of the ADP. Land Bank.
Draft National Land Use Plan
2000 Manifesto of the Front
Physical Planning Bill

A corrosive thread runs throughout the Land Bank, the Draft National Land Use Plan down to the Physical Planning Act 2005. It is a scheme and design by which Government would seek to acquire from private ownership lands for which the government of Anguilla has no immediate need, and therefore no immediate public purpose. It is a scheme to deprive owners of land, be they large or small, of the use and enjoyment of their land and place that land under the control of a government agency as a land banker.

What is more the proposal was that the land should be acquired at less than the fair market value. Just as the banker is enriched by the deposit of your money so the government was to be enriched by the acquisition and deposit of the land.

Motivated since 1994 by the harm which the Land Bank in any guise would bring to the people of Anguilla,It was my vigilance in going to the people about the matter both in print and in radio interviews which halted the implementation of the ADP’s Land Bank and the Draft National Land Use Plan.
My comments on the Draft National Land Use Plan dated 23rd August,1995 have been deposited in the Library and should be available for review In that commentary on the unconstitutionality and de-democratisation of Anguilla I urged
“But the object of the optimum use (of land) is the development of Man The universal rights and fundamental freedoms of the individual should not fall in that quest. Democracy should not be put upon that alter of sacrifice.
Let us be educated to give up some of our rights for matters of regulation and zoning if necessary; but let us keep the constitutional safe-guards which would vitiate our democratic society, and denude us of the universal rights enjoyed by mankind.
One last word of caution. Zoning an a tourist axis of the two extremities speaks of ghetto zoning. It has been expressed that Anguilla should not become another St. Martin. The proposed tourism zoning plans will clearly establish another Bermuda.
In conclusion, the D.N.L.U..P needs considerable further in-depth evaluation and refinement to meet the constitutional, democratic and social challenges as well as the economic goals.”

At that time I had no issues concerning land with the government. But out of a genuine concern for the protection of fundamental rights, and indeed all rights, I acted for the people with vigilance.. That was since 1995

It was vigilance which made the people aware in 2000 that the Land Bank had re-surfaced as a part of the UNITED FRONT’s Manifesto.
It is significant that the Physical Planning Bill surfaced in 2001. but could not be carried forward.

2. Nov. 1996 - January, 1997. RIFKIN LETTER
Anguillians should remember the furore surrounding the Rifkin Proposal to divest powers constitutionally enjoyed by the elected members of government and deposit those powers in the hands of the Governor.
Indeed, it was as a mark of protest that the then Mr.Don. Mitchell now Justice Mitchell, C.B.E. Q.C, wrote to the Commissioner of Police advising him that until the Rifkin Letter was with-drawn he would daily walk to Government House and place a half-inch stone in front of the Governor’s gate.
It was vigilance which caused me to write a paper entitled “An Appraisal of the Proposed Constitutional Re-arrangement Contained in the letter from the Secretary of State dated 17th September, 1996.”
That criticism of the Rifkin Letter was aired on radio and discussed with the Anguillian public and a copy deposited in the public library. As a consequence I was specially invited to attend a full session of the United Nations Committee of 24 to read and deposit that paper so that it, together with the Rifkin Letter, would form part of the record on colonialism.

The formal divesting of the powers has not as yet been implemented. Vigilance dulled the initiative.

3. LAKE & KENTISH’S APPEALS FOR STATUTORY PROTECTION OF WORKERS.
The law firm of Lake & Kentish has long been in the vanguard advocating the recognition and protection of the rights of the workers of Anguilla in an age when workers enjoy fundamental rights and their protection.
Out of vigilance we have supplied copies of the most detailed and effective Labour Code in the region to the Labour Department. We have made time available to the department both in correspondence and consultation to advance rights of workers and their enforcement.

That is vigilance without the motivation of a personal cause.

4. JUSTICE SENTRY
Anguillians will recall that pamphlet through which we kept watch over what was right or wrong , just or unjust in Anguilla.
You will recall how that came about.
The issue of the establishment of a Lottery in Anguilla was a most divisive one. Incidentally, just as the Minister of Finance is now the prime spokes –person in government in favour of the Physical Planning Bill, so too, he was the prime-person in government in favour of the Lottery.
His support of the Lottery lead to your denial of the right to freedom of expression over the government owned radio station and the Talk Your Mind Programme.

Vigilance moved us both to contest the denial of that right and to establish the pamphlet of Justice Sentry Indeed Justice Sentry is deposited in the Law Library of the University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus.
In it we stated on 18th November, 1997 –
“In order to give an administration the best shot at being a responsible administration it is the people’s duty resolutely to ensure that the administration observes the rules
An informed and alert public is a SECURE and RESPONSIBLE
Community
The citizens need regularly to exercise their capacity to learn the Rules of Government in order to attain the Ability of mind and strength of character to keep Governments in control.

Justice Sentry is committed to that CALL – the motivation of an ALERT and RESPONSIVE community.”

