Bermuda Case Law & Legislation

28 Nov 2014

Cynthia Williams
Changes in Bermuda’s Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (“AML/ATF”) Legislation will be addressed in Parliament in order to bring the technical components into compliance with the 2012 Revised Financial Action Task Force (“FATF”) 40 recommendations (the “Recommendations”).
15:02 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Fraud & Anti Money Laundering
28 Nov 2014

The 2014 matter involving the Bermuda Environmental Sustainability Task Force (“BEST”) and the Minister of Home Affairs [2014] SC (Bda) 73 App (18 September 2014) raised interesting legal points as it relates to environment and planning law. The substantive matter is discussed in a further article by my colleague Jessica Kemmenoe in another post.
14:53 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Litigation & Dispute Resolution
05 Nov 2014

Jeremy Leese
The Companies Amendment Act 2014 introduced new provisions with regard to the ability of local and exempt companies to acquire land in Bermuda. It should be noted that consent is still required from the Minister of Economic Development in relation to corporate landholding; however, the Minister’s decision will be guided by the provisions of the legislation and the accompanying policy.
18:48 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Company & Commercial Law
23 Jul 2014

Jane Collis
...it would seem that, unnoticed by the equity judges and academics over the centuries, actions subsequently regretted by trustees have a quality of reversibility. It appears that Doctor Equity can administer a magical morning after pill to trustees suffering from post-transaction remorse, but not to anyone else.[1]
The Trustee Amendment Act 2014 (the “Act”) (35 KB PDF) will have the effect of amending the Trustee Act 1975 to introduce a new section 47(A), giving the court jurisdiction to set aside the exercise of a fiduciary power, which has gone wrong, thereby enshrining in law the “Rule in Hastings-Bass”, referred to by Lord Neuberger in commentary as a “magical morning-after pill”. In the case of Hastings-Bass,[2] Lord Justice Brown laid down the following, which became known as the “Rule in Hastings-Bass”:
16:27 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Wills, Trusts & Estates
30 Jun 2014

Jessica Kemmenoe
On 27 March 2014 the Government enacted the Companies Amendment Act 2014 (the “Amendment Act”) (58 KB PDF) introducing new provisions to the Companies Act 1981 with regards to the ability of local and exempt companies to acquire land in Bermuda. An accompanying corporate landholding policy (the “Policy”) was issued to run alongside the Amendment Act to help clarify the objectives behind the changes in an effort to assist with the Ministers decision making when making an application for consent. There were a number of reasons cited for the changes but the key reasons provided by Minister of Education and Economic Development, The Hon. E. Grant Gibbons, in his statement to the House of Assembly were to “stimulate turnover in the real estate market and create jobs in the construction sector and to make Bermuda [a] more attractive and competitive jurisdiction.” (Hansard Report, 21 March 2014, p. 1739)
19:06 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Company & Commercial Law
13 May 2014

Fozeia Rana-Fahy
The Supreme Court of Bermuda handed down its judgment in the matter of The Minister for Home Affairs v Carne and Correia [2014] SC (Bda) 9 Civ (2 May 2014) (510 KB PDF) on 2 May 2014. The fundamental result of this judgment is that under certain circumstances, holders of Permanent Resident Certificates (“PRC”) who have been resident in Bermuda prior to July 1989 can now apply for Bermudian Status — an application which Chief Justice Kawaley described as “one of the most significant applications that it is possible for an applicant to make” pursuant to the “beauty in the sleeping provisions” of Section 20B of the Bermuda Immigration and Protection Act 1956 (“BIPA”).
17:22 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Labour, Employment & Immigration law
12 Mar 2014

Honor Desmond-Tetlow
A paragraph in the Throne Speech in November of 2013 heralded a proposed change to the Children Act, 1998. The need to incorporate family mediation into the Act was recognized as a prerequisite for co-parenting orders rather than arising only as a result of a parent’s non-compliance with some existing order. This proposed move to formalize the requirement for mediation brings Bermuda into line with the current practice in many jurisdictions.
12:38 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Family Law
18 Feb 2014

Brian Holdipp
Recently, the following Orders were enacted to add a dedicated corporate governance licensing criterion to the Trust (Regulation of Trust Business) Act 2001, the Investment Business Act 2003 and the Investment Funds Act 2006 (collectively, the “Regulatory Acts”):
17:43 / Bermuda Case Law & Legislation / Company & Commercial Law