David Waddington Memoirs (29 page)

F
rom the moment when I had arrived in Bermuda the politicians had stressed the importance that they attached to ‘Bermudisation’, i.e. filling job vacancies with Bermudians rather than foreigners whenever that was possible. We were not doing much for that policy in Government House, with an English butler and English chef, an English Governor’s secretary, a Portuguese maid and a Filipino maid, and five Portuguese
gardeners
. Indeed it was only the scullery maid, a downstairs cleaner and the woman who did the laundry who were Bermudian. When, therefore, the butler, Michael Schubert, was due to leave at the end of his contract I was determined to get a Bermudian replacement. The post was advertised but very few applicants put in for the job. One seemed reasonably good – a sergeant in the regiment whose wife was on the regiment’s permanent staff – and Andre Nesbitt was duly recruited on a probationary basis.

It was soon clear that we had made a serious mistake. As the royal visit had drawn nearer Andre’s nerves had got the better of him, and Eddie had to take away virtually all his responsibilities and bring in people from outside to do his work. After the royals had gone I had Andre into my room and told him that he had proved completely useless during the visit and, as far as I was concerned, he could leave there and then. But foolishly I then added that if he really wanted to stay I would give him a last chance and extend
the probationary period for another six months. Andre agreed to stay on those terms. Unfortunately there was no improvement and the time came when I told him he would have to go. For that the PLP branded me a racist. I pointed out that it was hardly racist to dispense with an English butler so that I could recruit a Bermudian and the fact that I was now looking for another Bermudian did not look particularly racist either. But that got me nowhere, and soon the story had been sold to the English press where it appeared suitably embroidered and embellished.

Then the time came when I had to recruit a new commissioner of police and things went from bad to worse. There had always been difficulty in recruiting Bermudians for the police. In good times higher wages could be earned in other jobs and Bermudians were not particularly keen on doing a job which involved night work and might even make them unpopular in the communities where they lived. Consequently, many police officers were recruited from the Caribbean and from Britain. Often the Caribbean officers found it difficult to get themselves accepted and were heavy-handed in their dealings with the local community. The British officers, being white, were seen by young blacks as an alien element. Furthermore, these different groups in the police often did not get on with and did not trust each other. Jack Sharpe, a former Premier, told me that after the Sharples murder a very pleasant Bermudian officer showed up to give him personal protection. The next day he told Jack that he was going off duty for a while but was worried about his replacement: ‘He comes from St Kitts and hates all white men.’

When I arrived in Bermuda Lennett (known as Lenny) Edwards, a black Bermudian, was commissioner of police and Alec Forbes, of Scottish origin who had acquired Bermudian status, was his deputy. Both were old-fashioned in their approach to policing and saw no need for change. Complaints against the police, if dealt with at all, were dealt with months after the event and then often
not properly. Morale in the police was at rock-bottom. An exercise in crowd control was held at the US naval annexe. Members of the regiment were detailed to act out the role of rioters. The police approached the rioters carrying their shields. The ‘rioters’ lobbed a few missiles and the police broke ranks and fled.

The Foreign Office employed an overseas police adviser to go round the police forces in the dependent territories, carry out reviews and make suggestions as to how efficiency might be improved, and in May 1994 Lionel Grundy, the then adviser, visited Bermuda. His report was damning. There was no leadership or sense of purpose in the police and no attempt had been made to prepare people to fill the top ranks. Lenny could retire on full pension the following May on reaching fifty-six; Forbes was due to go on 1 March 1995, but there was no one to follow them. There were two assistant commissioners. One of them, Harold Moniz, was of Portuguese descent and was rated both unpopular and
inefficient
. The other, Wayne Perinchief, had only been promoted a month or two before and, having no experience at all of high office, could not possibly be considered a candidate for deputy, let alone commissioner at that time.

I discussed the matter with the Premier and with John Irving Pearman, the Minister for Home Affairs, and we decided to replace both Lenny (who had by then become ill and wanted to retire) and Forbes on his retirement, with a commissioner and a deputy commissioner recruited from abroad. Big trouble followed. The PLP declared that as there were two Bermudians qualified to be commissioner I had again been guilty of racism. The Leader of the Opposition, Frederick ‘Freddy’ Wade, and a number of his supporters brought a petition against overseas recruitment up to Government House, and in front of the cameras I made the mistake of telling Freddy that the decision to recruit had been made and there was no question of it being reversed. At the time I thought it
right to be firm. If I had given the impression that I was prepared to reconsider, I would have been letting down the minister who had shown some courage in accompanying the deputy governor to London and seeing the applicants for the two posts. But it was a mistake to have been so forthright. According to the PLP I had not shown due respect towards the six thousand people who were alleged to have signed the petition, and there were calls for my salary to be cut. In due course the PLP tabled a motion in the House of Assembly reducing it to one dollar. It was rather
discouraging
that when such a motion had last been tabled it was a matter of hours before my predecessor Sir Richard Sharples was murdered. Indeed, the next day the
Royal Gazette
printed the report of the debate alongside the report of the assassination.

