In an extended session, the Legislative Assembly, in a straight 8-1 party-line vote, approved a two-year suspension of Cayman’s notorious “rollover” policy, clearing the path for full immigration reform.

After only a modest debate involving Premier McKeeva Bush, opposition leader Alden McLaughlin and North Side independent Ezzard Miller, the vote on the crucial second of three readings of the Immigration [Ammended] Bill came about 5:30pm on Friday.

In the absence of Deputy Premier and Minister of District Administration and Works Juliana O’Connor-Connolly, Mr Bush and his United Democratic Party (UDP) unanimously approved the Immigration Amendment Bill, already passed last Tuesday by the Governor-in-Cabinet.

Mr McLaughlin abstained, while his People’s Progressive Movement partner, East End’s Arden Mclean, voted against the proposal. Kurt Tibbetts, Anthony Eden and Moses Kirkconnell were absent the entire day, while Mr Miller, recognising the futility of his opposition, left the floor before the vote.

Mr Miller initially opposed suspending House rules to enable bringing the Bill to the floor, citing constitutional provisions for a 21-day notice before considering a law.

“I received it last night,” he told legislators on Friday, before speaking against the legislation, saying he was “still to be convinced of its urgency.”

“This goes far beyond a simple suspension of the rollover. It introduces a Term Limit Extension Permit and a 10-year Permit” for senior managers and high-profile companies in a category “to be named by the Cabinet at a future date.”

The most disturbing aspect of the amendment, he said, was the “lack of hope” for tertiary-educated young Caymanians “who come back here with professional degrees and they can’t get an interview”.

Not only would the suspension keep foreigners in place, limiting indigenous employment, Mr Miller said, but he predicted “by the 2017 elections we will have a second generation of non-Caymanian nationals sitting here because they will have a sufficient group of their own nationals to elect them. They can take over our country politically. That is what is happening.”

Mr McLaughlin, after denouncing the “indecent haste” of the UDP’s presentation of the Bill, argued it “would make a bad matter worse”.

“This is one of the most irresponsible approaches to a national policy matter I have seen in my 11 years in this House,” he said, accusing Mr Bush of bowing to expediency for political advantage.

“The suspension is for two years?” he asked, predicting legal chaos at the end of the period. “But this administration has less than two years to run, so they are saying, in effect, ‘listen folks, we will not have to deal with all that. Someone else will, but we don’t have to worry for
two years’.”

He declared the rollover and key-employee policies “inadequate”, but said it could be remedied by replacing both with an eight-year work permit that would allow holders to apply for permanent residence.

“That would make it much easier to draft legislation,” he said. “If the government had the courage to deal with the problem comprehensively, it could be done in six weeks to
two months.”

In his short rebuttal, Mr Bush said Cayman’s troubled economy could not sustain the departure of as many as 5,000 expatriates in the next 18 months, and accused his opponents of knee-jerk hostility.

“They try to poison and kill any impetus the government may have to get a better economy,” he said. “The PPM fiddled while Cayman burned. Every change we have made in this Bill and other legislation adds to a better island,” he said.

“I say we give the [17-member review] committee the two years. Businesses welcome this. It creates certainty and will really work. We are all elected to safeguard Caymanians so they are not taken advantage of.

“People are listening, they understand. People are feeling the pinch, they can’t pay, they can’t borrow, they can’t purchase and they can’t do business. We are looking for a more streamlined immigration policy,” Mr Bush said.