March 30, 2022

Thank you.
Would any other Senator care to ask questions?
Senator Robin Tucker, you have the floor.

QUESTION 1: UPDATE ON SCHOOL COVID- 19
PHASES —LIVING SAFELY WITH COVID -19
IN SCHOOLS

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President,
good morning, and good morning to my Senate colleagues.
Just following on the answer that the Junior
Minister gave concerning Internet access, I just wanted to get a little bit of clarity, because when he first answered the question I was under the impression
that the Internet provided was sort of past tense. So it
was not clear to me that the additional support for
those who need the Internet access . . . that they are
continuing to get it. And I was a little bit more unclear
(is probably a better way to put it) because he did add,
just a few second ago, that Mirrors also is [giving sup-port].
So, what I am wondering is, do all of the st udents who need it currently have Internet access? And will they continue to have it during the period of su mmer school when they will be in? Thank you, Madam
President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Tucker.

Sen. Owen Darrell: Thank you, Madam President.
Just for clarity, I did indicate, the Senator is
correct, that when we were in our deepest of loc kdowns, which would have been 2020, that there were
Internet pr oviders who stepped up and offered Internet service. I am relatively certain that also going in the middle of the pandemic, in 2021, there was Inter-net provided, and most recently it is documented that
Mirrors has also supported with Internet access. So I
think, to provide clarity, over the last two years there
has been full coverage by different entities, private and public, stepping up to support our students with
Internet access.


Bermuda Senate Now, to answer the second part of that question, are students still able t o receive support? The
answer is yes. I don’t think that at this point , after two
years of being in a pandemic , private entities are wil ling to always publicise that anymore. The Internet is
kind of becoming a standard procedure around the
world. So I think Internet providers are . . . if they are
made aware that a need arises, they are still willing to
help. So I want to make that clear.
I don’t think I am able to answer that question
effectively right now as to if all students will have ac-cess, but I do know the stats do say that Bermuda has
a very high, 90 per cent Internet penetration rate
amongst its citizens. So while I cannot sit here and
say, yes, all will have it, I am fairly confident that at least 90 per cent will be able to have Internet access.
And we are monitoring and we will continue to monitor and respond when parents reach out.

The President: Thank you.
Senator Tucker, do you have a follow -up
question? Second question?

QUESTION 2: UPDATE ON SCHOOL COVID- 19
PHASES —LIVING SAFELY WITH COV ID-19
IN SCHOOLS

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
And I thank the Junior Minister for his explanation.
My second question, I am not quite sure if he
will be able to answer it because it does look a little backwards from where we are. It seems as though the
Statement that was read and the decisions that were
made were more as a result of public outcry for
changes in our schools.
So I am just curious to know, what was the
benchmark that the department or the Ministry was looking for in order to make adjustments to the mask
requirements in the schools? Particularly because the
wider community has made adjustments.
Schools kind of hung on a little longer. So I
am just wondering what was the trigger point for the
Ministry to decide, Okay, now it ’s safe for schools to
start doing it. If it had not been for the public outcry, I
am just wondering if any adjustments would have
been made.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Tucker.
Sen. Owen Darrell: It is a difficult ques tion to answer.
I mean, I . . . these conversations are difficult,
Madam President. They are difficult amongst my
friends who I discuss COVID -19 matters with. B ecause one of the problems with this that we have seen
throughout this pandemic is that when the experts, or
[persons] more expert than myself because I don’t
think anybody is an expert in COVID -19, but when the
experts come up with data and they say . . . at first I think we were saying 70 per cent. And then, you
would know that when we started the in-school testing
it was 80 per cent of schools. And the Ministry of Education was monitoring staff absences. You know, Ja nuary was a very tough time.
Again, I will repeat this over and over. I have
two [children] in the public school system and there
has not been a week that goes by that I don’t get a
letter from the Ministry of Health saying, We are just
letting you know, there has been exposure in your
child’s classroom. And I think the Government should
be commended, health officials and education off icials, for being able to get to a point now where we
are able to keep students in class. I mean, there was an exposure in a class and they said, Not to worry.
Everyone was tested today. If your test comes back
negative you will return to school. If not, you stay home.
So we have gotten to a point and we have
moved . . . so I kind of reject the notion that there was
one singular outcry from one group of individuals who has forced the Government’s hand to make this
change. I don’t think so.
And it just goes back to leadership and it goes
back to trying to do, with the information you are gi ven, the best for the children. We don’t publicise these stats because it becomes an argument point. I used to
discuss with a friend when I first became an educator.
If you have a desire, you can actually make stats say
whatever you want them to say. So, you know, there
are some schools that are more compliant with testing
than others.
As a Government which is running a public
school system, how do we say that, Well, three schools may not have a high testing rate, we then
need to shut down the entire school system. So we have had to pivot, we have had to look at the data. And decisions that have been made by the Ministry
and the Department of Education are that right now it
is the time to move away from where we were but
slowly get to a different place.