The motion, like the one in 1973, was, of course, really no more than a procedural ploy, a method of getting at the Governor as the symbol of British authority, and after a vote on party lines, with every government supporter voting ‘no’, the motion was defeated. But this did not deter someone on the
Royal Gazette
(who had earlier caused us trouble selling false reports to the British press) from telling this story in lurid and wholly inaccurate terms to the
Sunday Times
where it appeared under the headline:
‘LOCALS ARGUE WADDINGTON WORTH JUST ONE POUND.’
The article began:

The article then went on to relate, with sundry embellishments, the story of Andre the butler before concluding:

Insofar as the article painted a picture of an island reduced to a state of turmoil as a result of a headstrong Governor meddling in affairs that were none of his business, it was a complete fabrication. But it was also a fabrication perpetrated by a journalist living on the
Island and employed by the
Royal Gazette
and his name appeared at the head of the article, along with someone called Andrew Malone. Imagine my surprise, therefore, when on the very day of
publication
I received a telephone call from another journalist on the
Royal Gazette
saying that the
Gazette
was going to publish the article and the paper would like my comments on the contents. I told the
journalist
that I had never heard such cheek in my life. If an article in a British paper was repeated in the
Royal Gazette
people were entitled to assume that they were being given the opportunity to see how other journalists in Britain were viewing the scene in Bermuda. When the article was nothing but a fabrication perpetrated by one of the
Gazette’s
own employees, I reckoned that I and their readers had something to complain about.

The only good thing about the whole incident was Peter Woolcock’s cartoon in which Basil was pictured saying: ‘Well, it was his constitutional right to choose the police commissioner and then this Mr Morton proposes cutting the boss’s salary to one dollar, having just voted a nearly 28 per cent wage increase for himself – and so I bit him.’ Well not quite the only good thing. Six months on and the politicians of the UBP were claiming that bringing in the officers was their own brilliant idea and the politicians of the PLP, while not going quite so far, were saying what grand chaps the British officers were and how successful they, the PLP, had been in building up a very special relationship with them. Colin Coxall and Michael Mylod did a splendid job and not so long afterwards were beginning to get a grip on crime on the Island and were the toast of those who had been so critical of the appointments.

T
he year 1994 began with Sir John Swan’s surprise bid for independence. It ended with turmoil in the UBP
following
the withdrawal of the Premier’s first Referendum Bill. Independence consumed so much of the government’s time and filled so much of the papers, a visitor from outer space would have thought nothing else had been going on in Bermuda throughout the calendar year, and he would not have been far wrong. But one or two other things did happen. There was liberalisation of exchange control, and Dr John Stubbs managed to steer through Parliament a Bill legalising homosexual acts in private between consenting males. Those who voted for that Bill showed considerable courage in the face of a fierce campaign mounted by the black churches against the measure. Stubbs died shortly after the Bill became law and in the resultant by-election Grant Gibbons took his place as the member for Paget East. Grant Gibbons was the minister in charge of negotiations with the Americans following their decision to close the US naval air station and give up virtually all the land leased to America in 1940.

The American decision to close the base followed a report by Sam Donaldson, who made the place look like a holiday camp for retired admirals. Although withdrawal by the Americans was going to happen sooner or later, it would have been nice if it had been delayed for a little longer. It was certainly going to be a very costly business.

In 1992 the US, Canadian and British bases together generated income of $393 million and public service revenue of $14.1 million. In addition the US through their running of the airport provided $8.4 million in services free of charge. With all these additional burdens the Bermudians were determined that the Americans should have to pay to right environmental damage on the base caused by leaking oil tanks and the dumping of waste. The British government in supporting this was, of course, accepting its own responsibility to carry out a clean-up at HMS
Malabar
where oil had been discovered in underground caves. It had apparently been dumped by ships or leaked from the Shell oil tanks on the site. The MOD were very much less forthcoming when it came to the severance terms to be offered to the civilian employees at
Malabar
at the time of closure. The Bermuda Industrial Union (BIU) argued, I thought with force, that there could be no excuse for treating these employees differently from other government employees in Bermuda, but that was what the MOD were now bent on doing; and my warnings that industrial action might well follow if they ignored the workers’ claim went unheeded. The date set for a parade on Front Street to mark the Royal Navy’s 200-year presence in Bermuda and the closure of HMS
Malabar
was 18 February, and in a letter to the MOD I pointed out that if the dispute was not settled by then, there would be a countermarch and demonstration, reducing the occasion to a shambles. There was even the possibility of violence. I added that I thought it quite obscene that money should be spent flying a Royal Marines band out to Bermuda when the same money could be used to meet the employees’ claim; and I gave notice that if the money to settle the dispute was not forthcoming, I would (a) cancel the parade and (b) withdraw my invitation to Vice-Admiral Tod to visit the Island and stay with me at Government House. That did the trick.

