I spoke yesterday on life being full of disappointments and I am afraid I have to continue today on the same theme.

This again is a subject I have raised before.

Permanent residency.

It is a disgrace.

When you see the highly respected Tony Travers speaking on the same platform as our Leader of the Opposition, McKeeva Bush about the present immigration policy, one can only feel our government has really lost its way.

With no Permanent Residency grants executed by the Progressives since they came to power (except by appeals to the court) and a blasting given to them by the Chief Justice over the present system they installed, I am at a loss why they haven’t done anything to put this political bomb into the sea.

After the blast from the Chief Justice, Premier Alden McLaughlin said he was immediately looking into the matter. He did. Over a year ago. He obtained the services of Attorney David Rich who at great expense to the country prepared very quickly a review of the whole Immigration system.

This report has never seen the light of day to the public and we have been informed it will unlikely be made public. Legal reasons was the reason given.

That would have been OK if we had seen something happen. It hasn’t.

And now we learn of another disgraceful case involving a former staffer of the Cayman Islands governor’s office, Rhonda Wolfe, who has been waiting for SEVEN years for her appeal to be heard. Her application for permanent residence – the right to remain in Cayman for the rest of her life – was denied in January 2009. The reason for the denial, we understand, was never given to her.

In the initial application she had to reach 100 points but managed to get 98 although being Irish she should have been awarded an additional 20 points. This wasn’t applied because this award is discretionary! With no transparency.

The only word to describe this is APPALLING!!

Ms. Wolfe has been residing here for fifteen years and finally the Immigration Tribunal gave her 129 points and she now has her status.

There are more than 750 applications pending.

The government has proved that their wheels can turn quickly. They should stoke up the boiler and get the train running on the rails at express speed and get rid of this blot on our landscape. Before the bomb explodes in their faces.