Among the many matters which we discussed with the people in Justice Sentry are:
a) The Debate on the Lottery
b) The Management of the Social Security Fund and the rights of the contributors to have a say as share-holders of the fund
c) The qualifications for Governorship of Anguilla
d) Abuse of Women and the Protection of children
e) Privatisation of ANGLEC
f) The Transhipment Money
g) The Implications of British Citizenship
h) Save The Nation Save The Children
i) The Talk Your Mind Case
When I was sharing the watch on these vital matters I had no personal issues with the Government save the denial of my right to freedom of expression.

Thanks to that vigilance that right to freedom of expression has been assured and radio stations and talk-shows have mushroomed in Anguilla and Anguilla is now connected by radio with the world at large.

5. CRIMINAL CODE & 2000 LEGISLATION

Time and again, reference has been made to the role of the Anguilla Bar Association in critiquing that spate of legislation and asserting the fundamental rights of Anguillians. We all know that that legislation was passed into law even while we were addressing the people on the several braches of their constitutional rights effected by those legislative provisions.

Even after the passage of the legislation I still continued in my discussions with Mr. Allan Jones about the unconstitutionality of the Financial Services legislation. Indeed the Financial Serves by letter gave an undertaking that within a six month period the government would seek to set up an independent financial services tribunal and so bring the tribunal in line with internationally required standards.
That is vigilance without personal motivation.

7. Citizenship Bill
It was the same group of lawyers who took the implications of the Citizenship Bill on the road and endeavoured to explain to the people how it would fit into the Treaty of Rome; we specifically warned that by and through that bill we would be subsumed into Europe and faced with reciprocity.

The government sat idly by; the people became comforted by Governor Johnstone’s assurance that that was not so. But where are we to-day with respect to European passports and our time-honoured access to St. Martin? The Citizenship legislation has effected all the disadvantages of which we foretold.

That was vigilance without being engaged in personal conflict.

It is significant that the Minister of Finance has always been centre-stage whenever there has been an assault upon the people’s rights. –Indeed the current debacle concerning the Physical Planning Bill is very reminiscent of the division and debacle in the Hubert Hughes administration surrounding the Lottery and the role of the Church and its views.

The people of Anguilla are no fools and they will judge the good-faith of VIGILANCE.

RELUCTANCE TO CONTRIBUTE LAND FOR INFRASTRUCTURAL DEVELOPMENT.

This is not a criticism which the Minister could with honesty and from an informed position lay at my feet.

A) He only had to ask the Hon. Eric Reid if we did not make a contribution of land, free of cost, for making a safe and danger-free road to Mead’s Bay and for the facilitation of the Malouahana Hotel.
B) Again he only had to ask the Hon Eric Reid if we did not make a contribution in land, free of cost, for opening an access road at Hughes Estate leading from the turn-off opposite Anguilla Trading in South Hill
C) He only had to ask Mr. Vincent Proctor if we did not make a substantial contribution in land, free of cost, for an access road at the Farrington to Long Pond. The rub is that some in Planning wanted us to contribute more than we had agreed and wrongfully entered an extended road on the filed plan which, upon discovery of it, they had to remove.
D) He only had to ask Mr. Fritz Smith if we were not willing to make a contribution for the improvement of the road to the Forest Bay. He knows what honestly went down.
E) He only had to ask Mr. Frankie Connor if we were not willing to make available the four acres of land for the Airport Expansion as was required by the Wallblake Airport Study for the facility of the new ATR 72 which was to be introduced by American Eagle.
WHAT we were not willing to permit is the arrogant acquisition of some 33 acres later reduced to 26 acres of land the use of which was not recommended by the Wallblake Airport Study
WALLBLAKE AIRPORT Study
Anguillians should understand that the Wallblake Airport Study clearly detailed what options were recommended for the expansion of the airport. Each option detailed what amount of land would need to be acquired. Option One (1) the recommended option detailed a requirement of no more than four acres of land from the Forest Estate.
There was never an unwillingness on the part of the owner to make that contribution.
It happened that with the introduction of Flag Luxury PROPERTIES which wished to cater to its jet travelling clientele the promoters of the airport expansion decided that they would require 33 acres of land to facilitate the jet parking services and facility to accommodate that clientele. That jet service and facility was never part of the airport study, nor was its feasibility ever evaluated, nor was it subject to an environmental impact assessment study. What is more the Attorney General expressed the view that the land had but little value.
The right of government to compulsorily acquire the land for an existing public purpose such as the expansion of the airport was never questioned by us. What was challenged was the constitutional method of acquisition and the constitutional compensation which had to be paid in order to satisfy the jet travelling clientele

EXHORTATION

Anguillians should not allow the ill-chosen and contemptuous remarks of the Minister of Finance to take them off message
The Message is that the Bill for the Physical Planning Act 2005 is a means of compulsory dispossession of privately owned land without there being any immediate public use or purpose for that land
As such the P:PA 2005 is the implementation of the 1995 Draft National Land Use Plan which has as its corner-stone the creation of Development Plans and the establishment of Land-Banking as its basic premise.