There was another little drama towards the end of 1994. In
1990 Bill Down, formerly general secretary of the Missions to Seamen became Bishop of Bermuda, having been appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury after the Synod had failed to agree on a Bermudian. When, however, Bill arrived at the airport to take up his appointment he was somewhat dismayed to be handed a work permit valid for one year, and later learned with astonishment that the minister, Jack Sharpe, had ruled that the work permit could not be renewed unless the clergy of the diocese granted their support for the renewal application. A year passed and Bill was summoned to a meeting of the clergy and, after some discussion, was asked to withdraw while judgement was passed on him. Those present then graciously agreed to allow their bishop, appointed for life by the Archbishop of Canterbury, to remain. Bill told me afterwards that huge damage to his authority was done by this exercise and he vowed that he would not suffer the same humiliation again. So, in 1994, when the work permit had only six months left, he asked for my help. Strictly speaking work permits were nothing to do with me. They did not come within my reserved powers. But I did think the government was getting into very deep constitutional waters, and I told John Irving Pearman, the minister, that I thought it quite outrageous that bishops should be subject to work permits in the first place; and it was certainly unwise of the government to get involved in the politics of the Church. Eventually, the minister accepted what I had to say but Bishop Bill, while getting his work permit, was thoroughly sickened by the whole business and when a job in England came along he took it. I could not blame him.

Now back to independence. After his setbacks in the summer of 1994 the Premier had announced his plans for a Green Paper and in the autumn of 1994 a committee of ministers was appointed to be responsible for its production. Jack Sharpe, who in 1977 had had a hand in an earlier Green Paper, was to be adviser to the committee. If the new Green Paper was going to be anything like the earlier
one, it was not going to point out any possible disadvantages of independence. So it turned out; and, as a result, attracted little but ridicule.

The committee’s estimate of the cost of independence – between $800,000 and $2.3 million – was extraordinary, being similar to that put forward in the 1977 Green Paper without even an uplift to cover inflation in the intervening years. There was no mention of safeguards to prevent an independent Bermuda suffering from the abuse of power and corruption which had proved such a problem when other small island communities had gone independent. There was no acknowledgment that international business set store by the British connection, considering it some guarantee of
political
stability. There was a reference to Bermuda receiving ‘expert advice and assistance from the United Kingdom’ with regard to the Bermuda Regiment, but nothing about what might or might not happen after independence; and there was a wholly inadequate passage on citizenship, with no mention that the UK Parliament would be unlikely to pass an Independence Bill which did not give the right to Bermuda nationality to the very large number of longterm residents at present denied it.

On the police there was no acknowledgment that the sharing of power between the Governor and the government of Bermuda was a safeguard against political interference in police operations or discussion on how such interference might be avoided on
independence
. And when it came to Bermuda on independence ‘assuming full responsibility for the conduct of its foreign affairs’ the estimate of the cost of overseas representation was again little different from that put forward in 1977 with, as the newspapers noted with glee, no provision for a bicycle let alone a motor car for either Bermuda’s Ambassador in Washington or its High Commissioner in London.

We had warned the FCO before the Green Paper committee went to London that there were bound to be questions about the
possibility of a new relationship between Britain and the
remaining
dependent territories after the return of Hong Kong to China. Black people in Bermuda greatly resented the fact that, while most white Bermudians were British citizens, most black Bermudians were not and were subject to immigration control. There was a strongly held view that after 1997 and the return of Hong Kong to China the total population of the remaining dependent
territories
would be so small (about 160,000) there would no longer be any immigration control justification for people belonging to a dependent territory having a different citizenship from those who belonged to the mother country, and we could revert to a system not unlike that which appertained prior to the British Nationality Act when we shared a common citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies. That is what eventually did happen under the Labour government.