The President: Thank you, Senator.
Senator Tucker, do you have supplementary
to your second question? Or third question?

Sen. Robin Tucker: I do not, Madam President. I am
thankful to the Junior Minister for providing his r esponse. I certainly do understand how difficult it is to make the right decisions. So, again, no, I have further questions. Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Robin Tucker.
Would any other Senator care to ask a question?
Senator Ben Smith, you have the floor.
Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
400 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate I was going to ask a third question, but the
Junior Minister actually brought up some of the [answer] in his response just now. So it would be a supplementary to the previous question.

The President: Mm-hmm.

SUPPLEMENTARY
Sen. Ben Smith: The Junior Minister was referring to
the testing and how there might be a difference between one school to the other. There was an issue at
one point that I believe he almost alluded to, where
we were in a position where we were penalising all
schools because some schools did not have the cor-rect level. Is the Junior Minister able to tell us what
percentage of students are presently in the testing
regime for the public schools?
Just so that we have an understanding that a
decision has now been made to change the masking, but the protection piece is based off of knowing that the tests are happening on an ongoing basis.
As the Junior Minister just pointed out, in that
classroom that he was referring to, the teacher was
able to say that everyone was just tested. Well, if you
are in a school that has a low testing rate, you do not
know that answer. So now, potentially, this change will expose children in some schools and not in others. So
if we could get an idea of what the testing percentage
is in the schools that would be helpful for everybody to
feel comfortable with the decision that I was pushing
for the Government to make.
Thank you.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.
Senator Darrell.
Sen. Owen Darrell: I will wait to see if I get the percentages of where the testing is. But I can say from
experience . . . I sound like a broken record. But as a
father with two children in the public education sy stem, I was very impressed with the uptake of the r eturn to school testing that they had in February (I think). I was sent a time. I was sent a schedule. We
showed up at the Bermuda College. The lines were
long. But people understood the importance of why they were there and the benefit that they will receive
in the next few days of their students returning to
school.
There was a comment by the Senator that we
may still be putting students at risk by relaxing some
of the mask wearing. He i s absolutely right. But as I
said in my Statement, it now becomes a personal
choice for us to still go the extra mile to protect ourselves. I know I have my children sometimes and I am
like, Hey, you are outside. You can take your mask
off. And she is like, No, Daddy, I want to wear it.
Okay. That’s her choice that she feels more comfort able wearing her mask all the time to protect herself. But as far as a percentage, all preschool and
primary schools are over 80 per cent right now, as far
as the testing. No middle schools and no high schools
are over 80 per cent. That is the data that we have
now.
Going back to a previous question, if I may, I
have gotten more information. I know that it was a
Ministerial Statement that was made in early February
about changes. We did allude that the changes were
coming. So there was no trigger point. There was no
specific timeframe. I know the good Senator to my right would love for me to give him credit for it, but it
was not any noise that he made last week. The Mini ster and the good staff in Education have spent much
time consulting school leaders, the health officials, private schools have even been in those meetings on
the changes. We always said that we will make the changes and the adjustments when the time was
right.
There have been multiple letters sent to the
Premier’s office, there have been letters sent to the
Department of Education where people have given their suggestions. Like I said earlier, some people are
experts on COVID -19, or think they are experts on
COVID -19.
So, yes, I just want to reiterate that. There
was no trigger point, but everyone was working t ogether to get us to this point. However, we all still
need to remain as safe as possible.
I hope that answers the question.

The President: Thank you, Senator Darrell.
Would any other Senator care to ask any
questions at this time on the Statement?
No.
Then, hearing none, I thank you all for your
questions. And thank you, Senator Darrell, for your
responses.
Moving on with our agenda we now move on
to the Orders of the Day.

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

SENATE VISITOR

The President: But before we actually get there, I
would just like to acknowledge the presence of the Acting Permanent Secretary for Legal Affairs, Ms. G ina Hurst -Maybury, who is in the Senate Chambers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

The President: The first Order of the Day is the consideration of the draft Order entitled, Gaming (Desi gnated Site) Order 2022. And this is in the name of
Senator Owen Darrell, Junior Minister for the Cabinet
Office.
Senator Darrell, you have the floor.



Bermuda Senate Sen. Owen Darrell: Thank you, Madam President.
Madam President, I move that the Senate do
now take under consideration the draft Order entitled
Gaming (Designated Site) Order 2022.

The President: Is there a ny objection to that motion?
No objection.
Carry on, Senator Darrell.

