Discussions on the Cayman Islands’ new compact with the United Kingdom will be high priority in the new year and will come with widespread consultations within the community.
Governor Jane Owen, speaking on the plans ahead for the country, said, while it is still “early days”, she has had discussion on the new agreement with Premier Juliana O’Connor-Connolly.
“I think we’re both clear that we would like to start talking about the compact pretty early on, so we’re definitely up for a discussion about it. I think it will be an opportunity for us to think about how can we make this relationship as substantive and secure and useful for the future,” Owen said when she appeared on Wednesday’s episode of the Cayman Compass talkshow ‘The Resh Hour’.
She said the aim is to cover all of the areas that have come through in a new joint declaration that was recently signed between the UK and its overseas territories at the close of the Joint Ministerial Council in London in November.
Cayman’s UK representative Tasha Ebanks-Garcia represented the island at the meeting as local leaders were engaged in transitioning from the PACT administration to the United People’s Movement government.
Premier O’Connor-Connolly has since signed the declaration, as have other British overseas leaders.
Owen said the declaration covers areas including a stronger global family, empowering Territory governments and sustainable development.
However, she said, it is also for Cayman and the UK to add anything else they want included in the compact outside of the joint declaration topics that were agreed to at the JMC meeting.
She said it will not be a quick exercise at all.
“I think it may take obviously a little while to negotiate the compact. It’s quite right and we should take our time and we should do some proper consultation. I should be enjoying having some discussions, hopefully in the future, over the coming months… to understand what is important to our population here in Cayman,” Owen said.
When asked if the removal of the governor’s reserve power, which is listed in the Constitution under Section 81, will form part of the discussion, Owen said, “I think everything is on the table.”
Cayman, back in 2019, sought and received approval from the UK to remove the section during review of its Constitution.
However, this was withdrawn after legislators, in 2020, voted down the Domestic Partnership Bill, which aimed to provide a legal status for same-sex unions in Cayman.
Using Section 81 of the Constitution, then-Governor Martyn Roper was able to enact the Domestic Partnership Law, which was renamed the Civil Partnership Law, and amend 11 accompanying pieces of legislation to bring it in line with legal framework formalising same-sex relationships.
Owen, speaking to the reserve powers, said she did not know how that discussion would go.
The whole relationship with the UK and Cayman, she said, is a balance, and “it is kind of a balance of the obligations and the responsibilities”.
“I think we have to be a bit careful about not deconstructing it to such an extent that then you start to think about what does this relationship mean… for both sides? It would be a very, very big question if you were going to do that, because that would speak very much to the UK’s obligations and responsibilities,” she said.
However, she said, there’s certainly no reason why Cayman cannot have that conversation.
Owen said having the UK continuing to give support to the Cayman Islands during crises and hurricane season will be important.
“It’s really important that we can to work together on security,” she said, adding that Cayman’s law enforcement agencies have benefitted from training for Royal Engineers from the British Defence Forces.
“I think there’s a lot of value that can be had from having that relationship,” she said.
The environment also remains an agenda item for discussion, she said.
“We’ve just come out of the big COP climate UN meeting,” she said. “How we can work on that successfully so that we have a balanced approach which takes into account what Cayman wants to do with its economy and its development, but making sure we do that in the right way. I think there’s an awful lot of things we can talk about.”
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The only type of reserve powers that the Governors’ possibly should have some ‘restrictions’ (not removal of any kind from) should be some cirtain reserve powers such as, local Civil and Civil Courts matters in our own jurisdiction only. E.g., Civil Partnership and certain business engagement policies, e.g., Grocery Stores open full hours on Sundays, or new holidays. This would be simply to ensure the continued balance of the Cayman Islands with the UK, and so that politicians can not then go and use issues such as forced Civil Partnership to make a case for independence from the UK. Whatever we the people of the Cayman Islands can do to ensure politicians here have no claim or can raise any case or reasoning for a referendum for so-called independence from the UK as a B.O.T. we should support be supporting it. We are already independent, autonomous, prosperous, powerful and the most populous B.O.T. on the planet. To be any more independent of this would only make the people of the Cayman Islands do a 360° turn becoming completely dependent on just our own MPs as the be all and end all; and is exactly what we should be amending policies to avoid.