Dear Sir,

I was quoted in your article of October 8, 2025, under the headline “Misunderstanding in senate debate”. It behoves me to highlight for the avoidance of all doubt, that Opposition leader Robert King was commenting only on behalf of the One Bermuda Alliance senators, and his statement was not in respect of my understanding or the legislation up for debate.

Including my comments under the headline “Misunderstanding in senate debate” may have ironically led to a “misunderstanding” by your readership that the issues that I raised were resolved and covered under the “misunderstanding” referred to by Mr King.

My questions below summarise my questions raised during the debate — most of which were not answered in full or, in some cases, at all — and form the basis of my concern with passing The Loren (Pink Beach and Elbow Beach) Act 2025 in its present incarnation. They are specific to the continued reliefs granted to The Loren Pink Beach property. The lack of clarity or response to the below left me unable to vote in agreement with passing the legislation:

1, The Tourism Investment Act, which forms the basis of the ability to grant special development reliefs, states that no relief should be granted for a period of time that exceeds ten years for an existing property or 15 years for a new hotel. The Loren Pink Beach property is not a new hotel — but let’s posit that The Loren Pink Beach does meet the requirements to be considered a “new hotel”. Upon the passage of the legislation proposed, the special development reliefs — payroll tax exemptions, import duty exemptions, etc — granted to The Loren Pink Beach property will exceed the maximum amount of time of 15 years allowed under law for tax exemptions.

i. How many total years of tax relief concessions will The Loren Pink Beach property be eligible for, factoring in the exemptions granted to that particular property since 2017?

ii. What, if any, cost-benefit analysis was conducted which assisted the Government to assess, notwithstanding the projected estimated revenue loss by the cumulative amount of the concessions granted, that it was in the economic interest of the country to grant the breadth and width of the exemptions granted for the length of time specified under The Loren (Pink Beach and Elbow Beach) Act 2025?

iii. How much money has The Loren Pink Beach hotel saved in taxes since its first special development relief was granted?

2, In the original Pink Beach Order 2015 — which came into effect in 2017 — in order to continue to qualify for the tax exemptions and relief/concessions granted, there was a requirement for The Loren Pink Beach to send the minister an audited record of any management programme provided for its staff and the amount of money spent in its budget annually on said management trainee programme. Why was the requirement for an audited record of training programmes and evidence of a budgeted amount for such dropped from subsequent legislation and not included in the Act up for debate?

3, The Tourism Investment Act states that within seven to ten years of properties being granted special development reliefs, 70 per cent of employees should be Bermudian. We are now at the ten-year mark from the passing of the first Loren Pink Beach Order and eight years since it came into effect. Does the Pink Beach Loren have 70 per cent Bermudian staff? [Had I received a response to this question, my follow-up would have been: can we get the percentage of Bermudian staff trained to management positions and the percentage of Bermudian staff employed there at present?]

4, Please confirm where in the Tourism Investment Act it states that the legislature or minister has the discretion to extend concessions [for an existing hotel] more than the 15 years stated under the Tourism Investment Act?

In conclusion, it is easy and low-hanging fruit to challenge informed questions as the enemy of progress, so I will state as I did in the Senate: I have no objection to the portion of the debated legislation that grants special development relief to The Loren Elbow Beach property.

I understand the importance of incentivising entities that wish to invest in Bermuda — although I appreciate and hear the concerns of employers in Bermuda who take issue with, in particular, the continued exemption from paying payroll tax that hotels granted special development relief receive.

Further, I will also state that I enjoy attending events at The Loren Pink Beach Club, so I appreciate the value-add that it provides to our tourism product. However, it would be remiss of me not to raise the above questions to ensure that the public have a clear understanding of the economic impact of legislation passed and that the commitments expected as a result of reliefs granted are being met.

TAWANA TANNOCK

Independent senator

Editor’s note: this letter was initially submitted on October 9.