DRAFT ORDER

GAMING (DESIGNATED SITE) ORDER 2022
Sen. Owen Darrell: Madam President, the Order
before the Senate this morning is very short. However,
Madam President, this measure is another building block to be laid in the all -hands restoration effort in the
support of tourism in Bermuda.
Madam President, Senators will be aware
that t his Order is made by the Minister responsible for
gaming, under the provisions of section 4 of the Gam-ing Act 2014. That section permits the Minister r esponsible for gaming, acting on the advice of the Gaming Commission to make and publish an order
designating a site on which a casino may be located.
Madam President, the location of the site under this Order is set out in the Schedule and is better
and well known to the public as the Fairmont Sout hampton. Madam President, last week in another place
it was signalled that the Government had reached an
agreement with the owners of the Fairmont Sout hampton for the development of that critical property.
Madam President , the casino is a critical part
of the redevelopment of that hotel. From a tourism
perspective, marketability is enhanced by the addition
of a gaming component , and a full -service resort hotel
must have all the elements required to justify its price
points. The casino, Madam President , is as important
as the beach club, the pool and the restaurants . Its
availability to guests is another means by which to
enhance their experience. Casinos enhance the attraction of group business for Bermuda’s largest conference hotel, and casinos also support increased bed
nights in our shoulder and off -season.
Madam President , I can advise the Senate
that this Order in respect of the site had been pr epared in 2017 under the previous administration, but it
was not advanced in the Legislature. The Gaming
Commission has confirmed that all necessary cond itions under th e application process have been met
and therefore their advice is that this O rder can
properly be made.
Madam President , I am therefore pleased to
commend this Order for the support of this Honour able place and welcome the support of other [Senators]
as we work together to support the return of the Fai rmont Southampton and the 800 jobs that will be cr eated in Bermuda when the hotel reopens.
The President: Thank you, Senator Darrell.
Would any Senator care to speak on this O rder?
Senator Ben Smith, Opposition Leader in the
Senate, you have the floor.

Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
I thank the Junior Minister for his remarks on
this Bill. As he stated, we are all trying to get tourism
revitalised, and this project is going to be an important step for that. And if this going to increase the amenities that attract people to Bermuda, we are supportive
of it. So the Opposition is in complete support with
anything we can do to enhance our tourism project
and we have no objections.
Thank you.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.
Would any other Senator care to speak on
this Order?
Senator John Wight, you have the floor.
Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Madam President.
Setting aside what my views are of gaming, I
wonder if the Junior Minister could just describe . . . I
read through this . I wasn’t certain I understood exactly
what lots of land are going to be used for the purpose
of gaming. So if the Junior Minister could just describe
where the lots of land are, just so myself and perhaps
others could better understand.

Sen. Owen Darrell: For this particular Order, it just
mentions Fairmont Southampton, so I think it will be
up to them to decide where exactly they put their c asino. But it is the entire property.

The President: Senator Wight.

Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Junior Minister, for that
clarification. Thank you.

The President: Thank you.
Would any other Senator care to ask any . . .
or to speak on this [Order]?
No? Then Senator Darrell, it is over to you.

Sen. Owen Darrell: Thank you, Madam President.
Madam President, I move that the said draft
Order be approved and that the following message be
sent to her Excellency the Governor.
The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
You had better read it, though, sorr y.
Sen. Owen Darrell: Madam President, I move that
the Senate do now take under consideration the draft
Order entitled Gaming (Designated Site) Order 2022.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
402 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report
B ermuda Senate No objection.

Sen. Owen Darrell: Madam President, I now move
that this draft Order be approved and that the following message be sent to her Excellency the Governor.
The President: You need to read the message,
Senator Darrell.
Sen. Owen Darrell: May it please Your Excellency:
The Senate, having had under consideration the draft
Order entitled the Gaming (Designated Site) Order 2022 , proposed to be made by the Minister respons ible for Gaming under the provisions of section 4(1) of
the Gaming Act 2014, acting on the advice of the
Bermuda Gaming Commission has the honour to i nform Your Excellency that the Senate has approved
the said draft Order.
The President: Is there any objection to it?
The message will be sent. Thank you, Senator Darrell. And thank you all Senators who have spo ken.
[Motion carried: The Draft Order entitled Gaming
(Designated Site) Order 2022 was approved.]
The President: The second item on the Orders of the
Day is the consideration of the draft Regulation ent itled Electricity (Regulatory Authority Fees) Amen dment Regulations 2022.
This is in the name of Senator Lindsay Si mmons, Junior Minister for Home A ffairs.
ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT
SENATE VISITOR
The President: But before you speak Senator Lin dsay Simmons, I would just like to acknowledge in the Senate Chamber, Ms. Jeane Nikolai, Director of E nergy.
Welcome to you, Madam.
[
Orders of the Day, continuing]
The President: Senator Lindsay Simmons, you have
the floor.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I move
that the Senate do now take under consideration t he
draft Regulation entitled Electricity (Regulatory Au-thority Fees) Amendment Regulations 2022.
The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection.
Carry on, Senator Simmons. DRAFT REGULATION
ELECTRICITY (REGULATORY AUTHORITY FEES)
AMENDMENT REGULATIONS 2022
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President , I am
pleased to present the Electricity (Regulatory Author ity Fees) Amendment Regulations 2020 [sic] for consideration in this Honourable House in accordance with section 44 of the Regulatory [Authority] Act 2011.
Madam President, these fees are part of the
funds which finance the activities of the Regulatory
Authority of Bermuda. These fees apply to each licensee who provide services to customers according to the terms and conditions required by the supply or transmission distribution and retail licences. The fees noted in this amendment pertain to the application for
a transfer of licence which is reduced from $25,000 to
$2,400. The reduction brings this fee in line with the analogous fee of the electronic communication sector.
Madam President, the fee comprises a portion
of the funds collected by and for the use of the Regu-latory Authority. These fees provide the necessary
funds to the Regulatory Authority to fulfil its statutory
obligations under the Regulatory Authority Act 2011
and the Electricity Act 2016, and include conducting market studies, imposing remedies, enforcing regul ations and protecting consumers.
Madam President, in closing, all other fees
are proposed to remain the same as last years. The
slight reduction is in adherence to section 44 of the Regulatory Authority Act 2011 , which requires the
fees to be reviewed annually. If these new regulations are not made, the fees would increase by the Co nsumer Price Index under section 44(14) of the Act.
Thank you, Madam President .
The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Would any Senator care to speak on these
Regulations?
Senator Robin Tucker, you have the floor.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
And thank you to the Junior Minister for bringing these Regulations to the Chamber.
I just have a question. She mentioned a year,
2020, was that just a misstatement? If she can clarify that, it would be wonderful.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: I apologise. It was 2022.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Okay. Thank you so much.
I am just wondering . . . well, first of all, I will
say that we have no objection to this because it does appear to be strictly administrative in nature. But if the Junior Minister can just provide a little bit more sort of detail around what accounts, specifically, for [the] si gnificant reduction in the licence fee? Because to go