At this time, however, the government’s attitude was that it was too early to consider what options might be available after 1997, and we painstakingly worked out and settled with the Foreign Office a form of words to go in the Green Paper to reflect this. It was decided that it should say that there had not yet been any discussions within government as to whether there might be a change in the relationship between Britain and the remaining dependent territories after the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997, that complex issues were involved; but there might well be the opportunity for a reassessment of UK/dependent territories policy at that time.

In February Freddy Wade, as Leader of the Opposition, set out for London to present the PLP petition against the police
appointments
and when there he raised the subject of the Green Paper. Tony Baldry, the minister, should have told him that insofar as the Green Paper purported to reflect British government policy, it did so correctly and he had nothing to add. But it seems that instead
he said that, in spite of what was in the Green Paper, there was in his view no possibility of a change in citizenship post-1997, and his remarks were repeated by Freddy at a press conference.

That was embarrassing enough, but Freddy went even further and said that Tony Baldry had agreed with him that it would be most unusual to grant independence without a general election. If the minister had said anything like that, he would of course have been casting doubt on the appropriateness of using a referendum to determine whether the people of Bermuda wanted
independence
and was doing so in spite of our having, with the agreement of the Foreign Office, told the Bermuda government from the outset that a referendum was a perfectly legitimate way to determine the people’s view. Worst of all, Freddy announced what I already knew – that the minister was planning to come to Bermuda at Easter to clarify a number of other matters about which Freddy had expressed concern.

Freddy at once seized on all this as an argument against the Referendum Bill being allowed to proceed until the minister came at Easter to explain Her Majesty’s Government’s position. John Swan was up in arms, and we thought it politic to advise the Foreign Office that it would be best if the Baldry visit was postponed.

At the end of March 1995, the Referendum Bill was due to have its second reading, but with two UBP members, Ann DeCouto and Trevor Moniz, saying they were prepared to abstain and another in hospital, John realised that if he wanted to get his Bill he would have to compromise, and after many comings and goings he agreed to it being amended along the lines of the Scottish and Welsh Referendum Bills. The referendum result would not provide a mandate for independence unless 40 per cent of the electorate voted ‘yes’. Freddy Wade announced that the PLP would boycott the whole exercise and tell Labour supporters to stay at home.

As polling day, fixed for 15 August 1995, drew near, people began
to sport button badges. One in great demand read ‘Better Queen Elizabeth than King John’; but the progress of Hurricane Felix was attracting as much interest as the progress of the campaign. Gilly spent her time either taking the pictures down from the walls of Government House and putting them under the beds when Hurricane Felix was heading straight for us or putting the pictures back on the walls when Felix veered off to the left or right.

By noon on Sunday 13 August, Felix had become a category three storm with maximum winds of 110 knots and gusts of up to 135 knots. It would be within fifty miles of Bermuda at 3 a.m. on polling day, but in fact the storm passed the Island late on the 14th and although by 1 a.m. on the 15th the worst was over, the causeway to St George’s was damaged and impassable. Early that morning deputy governor Peter Willis’s secretary was up at police
headquarters
for the meeting of the Emergency Measures Organisation with Leo Mills, the Cabinet Secretary, and the Premier.

I was at Government House awaiting a report from the deputy governor on the damage from the storm and at 8 a.m. he rang. ‘Things do not seem too bad,’ he said, ‘but the causeway to St George’s has been breached and for the moment there is no way of getting across to St George’s.’ I then asked how the arrangements for the referendum were faring and, to my great surprise, he replied that it had been postponed indefinitely and that, after meeting with John Swan, Leo Mills had gone on the radio to say so. I told Peter Willis he had better get Leo Mills up to Government House at once.

To my mind the situation was dire. If the referendum was postponed for some months, not only had one to consider the economic damage that might follow, but months more
campaigning
with fiery speeches, demonstrations and marches might well end in violence. My job, therefore, was to make sure that by hook or by crook the referendum took place and the plain intention of Parliament was carried out.

Leo arrived and I asked him by what right he had postponed the referendum. He said it wasn’t a question of legal authority but a question of whether the referendum could take place when one at least of the returning officers, St George’s, simply could not get to his polling station. I asked why someone in St George’s could not act as returning officer and why the polling station should not be opened later in the day when no doubt someone would be able to get from Hamilton to St George’s. To that, Leo, a decent and
honourable
man, who had simply not thought the thing through, had no answer. I told him that in my view he should take whatever action was necessary to bring into play Section 44 of the Parliamentary Elections Act 1978 so that voting could take place next day. That meant ringing Marlene Christopher, the parliamentary registrar, and telling her to instruct the returning officers to get to their posts.