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The Editor speaks: No hiding place

“No Hiding Place“ was a British television series that was produced at Wembley Studios by Associated-Rediffusion for the ITV network between 16 September 1959 and 22 June 1967.

It starred Raymond Francis as Detective Superintendent, later Detective Chief Superintendent Tom Lockhart.

It was one of my favourite TV shows as a teenager and young adult. Even the police loved it and when there were plans to cancel the show, they and the public protested and the show continued, but only for two years.

When you want to get a rid of a show the powers that be make sure the scripts are poor and that is exactly what happened.

We now move on to July 2019, and our premier, Alden McLaughlin, has made it very plain that those who want to hide money here will find it very difficult.

He said, “Cayman does not want or need to deal with those who would seek to hide money or use it for illegitimate purposes. Our efforts in improving the effectiveness of the implementation of our world-leading legislation to protect the integrity of our financial services will mean that we can demonstrate to the world that anyone attempting to use Cayman for such illegitimate purposes will be caught and dealt with to the fullest extent possible under the law,”

The government is investing in millions of dollars, the CI kind, that will ensure we meet all the international compliance standards. To help with this the public sector will be employing over one hundred more people.

Caymanians? He didn’t say.

He is doing his best to comply with all the recommendations thrown at him by the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF).

He told the Legislative Assembly members, “We certainly understand the rationale for ensuring that not only do we as a jurisdiction have the required regulatory framework, but that we also have the mechanisms and people to ensure that the framework is effective and can be proven to be so.”

And government will be funding all this and it will not be a one off situation, McLaughlin said.

It is going to take time. The new measures will not work over night. He hoped to show there was some progress made to the CFATF Enhanced Follow Up Process in September.

McLaughlin also announced there would be a committee, which he was chairing, that would oversee the work of all the agencies involved. Also, there would be a Financial Crime Focus Group created to ensure coordination and cooperation at the operational level between law enforcement agencies.

The premier finally announced there would be even more legislation in the works in order to comply with various supra-national bodies and respond to the ever-evolving regulatory landscape.

It would seem there will definitely be no hiding place, as also being put in place, is an Anti-Money Laundering Unit at the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority. A dedicated cross-border Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Task Force within the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service is already established.

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