Bermuda Senate from $25,000 to $2,500 seem s to be quite a drop. So
if she can just sort of clarify how that works I would be
grateful.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Robin Tucker.
Senator Michelle Simmons, you also want to
speak to the Bill?
Sen. Michelle Simmon s: Just a quick question,
Madam President.
I wondered if the information that was read
accurate. Is the decrease from $25,000 to $2,400?
Because the Statement mentioned a slight decrease;
but that is a huge decrease. So I am just seeking clar ity. Thank y ou.

The President: Thank you, Senator Michelle Si mmons.
[Pause]

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you. It is pegged to
how much is required for this action. Yes, the decrease is what is noted. I hope that answers your question.

The President: Sorry. Senato r Tucker.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
If the Junior Minister can clarify the response,
I did not understand. I don’t know if anyone else did. I
just did not understand her response.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: We are waiting for Senator Simmons
to get a response from her technical officer.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: It is pegged to how much
work is required for the action. Yes, the decrease is
what was noted and aligns with Telecom. In working
with the electricity sector, the Regulatory Authority
[RA] has found out that the work did not need that
huge fee.

The President: Senator Tucker.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
May I just ask one follow -up question? If the
Junior Minister could sort of give some i dea of what
“work” we are talking about. That would help to put it
all in context.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Robin Tucker.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Analysis of the market, pr ocessing the requests, mainly clerical work.
The President: Senator Ben Smith, you wish to
speak on the Bill?

Sen. Ben Smith: Yes, thank you, Madam President.
So I guess the question is, Was the rate
$25,000 last year? If it was $25,000 last year, was a
significant amount of clerical work done i n last year’s
amount, and this year there is an expectation that
there will be very little clerical work that is needed?
I think we are just trying to get clarity on what
has caused a significant drop in the fee. If the fee is to
pay for the clerical work , what was different from last
year to this year? And can we anticipate that if the
clerical work is needed in the future, that number is
going to go up?

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.

[Pause]

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: It is to change the ow nership of the licence. Yes, it was $25,000. No, there was
not much done last year. The electricity sector is not
lively and does not need as much expenses.

The President: Senator Lindsay Simmons, would you
repeat . . . I don’t think it was heard by the S enators,
the last part of the response.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Okay. I will say it again.
It is to change the ownership of a licence.
Yes, it was $25,000. So, no, not much was done last
year. The electricity sector is not lively and does not
need as much expenses.

The President: Senator Ben Smith.

Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
So, I guess to clarify, last year’s fee of
$25,000 was because there was a sale that was ha ppening, so there was more admin that needed to be
done. And because ther e is no longer a sale this year,
we go back to a normal rate. So the only reason that
the cost would go back to $25,000 would be if there
was another sale. I am just trying to figure out exactly what the details are in the change of the fee.
Thank you, Ma dam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you. Licences don’t
change hands frequently in the electricity sector so it
is not necessary to keep the fee that high.

The President: Senator Robin Tucker, you hav e a
question.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Yes, I do, thank you, Madam
President.
404 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate Again, just for a point of clarification. Can the
Junior Minister confirm whether the $25,000 fee was
in relation to the sale of BELCO from Ascendant to
Algonquin? Is that what that $25,000 fee was in rel ation to? That would clarify the situation.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Tucker.

