Look at the costs

September 23, 2005

Dear Sir,

Missing from the media coverage surrounding the report of the Bermuda Independence Commission has been a critical examination of the potential benefits and costs of independence. Instead the coverage has centred around the question of how truly independent and object the Commission was and what submissions were omitted from the Report.

Independence is clearly a change in the status quo, so the first question to be addressed is ? what is wrong with the status quo?

Are Bermudians somehow less politically and economically free as a UK territory than they would be as a sovereign territory?

Are there costs imposed by UK authorities that Bermudians consider excessive or detrimental? Another question to be asked is ? what is to be gained by being a sovereign nation? Are there quantifiable economic and political benefits?

If so, what are those benefits, and equally important, who stands to reap those benefits ? a small minority or the entire population?

Still another question to be asked is what are the potential costs? Is there business that could be lost? Could property values and decline? How would the government finance itself? What credit rating would a sovereign Bermuda have in the international finance markets?

If it is na?ve to assume that nothing in Bermuda?s business climate would change, then it is nothing short of irresponsible to look at the potential negative impact on the country in terms of lost income, lost jobs and lower tax revenues for the Government.

Only by engaging the public in an educated debate on these issues can Bermudian hope to make the right choice and reach a consensus on this issue. Perhaps in the process they will discover that there are far more serious challenges facing Bermudians than the question of whether or not to be a sovereign nation.