For those in doubt that this is so I refer them first to page 116 of the Draft National Land Use Plan which, after making reference to the Development Plans and what they should contain, stipulates
‘The Land Acquisition (Amendment) Ordinance 1967 must facilitate the acquisition of land for public purposes; to ensure the protection/conservation of environmentally .sensitive land; and in the interest of optimising the use of scarce land resources. The value at which the Crown is required to acquire land should not therefore be prohibitively high even while trying to ensure that land owners are adequately compensated for their loss. It is also necessary that the Land Acquisition Ordinance facilitates creation of a public Land Bank. This would allow the GOA to acquire and hold land in order to be able to carry out development projects in the future”

At page 119 the Draft National Land Use Plan has this to say at paragraph 10.5 :

‘Land-Banking
Ninety-five percent (95%) of land in Anguilla is privately held in small parcels. While this situation may be highly desirable, it nevertheless presents serious constraints to rational land use planning and comprehensive development. Land assembly involves numerous individual owners and can be both expensive and time consuming. Similarly, attempts to ensure that adequate amounts of land are available in the most suitable locations to ensure timely provision of physical and social infrastructure are often frustrated by having to negotiate with multiple land owners.

Comprehensive land use planning, service provision, and environmental management often require public sector access to fairly large and contiguous tracts of land. To facilitate this, the Plan recommends that the Government of Anguilla adopts the practice of land banking – acquiring land at existing use value when prices are relatively low in order to carry out development projects in the future when land prices may have increased to a level which makes acquisition more expensive at that time. The Plan further recommends that at all times the Government of Anguilla should seek to secure that the amount of land acquired always exceeds the amount disposed of, so building a stock of land which is adequate to facilitate future development and to use as equity in development partnerships with the private sector.”
What is clear from those quotation are the following:
1) The Physical Planning Act 2005 will draw into its drag-net of Development Plans land held in small holdings as well as land held in large holdings. Indeed the Plan targets that 95% of land in Anguilla which is held in small parcels.
2) The corner-stone of the Development Plan of the Act is Land-Banking
3) By the Physical Planning Act 2005 the Land owner must be deprived of the opportunity of rising values of the market.- GOA must acquire land at existing use value when prices are relatively low in order to carry out development projects in the future when land prices may have increased to a level which makes acquisition more expensive at that time.
4.. Government is to become the speculator of land unconmstitutionally acquired from the private owner. The Plan further recommends that at all times the Government of Anguilla should seek to secure that the amount of land acquired always exceeds the amount disposed of, so building a stock of land which is adequate to facilitate future development and to use as equity in development partnerships with the private sector.”
So Government acquires your land at low prices, holds it in the bank and at the appropriate time in the future when prices are up, government can then use the land which you once owned as its share in joint venture agreements with investors in the private sector.

5. Focus upon the provisions of sections 9 (5) and 15 (2) of the Physical Planning Act 2005 is instructive. 9 (5) states:
“Where any land is designated in a development plan made under this Part as a comprehensive planning area, the land or part of the land may be purchased compulsorily by the Crown in accordance with the Land Acquisition Act as being land required for public purposes within the meaning of that Act.”
The effect of that provision is that the mere creation of a development plan constitutes a public purpose for the compulsory acquisition of land. In accordance with the Draft National Land Use Plan the 95% of land held in small parcels can thereby be targeted for acquisition by the Crown.

Section 15 (2) provides:
“When a development plan has been approved –
(a) it shall be the principal reason for the compulsory acquisition of land designated in that approved development plan as a comprehensive planning area;
(b) the Board shall, in considering any application for development permission, give principal consideration to, and be guided by the plan.”

6. The end result is that the target upon the 95% of small parcels of land in Anguilla is once more in the cross-hairs of government’s planning policy. It is right to apprise the international and regional media that the land-banking policy of the ADP under the Minister of Finance has been resurrected through the policies of the United Front. The policies of the Draft National Land Use Plan coincide with and are reflected in the Physical Planning Act 2005.

7. When the Minister of Finance says that the Government will not establish Land- Banking he does not understand the import of the connections between the Development Plans of the Physical Planning Bill and the policy as framed in the Draft National Land Use Plan, or he is not comfortable with the truth.

It is no wonder that Teacher Artwin Vanterpool has exhorted Anguillians to be very vigilant

An informed and alert public is a SECURE and RESPONSIBLE
Community
The citizens must not be deterred in the exercise of their fundamental rights to freedom of expression and of assembly in a firm and responsible way; they need to be strong and articulate their right to take part in the decision making process. They must demonstrate the Ability of mind and strength of character to keep Governments in control.

“The price of Freedom is eternal vigilance.”

17th October, 2005
DAME BERNICE V. LAKE Q.C

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