[Pause]
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: The $25,000 fee did apply
to that sale. But I will get more information as to wheth er this was the original design of the fee.
The President: Senator Ben Smith, you have . . .
Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
So that response creates another question for
me. So, if the $25,000 was not specifically for the purposes of the s ale, we don’t have that answer yet. I am
confused as to what it would have been for if now we
are reducing from $25,000 to this significantly lower
number.
I would hate to think we are reducing a number when there are actual costs that are being i ncurred, because Bermuda does not have the money
to waste and we need every dime that we can bring
in. So that is the reason we are asking these specific
questions on this because that reduction is significant.
We want to be sure that we know why that r eduction h as happened, and that there are no costs,
that we are going to find out a year from now were not covered, because of this reduction. Thank you.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.

[Pause]
The President: Senator Lindsay Simmons is conferring the technical officer in the Chamber.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: So, Madam President, ot herwise the fee has been set high recognising that the
fee was in relation to a major change in ownership. No
other major changes of ownership are anticipated.

The Presi dent: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Senator Ben Smith, you have . . .

Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
So, the response prior to this last one, where
there was potential that we are not sure of exactly
what the $25,000 was used for, has that changed?
Can we get a clear -up of that previous response? The
$25,000 was only for that, not for anything else, and
that is the reason it has been reduced to this lower
number? Because I do not want to have an answer a couple of weeks from now that looks different. And my
only . . . the confusion in this is solely based on the
previous response.
Thank you.
[Pause]
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, the
$25,000 was for change of ownership. It was about
the BELCO change. No other major changes are anticipated.

The President: Thank you.
Senator Robin Tucker, you have the floor.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
I have one last question. So, with regard to
the Junior Minister’s response, I am now curious to
know how the fee is actually determined. If she can let
us know how that figure is arrived at based on what is
required, that would . . . I think that may help.
Thank you, Madam President.

[Pause]
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: The fee is determined in
consideration with the Regulatory Authority. It is . . .
[Pause]

[Inaudible interjection]

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: —commensurate with the
work that is required for the other major changes of
control.

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

SENATE VISITOR

The President: While we are wait ing for the response
from the Junior Minister, I would just like to
acknowledge the presence of the Honourable Walter
Roban, Minister of Home Affairs and Deputy Premier,
in the Chamber.
Welcome to you, Minister.

[Electricity (Regulatory Authority Fees) Amendment
Regulations 2022, continuing]

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, the fee is
in line with what is needed for the other minor changes of control.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
The President: Thank you, Senator Tucker.


Bermuda Senate Sena tor Lindsay Simmons, then it seems
there are no further questions or comments. You can
now—

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I move
that the said draft Regulation be approved and that
the following message be sent to her Excellency the
Governor.
May it please Your Excellency: The Senate,
having had under consideration the draft Regulation
entitled the Electronic Communications (Regulatory
Authority Fees) Regulations 2022, [sic] proposed to
be made by the Minister responsible for telecommunications under the provisions of sections 6 and 11 of
the Electronic Communications Act 2011 as read with section 44 of the Regulatory Authority Act 2011 has
the honour to inform Your Excellency that the Senate
has approved the said draft Regulation.

The President : Is there any objection to it?
Senator Ben Smith, you have a comment?

Sen. Ben Smith: Yes, Madam President. What the
Junior Minister was saying was on—

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: I’m sorry, I read the wrong
one.
Sen. Ben Smith: —the wrong one. Thank you.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Sorry.
Madam President, I move that the said draft
Regulation be approved and that the following message be sent to her Excellency the Governor.
May it please Your Excellency:
The Senate, having had under consideration
the draft Regulation entitled the Electricity (Regulatory
Authority Fees) Amendment Regulations 2022, pr oposed to be made by the Minister responsible for en-ergy for the purpose of establishing Regulatory A uthority fees for electricity sector pursuant to the Electricity Act 2016, in exercise of powers conferred by
section 44 of the Regulatory Authority Act 2011, has
the honour to inform Your Excellency that the Senate
has approved the said draft Regulation.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection. A suitable message will be sent.
Thank you, Senator Lindsay Simmons and
thank you to Senators.
[Motion carried: Draft Regulations entitled Electricity
(Regulatory Authority Fees) Amendment Regulations 2022 was approved.]
The President: We will no w move on the next item on
the Orders of the Day and that is consideration of the
draft Regulations entitled Electronic Communications
(Regulatory Authority Fees) Regulations 2022. And that is also in the name of Junior Minister for Home
Affairs, Senator Lindsay Simmons.
You have the floor.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I move
that Senate do now take under consideration the draft
Regulation entitled Electronic Communications (Reg ulatory Authority Fees) Regulations 2022 .

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection. Carry on, Senator Lindsay
Simmons.

