Shadow Minister of Home Affairs Walter Roban was not surprised to hear by the Minister’s own admission that eradicating term limits has not triggered an influx of international companies to return to Bermuda.In part three of a series on ‘Immigration Matters’, the Progressive Labour Party MP for Pembroke East, the heart of North Village, spoke candidly to The Royal Gazette on Minister Michael Fahy’s first six months in office as the man in charge of Bermuda’s Home Affairs.Responding to the Minister’s take on the effectiveness of lifting term limits, Mr Roban reiterated the reasons given for the move after the One Bermuda Alliance promised a review.“The Minister said removing term limits would stop job losses, companies would stop leaving Bermuda and they would come rushing back in once they knew the term limit policy was gone,” said Mr Roban.“He ignored the other facts about the shrinkage of Bermuda’s economy and companies downsizing because of the recession. The OBA Government from the beginning was saying that term limits is a job killer.“That’s false, we have companies and even some of our local banks continuing to put in place plans for people to be let go. I say that the Minister’s assertions about the perceived success of his policy decisions is false, or at best, the jury is still out.”Commenting on the plan to raise the enforcement level of work permit violations in Bermuda, with $5,000 fines from ticketable offences with a public register on offenders, he said the Opposition has no problem with that.But he questioned the lack of commitment to training, resources, and the hope expressed by the Minister that eventually the move will be self-policed by an 11-member compliance team with three enforcement officers.“There was no increase in the budget as it relates to the compliance section in his Ministry. One begs to wonder if you’re not committing any resources to enforcement and you’re just changing the law, why does the Minister believe now that self-policing is the answer to a problem that he himself has admitted has to do with business people purposely flouting the process.“It’s contradictory and this is part of the problem. This Minister falls over many of his statements and makes assertions that just don’t quite add up. You say you’re raising enforcement but then you rely on self-policing to make it work the self-policing of the same people who are breaking the law.“That 15 percent of employers you’re expecting that your new policies will benefit by some self-policing by them. Again, I wait to see. The Minister in the Budget committed no new money to enforcement or compliance,” said Mr Roban.“He committed no new money to training in the Ministry in this area. But he’s bringing in new laws, new levels of enforcement, but he’s not committing any manpower or any resources financially.“If he’s just relying on changing the law, he’s not increasing the manpower to be out there in the street in the areas where there’s concern, he’s not committing any further resources, then the Minister is falling over his own statement.”With record unemployment in Bermuda, he said the OBA’s promise of 2,000 jobs in their first five years will be the main focal point for people out of work and the electorate in general.Mr Roban also questioned the absence of a clear cut plan by the new administration pinpointing how these jobs will be created and when.“How many jobs have been created and where is their plan around any job creation whatsoever?“Let’s say they can’t come up with a plan for 2,000 jobs, what about 500 jobs or 200 jobs. They’ve been nickel and diming on jobs, they’ve created little things here and there using Government money to create programmes to send young people off, to train young people to become butchers and the like. And that’s a good thing, but at the same time hundreds of jobs have been lost in other sectors of the economy.“Companies are continuing to repatriate. I am continuing to hear from people — Bermudians in the job sector, that large corporations are still rolling out their plan to release hundreds of people in the financial service sector and other sectors. Getting rid of term limits hasn’t brought anything to reverse that,” said Mr Roban.“They decided to remove the policy and they have every right to, but they did it in a manner that was inconsistent with the promise they made to the Bermudian people.“If the Government feels that ramping up enforcement measures of this nature will work — fine. We will wait and see if it works because ultimately it’s how violators respond and the data they will produce out of that will determine whether it is valuable or not.“Maybe a $5,000 fine will make a violating employer think about their actions. What we have found is that employers will do what they can to get what they want by any means; even if it means dealing with a $5,000 fine.”In part four of this series, both the Minister and his Parliamentary counterpart square off on the issue of non-skilled labour and whether or not Bermudians want or apply for low-paying jobs in Bermuda.