Minister West: Financial compliance bill will help Trinidad and Tobago

MINISTER of Public Administration Allyson West said on Friday a new bill to expose the real owners of properties in line with European Union (EU) requirements can benefit TT such as by helping the Board of Inland Revenue (BIR) to unearth taxable earnings hidden overseas.

She spoke in the Senate debate on a bill to unearth beneficial owners by amending several acts pertaining to financial regulation. The bill is the Miscellaneous Provisions (Trustees, Exchequer and Audit Act, Minister of Finance (Incorporation) Act, Proceeds of Crime, Income Tax, Companies, Partnerships, Securities, Tax Information Exchange Agreements, Non-Profit Organisations and Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters) Bill 2023.

West admitted the bill was cumbersome and that senators were short on time to digest it, but said it was simple in concept – to identify beneficial owners, namely actual humans who owned or had an interest in particular property.

She said TT must collaborate with the 200 countries of the Global Forum to stymie those businesses involved in hiding their income, trafficking or terrorism.

West said while it was true that most perpetrators came from bigger countries, TT had a benefit by knowing what percentage of such operations involved TT.

"As borders become less and less relevant, this (regulation) becomes more critical."

Saying she too had initially wondered why TT must spend money on such measures to benefit big countries like the US and UK, West said that conversely just as the Prime Minister had sought help from the US against the influx of illegal guns to TT, so too TT now had to work with others to reduce such finance-related offences, such as tax evasion and money-laundering. She said money-laundering was the legitimising of money earned from criminal activities.

West said when real owners were known, the authorities could see their linkages around the world and how they were using their resources.

She said legal vehicles for someone to own property were trusts, NGOs, companies, partnership and the Corporation Sole (Minister of Finance.)

Real owners must be identified, she said, as this allowed the authorities to detect suspicious activity and determine who stood to gain.

"Unless we identify, it is very difficult to stamp it out."

West listed the authorities regulating such ownership/activities in TT as the Inland Revenue Division (IRD), Financial Intelligence Unit, Companies Registry and Securities and Exchange Commission. TT can benefit from the bill, she said, by the tax authorities unearthing the worst tax loopholes and who was using them and in what way. While lamenting the bill's impositions on TT, she hoped the tax authorities – the IRD, to be followed by the Revenue Authority (TTRA) – would take advantage of it, to make tax compliance in TT more effective than present.

West concluded, "We can't hide in our little corner and say it is a big country matter. We all have to take part."