DRAFT REGULATIONS

ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS (REGULATORY
AUTHORITY FEES) REGULATIONS 2022

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I am
pleased to present the Electronic Communications
(Regulatory Authority Fees) Regulations 2022 for
consideration in this Honourable Senate in exercise of
sections 6 and 11 of the Electronic Communications
Act 2011 and in accordance with section 44 of the
Regulatory Authority Act 2011.
Madam President, these fees are what in part
fund the activities of the Regulatory Authority of Bermuda. These fees apply to each carrier who provide
services to custom ers according to the terms and
conditions required in their individual communications operating licences. The fees are calculated on the
basis of relevant turnover of which a percentage is
assessed. The percentage proposed for the coming
year is 1.65 per c ent, a decrease of 0.05 per cent over
last year’s fees. This slight reduction is in response to
the actual needs of the Regulatory Authority in regulating the electronic communications sector and to
pass the savings back to the sector, recognising these are more challenging economic times.
Madam President, these fees comprise a portion of the funds collected by and for the use of the
Regulatory Authority. These fees provide the necessary funds to all the Regulatory Authority to fulfil its
statutory obligat ions under the Regulatory Authority
Act 2011 and Electronic Communications Act 2011
among which are to conduct market studies to impose
remedies, to enforce regulations, and to protect co nsumers.
Madam President, the other difference pr oposed in this year’s regulations is the reduction to zero dollars for the application to use non-high demand
frequency spectrum from last year’s $500. This slight
reduction is proposed to increase the interest in u nderutilised spectrum and anticipates a greater vibra ncy in services provided to the Bermuda market.
Madam President, in closing, all other fees
are proposed to remain the same as last year’s.
These slight reductions are in adherence to section 44
of the Regulatory Authority Act 2011 which requires
406 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate fees to be rev iewed annually. If these new regulations
are not made, the fees would increase by the Co nsumer Price Index under section 44(14) of the Act.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Would any Senator care to speak on this?
Senator Robin Tucker, you have the floor.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President.
And again, thank you to the Junior Minister for bringing these Regulations to this Chamber.
I have just a couple of questions, actually.
One being the Jun ior Minister mentioned the slight
reduction of fees and the savings that are brought back to the sector. Any savings is a good savings, I
think, specifically as it relates to businesses. But I
would like to know if any of those savings will be tric kling do wn to consumers.
The next question I have relates to the nonhigh density spectrum fee. I would like to know what the rationale was for reducing that application fee to
zero rather than reducing it to maybe a lower amount.
If the Junior Minister could prov ide some answers to
that, this would be wonderful.
Thank you, Madam President.
The President: Thank you, Senator Robin Tucker.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, just to
note that these fees are not Government fees, these
are fees funded by the Regulatory Authority. Saving s
in regulation fees are up to the carriers.

The President: Thank you.
Senator Ben Smith.

Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you, Madam President.
Speaking to the reduction in the fee, I wonder
whether the Junior Minister can let us know if this r eduction were put on the fees for last year what the
actual number would be so that we have an idea of what the savings is and what the reduction in the fees
into the Regulatory Authority will be going forward?
Just so we have an idea. It is a lo w percentage number. So when we are talking about reducing costs, it
would just be helpful if we had an understanding of
how much. Like, what is this number?
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith.

[Pause]

The Presid ent: Senator Robin Tucker, you have indicated you have a further question.
Sen. Robin Tucker: Yes, please, Madam President. It actually is not a further ; it is just going back
to the second part of the first question that I asked
concerning the non- high density spectrum fees and
the rationale as to why that application fee was r educed to zero. I don’t believe the Junior Minister an-swered that question.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Robin Tucker.
[Pause]

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: The fee reduction for a nonhigh demand frequency spectrum is again due to the
work and demand required. The non- high demand
frequency spectrum does not get much demand.
Madam President, I do not have the figures,
but we can get those for you at a later date. Or if my
colleagues want, they can go to the Regulatory website and get the actual fees from the website.
The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Are there any other comments from Senators?
No. Then, hearing none, Senator Linds ay
Simmons, you can carry on and pass your Regul ations.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I move
that the said draft Regulation be approved and the
following message be sent to her Excellency the Governor.
May it please Your Excellency: The Senate,
having had under consideration the draft Regulation
entitled the Electronic Communications (Regulatory
Authority Fees) Regulations 2022, proposed to be
made by the Minister responsible for telecommunic ations under the provisions of sections 6 and 11 of the
Electronic Communications Act 2011 as read with section 44 of the Regulatory Authority Act 2011 has
the honour to inform Your Excellency that the Senate
has approved the said draft Regulation.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection. A suitable message will be sent.
Thank you, Senator Lindsay Simmons. And
thank you to all Senators who participated.
[Motion carried: Draft Regulations entitled Electronic
Communications (Regulatory Authority Fees) Regul ations 2022 was approved. ]

The President: We will now move on to item number
four of the Orders of the Day and that is the Cannabis
Licensing Act 2022. This is in the name of the Senator
the Honourable Dr. E. G. V. Peets, spokesman for Legal Affairs and the Government Leader in t he Senate.


Bermuda Senate Minister Peets, you have the floor.

