We can appreciate plans by the
Cayman Islands Department of Immigration to begin fingerprinting people coming
to our country to by employed via work permits.
But we have to ask, is it enough?
We would not be surprised to learn
that there are people who come to the Cayman Islands on a regular basis who
have criminal records.
The need to take fingerprints of
people coming into our country is not to single out any one nationality or
making coming to our shores more difficult.
It’s basically about security, and
it’s done in many other countries including the US and the UK.
Some may express concerns over the
possible infringement of human rights and the reluctance of those coming to
visit us to be fingerprinted. However, protecting life and property of people
from the threat of crime and terrorism is the basic responsibility of a
government and one of the most important elements of human rights protection.
Starting by taking fingerprints of
expatriates who want to work here is a good place to begin the exercise.
So far, plans are to keep the
fingerprints on file for seven years – the amount of time allowed under the
current rollover policy that work permit holders are allowed to remain in Cayman.
And, plans are in the works for those
at Immigration to share the fingerprint information with the police.
It’s all necessary to ensure the
safety of our borders.
As it stands now we have no method
in place to keep criminals out of our country. We have seen from time to time
that expats with criminal records have made it to our shores on work permits
and have been allowed to work. It is possible to alter police records.
It is possible to alter a person’s
appearance and to falsify passports.
Fingerprints, however, don’t
change.
We would hope that government will
consider all types of biometrics – from face recognition, DNA, palm prints and
iris recognition – when protecting our country.
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Keeping fingerprints for 7 years is absolute nonsense!
They should be kept forever in order to enhance an effective and workable comprehensive system.Guest workers and citizens and residents alike everyone living on the island should be fingerprinted. Not just guest workers.
These comments I’m about to make might not go down well with some folks but these are the facts of the matter.
The Cayman Islands is not an independent country (as yet) and are still governed by the international treaties on human rights that the United Kingdom are signatory to, whether there are people in the Cayman Islands who agree with this situation or not.
For all British citizens who have a full British passport, the biometric system is already in place, which includes the eye id, an even more accurate id than fingerprints.
This system is already used by Homeland Security(US Immigration); when a person passes through US Immigration, not only are their fingerprints checked but their eye retina is scanned at the same time.
For Caymanian citizens who only have a British Territorial passport, as far as I know, these features are not a part of the passport and Caymanian British passports, those issued in the Cayman Islands, do not meet the standards for the full British passport.
Where this situation impacts this fingerprinting measure for immigrant workers in the Cayman Islands is that it really should have been an established requirement a long time ago, not just now but….
There has been an introduction in Britain of a National ID card, which would carry every single bit of a person’s indentification on it but this is only for non-British and EU citizens.
The British population outrightly refuse to be forced to carry a national ID card because of the implications that it carries of being in a government database that can be used for all sorts of human rights abuses.
Caymanians who have no criminal record would be rightly concerned should they be forced to be fingerprinted and put in a government database, for the same reasons.
British citizens in the UK are covered and protected by the Data Protection Act that allows any government or private organization to keep a persons private information for a limited tme only and Cayman, while it does not have statutory laws, must comply with British laws on this issue, thus the 7-year limit.
This fingerprinting exercise has the potential to open a ‘Pandoras Box’ of problems for the Cayman Islands if it is not handled properly.