After some concerns expressed particularly by the Elected Member for Road North, the Hon. Edison Baird, in connection with the parent Proceeds of Crime Bill, recently passed in the Anguilla House of Assembly, an amending measure, which has come closely on its heels, was passed on Tuesday, September 22.

Hon. Attorney General, Wilhelm Bourne, speaking on Amendment Bill

Mr. Baird, who sustained injuries in a traffic accident early in June this year, was not present when the then controversial principal Proceeds of Crime Bill was eventually debated and passed in the House. Before this, the Bill was the subject of much criticism and its provisions were widely discussed at meetings involving the Attorney General’s Chambers, the Anguilla Bar Association, the Anguilla Financial Services Association and the Anguilla Christian Council. As a result, many amendments were made to the draft legislation which then facilitated its passage in the House.

Mr. Baird called for the postponement of the amending Bill to allow him time to speak on the Proceeds of Crime Act. He was supported by the Hon. Hubert Hughes, an ardent critic of the legislation. Mr. Baird said there were several matters he wished to address in response to concerns which still lingered in the minds of a number of persons who had approached him. Both the Attorney General and the Chief Minister were sympathetic with Mr. Baird who was not able to be present in the House to speak on the Proceeds of Crime Bill. They assured him that there was substantial agreement among the parties who had discussed and amended the legislation and that that stage had already been passed.

The Attorney General told the House that since the passage of the Bill, two evaluators from the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force had visited Anguilla and held several meetings with Government officials and various business persons across the island to discuss the provisions of the legislation. “As a result of all those discussions and meetings, it became clear that we would not be achieving the compliance that we were trying to seek if we left the legislation which was recently passed, the way it was,” Mr. Bourne explained. “And so it was a question of listening to the evaluators and then drafting into law provisions which would satisfy them as evaluators. This is because in the final analysis they have to write the report which will come down [to Anguilla] on the 2nd of October. In order to get within the time frame for that report, we have to get this [amending] legislation passed. Our absolute [deadline date] would be the end of September.”

Hon. Hubert Hughes and Hon. Edison Baird

He pointed out that there were a number of amendments to clauses 1-12 of the principal Act. Among them was as an amendment with respect to the definition of “terrorist financing” which the evaulator thought was unclear. Another matter, which called for clarification and amendment, in the public interest, was in relation to what property the legislation was speaking about in terms of confiscation or forfeiture orders. A further amendment had to do with the definition of “tainted property” taking into account a case where the owner made his property available to someone else but does not himself engage in unlawful conduct.
The Attorney General said this was a matter of much public concern. “The Act is concerned with the proceeds of criminal conduct. If a property owner is using his property for criminal conduct, or allowing it to be used for criminal conduct, that is a different thing,” he explained. “I don’t think anyone in Anguilla would want to condone that. It is not aimed at neither can it connect with, an innocent owner who is not complicit with, or condoning, any crime. It is not designed for that person. It is about criminal conduct.”

The amendments to the other sections of the Act were of a general and consequential nature. The amendment to section 12 was to bring the Risk (Amendment) Act into force with retroactive effect to the date of its parent Act.

“When we examine the objects and reasons behind this amending Bill, Mr. Speaker, I respectfully submit that there is nothing in here that causes the public any concern,” the Attorney General concluded.

When the vote was eventually taken, the Government’s side of the House came out in full support of the Bill while Opposition Members, Hubert Hughes and Edison Baird, remained silent, but showing no rancor.

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