Yes, thank you,
Madam President, and good morning to you and good
morning to Senators here this morning, as well as to the listening public.
Madam President, today for this Honourable
Chamber, I take up the Bill entitled Cannabis Licens-ing Act 2022. I move that it be now read a second
time.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection.
Carry on, Minister.

BILL

SECOND READING

CANNABIS LICENSING ACT 2022

Madam President,
the Cannabis Licensing Act 2022
ushers in a new
regulatory regime licensing all activities involved d irectly or ancillary to the cultivation, import, export,
production, sale, supply, use or transport of cannabis
or medicinal cannabis or products derived from cannabis or medicinal cannabis in Bermuda.
Madam President, before I discuss the merits
of this Bill I would like to take time to detail for the record and for the listening public how and why it is that this Bill is before us again.
The Bill was voted down by this Honourable
Chamber on the 3
rd of March 2021 by six nay votes of
the combined Opposition and the Independent Members. Undeterred, the Government committed to re-table the Bill in the Legislature at a later date. Thus
the Bill was re- tabled in the House of Assembly on the
4
th of March 2022 and debated by that Honourable
House on Friday, the 25th of March 2022.
The Bill has now passed the House a second
time. The Bill is identical to the former Bill which was debated on March 3, 2021. This is a requirement of a
constitutionally prescribed procedure set out in section
38 of the Bermuda Constitution Order 1968. That pr ocedure allows for a Bill to be sent to her Excellency
the Governor for assent due to passing the House on
two occasions.
Madam President, the formers of our Const itution quite rightly recognised the structural limitations
of the parli amentary procedure which would allow an
unelected body to strike down legislation passed by
democratically elected Members of the Honourable
House of Assembly. Thus, a constitutional procedure allows the House of Assembly to have the final say on
whether a Bill is sent for assent to Government
House. This means that much of what this Honourable
Chamber does today is inconsequential in that r espect. Madam President, in my view, those of us in
this Chamber [who] have the ability to move the ne edle today, ha ve an obligation to consider the merits of
this Bill. Further echoing the sentiments of the Honourable Premier on Friday, it is unprecedented in the Westminster system of Government for an Upper
House to strike down legislation that is the subject of a
Government’s Election Manifesto and Throne Speech.
Members of this Honourable Chamber are
making history today. Each vote will be counted one
by one, and each of us will be criticised by certain
segments of society and individuals based on indivi dual persona l views about cannabis and cannabis law
reform.
Madam President, we have heard all manner
of objection from detractors. What we have not heard are any viable legislative or policy alternatives to advance. Based on the House debate last Friday, it is
expec ted that our own debate may take a similar
“Groundhog Day” experience. There is absolutely no reason for me to filibuster in the futile attempts to perhaps move Members opposed to this Bill to see its
merits or perhaps potentially to vote differently. In actuality, we have not heard any substantive critique of
the merits and provisions of the Bill as presented.
Madam President, I might add that this Bill
represents a culmination of a comprehensive public
consultation exercise for which as legislators we have
the unique opportunity to opine, comment, and contribute to an illustrative draft of the Bill during its development. Many of us took up that opportunity.
Therefore, to just vote against the idea of what the Bill
represents without seriously scrutinisi ng the prov isions or offering amendments is intellectually lazy and
amounts to letting down the electorate and the people
of the country. In this Honourable Chamber we have
by some calculation the good fortune of not having to
be directly accountable to the electorate. However,
the way I see it, the lack of democratic agency does
not mean that those of us appointed to this place should act against the democratically expressed will of
the electorate or act as an echo chamber for the m inority views of outside interest.
Needless to say, Madam President, despite
its detractors this Bill remains legally sound and the
underlying policy is unassailable if the Bill is to be taken as a whole for what it is and for what the regulated
cannabis framework will become once it is fully i mplemented. In a simply utilitarian sense this Bill does
the greatest good for the greatest number. It is no
longer feasible for this country to bury our heads in
the sand on the issue of cannabis reform. The drug
will not magically disapp ear if this Bill does not b ecome law. It is absolutely derelict for us as a society,
for all that we know about health, social and economic
costs of the illicit cannabis market and drug addiction, to leave cannabis in the hands of criminal elements.
That i s the stark reality of the status quo. Collectively
we have to know and understand this reality. Drug
408 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate interdiction and law enforcement still disproportionat ely target one segment of society.
Madam President, I presented in this Honourable Chamber a compr ehensive brief on the Bill when
it came before us this time last year. For brevity, I will
not repeat that Statement today, most of which was
repeated in the House last week. Details of the policy,
consultation, as exercised, the international law obl igations at play, racialised disparities in drug enforc ement, and the recognised social and health harms of
unregulated cannabis, et cetera, have been adequat ely ventilated and recorded in Parliament on at least
three occasions.
Turning now to the merits of this Bill, Madam
