Overseas Territories now moved to Tory minister

| 19/05/2010

(CNS): After only two days the Overseas Territories have been moved from the responsibility of Liberal Democrat Jeremy Browne to that of Conservative Henry Bellingham who was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State on 14 May 2010. A Foreign Office spokesperson told CNS on Wednesday that portfolios are constantly under review and some adjustments had been made to the early division of responsibilities between the new FCO ministers. It will now be up to Bellingham to decide if the Cayman Islands’ Government’s three year economic plan will work and allow further borrowing to plug this year’s budget deficit.

 
Bellingham first entered Parliament in 1983 and is Member of Parliament for North West Norfolk during his political career he has been Parliamentary Private Secretary to Malcolm Rifkind as Secretary of State for Transport and for Defence and as ForeignSecretary, before losing his seat in the 1997 election. Re-elected to parliament in 2001 he became shadow Minister for Trade and Industry, then Economic Affairs, followed by Opposition Whip and Shadow Minister for Constitutional Affairs/Justice.
 
Under his new portfolio he has a number of diverse responsibilities including Africa, United Nations, Global economic issues, Climate change, Conflict resolution, Protocol, Ministerial oversight for FCO Services, FCO relations with British Business and finally as of Wednesday 19 May, Overseas Territories.
 
Bellingham lists his interests as small businesses, agriculture, defence, Northern Ireland and tourism. He is also Chairman of the Conservative Council on Eastern Europe and lists his countries of interest as the Far East and Eastern Europe.
 

 

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  1. Anonymous says:

    I hope he taxes cayman to hell then all those big heads in government and the private sector can also feel the pain of living in this country.

    • Anonymous says:

      With that attitude, your living conditions will be closer to Jamaican than Caymanian.

      All the complaining you hear, and Caymanians have one of the top 10 living standards in the world – in a place with virtually no industry or resources.

      How many countries in the world, outside of Cayman, can the average family have the following:

      – 3 bedroom house with a small yard

      – 2 TVs with cable/satellite

      – 3 cell phones + 1 landline

      – 2 cars

      – private pension account

      – a nanny/helper

      – gardeners

      – college scholarships for any students acedemically eligible

      – annual trip to Miami

      – pay no taxes

      And I could keep going…

      Not even do Americans or Brits have these priviledges.  Caymanians have a lot to lose, so be careful of what you wish for.

      • Anonymous says:

        First of all everything you just listed is not even close to what all caymanians have or will ever achieve under this high cost of living that you obviously are not experiencing!and for us becoming like Jamaica we are already on our way there,the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer=increase crime.

        • Anonymous says:

          Nobody said "all" Caymanians.  The poster said the average Caymanian family and the list is probably not comprehensive.

          Example – he/she didn’t mention computer/internet access which people obviously have – otherwise they couldn’t bellyache on CNS!

        • Anonymous says:

          And a large, large number of Caymanians have much, much more than the list above. 

          Caymanians must have the highest number of millionaires as a percentage of the population as any place in the world (or at least outside of the Middle East).

          I wonder how many of them will stick around if things get tough.  My guess is not too many.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Yay! A conservative is in charge of we. Yay! No Lib Dems with their socialism nonsense for Cayman. Yay! Of course, Bellingham will do everything to help the richest 2 percent and hurt the other 98 percent of us, but that’s okay. Yay! There is a god and he’s a Tory. Yay! Who says National Prayer Days don’t work? Yay!

     

     

    • Anonymous says:

      Thank God. This is better news than havinga Liberal in charge of us. If we never had to deal with Liberals or Democrats for the rest of eternity it would still be too soon.

  3. Certified says:

    You’ll be lucky!

    The Tory’s are manic on cutting spending to get the UK budget deficit down.

    They are likely to tell Cayman just where to shove their request to increase their deficit.

     

    • Dred says:

      "The Tory’s are manic on cutting spending to get the UK budget deficit down."

      This is not a bad thing. This is what we wanted for sometime now. Maybe they will force them to bring down expenses in other words cut civil service. What was one of his first things? Salary cuts right. Good first move.

      I could be wrong but I’m truly interested to see the approach taken here. To me the Miller Report which was not long done falls well in line with Tory mindset of cuts over new taxes. Keep in mind Mr David Shaw is a Conservatist also and he is a participant in the report which states taxes are not the right way to go.

      I’m just interested to see how they weigh out the Miller report against our present situation.

       

  4. Anonymous says:

    Thank you Jesus!!!

    Who says there is not a God!!!!!

    • A. Theist says:

      I say there is not a god.  Never seen any decent case put forward for one. 

      • Anonymous says:

        Meet me at Cayman Islands Baptist Church on Pedro Castle road at 10am on Sunday. If you still don’t believe there is a God after attending the service that lasts for just about an hour, then I will accept that you are right. One hour is all I ask? Look forward to your response! 

        • A. Theist says:

          Thank you for your kind offer.  I have visited many services of many denominations so my view is not derived from want of investigation.  I would really like to carry this discussion on a bit, but I don’t think we should hi-jack this thread . . . .

        • Been There, Done That says:

          XXXXX Been to church thanks, cost me $10 and I didn’t really enjoy it. Could have gotten a six pack for that. This week I will. I will buy it on a Saturday and keep it in my fridge for Sunday. Will I burn in hell? I’ll take the risk.

          • Anonymous says:

            I’ll buy you two six packs if you take my challenge plus refund you your ten dollars if you take my challege. Cayman Islands Baptist Church has never asked me or any visitors for a dollar. Can ask for more than that can you?

        • Anonymous says:

          I certainly will try church again. But, in return,  will you please spend an hour reading http://www.whywontgodhealamputees.com

          • David says:

            Before you can say that there isn’t a God, just let me say that you must define God first, because there are many views of who or what God is. To me, God is the source of everything, and all things is the manifestation of 
            God. So your statement can’t be address to me, because I don’t just have a christian miracle concept of God who is a fatherlike figure

            • Mudblood says:

              David,

              A good point, I think most people on CNS who defend "god" defend the "omnipotent being who wrote the bible", a bible which advocated slavery, suppression of women, capital punishment and other things associated with a "loving god".  Which most sane people would consider utterly loopy.

    • Anonymous says:

      Check out his tabled expenses at the bottom of the page. I would love to see this information for all our MLAs for the past 10 years. I think it would be rather enlightening…

      • Anonymous says:

        I actually posted the link so that people could see his voting record – this is very useful to get an idea of where a British MP stands politically.  And yes I absolutely agree about the tabled expenses.  Thats the difference between the UK and Cayman – a history of MP’s abusing the system in the past has led to significant accountability and legislation to make their financial activities more transparent ensuring that they all keep and submit detailed records of all expenses, etc. and those expenses are placed in the public domain for anyone to access. 

  5. Anonymous says:

    This Gentleman certainly has a sympathetic looking face.

    XXXXX

    I hope this is one of the things God is doing to help us with our situation.

    I just hope Mac dont run off and start insulting the gentleman before he has a chance to examine our situation.

    • Twyla Vargas says:

      Well if a face is to be judged I would say this man does have a good profile.  Anyway we cannot judge a book by its cover, because the story can run anyway, good or bad. So  Lets us have a positive hope.