President, the Bill entitled Cannabis Licensing Act
2022 ushers in a new regulatory regime, licensing all
activities involved (as I mentioned) directly or ancillary
to the cultivation, import, export, production, sale,
supply, use or transport of cannabis or medicinal ca nnabis or products derived from cannabis or medicinal
cannabis in this country . The Bill establishes the Cannabis Licensing Authority to be the statutory regulator
to oversee the issuance of licences, inspection, compliance and enforcement of the cannabis licensing
regime.
The Authority will also make recommendations to the Minister responsible for Drug Prevention
on related policy issues and the administration of the
Act. Provisions in the Bill will permit lawful activities
relating to the cannabis plant, medicinal cannabis,
cannabis products and cannabis -infused food products.
Madam President, the drug data supporting
the Government policy is captured in the Bermuda
Drug Information Network 2018 Annual Report [BerDIN]. I will highlight some of the salient figures.
In the reporting year 2017, some 71,160
grams of cannabis were seized. This accounted for
84.5 per cent of all drug seizures by weight. Criminal
trials for cannabis possession were at 56 with a total
of 18 trials for cannabis possession with intent to supply. Contrastingly, convictions for cannabis offences
were reported as follows : possession, 47 convictions;
intent to supply, 10 convictions; importation, 14 co nvictions; and cultivation, 2 convictions. Only 11 per cent of all total drug arrests in 2017 were for import ation offences.
For the fiscal year of 2017/18 a total estimate
of $9 million was spent on drug treatment; $770,000 on drug prevention; and $5.7 million spent on drug
enforcement and interdiction. Historic ally, the cumul ative go vernment spending for drug use issues is approximately $15.5 million per year. Cannabis enforcement is overly represented in the drain on these
government resources.
Further, Madam President , when analysing
the prison population in 2 017, at least 94 trials for
cannabis offences were initiated. Most of those accused would have spent some time in custody, either on remand or after conviction. The annual cost of
housing a prisoner is recorded at about $70,000 per
year or $5,800 per month. It shows that we were unable to keep cannabis out of the prison system. T he
order of prevalence of drug use reverses once persons are incarcerated, with cannabis overtaking c ocaine and opioids.
Madam President, the status quo has not
been effective at d eterring illegal consumption and
trade in cannabis by any matrix. The illegal market in
cannabis is estimated to be valued at between $6 mi llion and $6.5 million. This puts tremendous strain on
public resources through enforcement, criminal justice
and our health systems.
Under current law, Bermuda has partial d ecriminalisation of cannabis as persons are permitted
to possess 7 grams of cannabis without criminal pe nalty since December 2017. Hemp and CBD formul ations are also legalised in Bermuda since November
2019. The legal definition of hemp is purposefully defined to include cannabis which contains concentr ations of not more than 1 per cent of THC. Further, approved medicinal cannabis pharmaceuticals like Marinol, Cesamet and Sativex are lawfully availabl e
for prescription in Bermuda.
Other formulations of cannabis for medicinal
purposes can be authorised for patients under a l icence by the Minister responsible for the Misuse of
Drugs Act 1972. Globally medicinal cannabis is reg ulated or authorised by law in all of North America,
most of South America, Western Europe, Australia,
and New Zealand.
The Government took a deeper look at how
far cannabis reforms could go. Raising the decriminal-isation amount to above 7 grams of cannabis, similar
to Portugal’s model of wholesale decriminalisation,
was not a feasible option for Bermuda’s size and li mited resources. Therefore, a balancing exercise
acknowledged that full legalisation of cannabis without a robust regulatory framework might have the uni ntended consequence of increasing cannabis abuse
and could negatively impact Bermuda’s pristine reputation. Inadequate regulation would neither dissuade
cannabis use nor eliminate the illegal cannabis market, nor [would it] prevent the known health risks and
associated soc ial harms.
Madam President, the Government’s concl usion was that we need a regulated cannabis regime
tailored to Bermuda which would improve public
health and safety and which is not unjustifiably punitive.
Madam President, the Government is mindful
to ensure that reforms effectively curtail the persi stence of the illegal cannabis market of unknown qual ity and potency and that the inherent exploitation wit hin the criminal enterprise would fade. The longer cannabis use remains criminalised, cannabis users w ould
largely be out of reach of prevention and risk reducBermuda Senate tion protocols and treatment services without also being caught up in the criminal justice system.
Madam President, scientific advances and a ttitudes about cannabis now indicate that the health
risks of using cannabis are lower than that of alcohol
and tobacco. Dependence potential of cannabis is
moderate to low and on par with that of caffeine.
However, local cannabis use data places cannabis
and alcohol side by side as drugs of choice in Berm uda. Reported lifetime consumption rates are at 78.7 per cent for alcohol, 76.5 per cent for cannabis,
and 70.4 per cent for tobacco.
There is no escaping that alcohol and cannabis are cultural staples in a country where almost 99 per cent of people admit to taki ng these drugs in
their lifetime. Law and policy models around cannabis
interventions globally are shifting focus towards ident ifying persons at high risk, modifying risk factors and risky behaviour, and modelling responsible use—the
same as for alcohol —instead of outdated criminality
focused models.
Madam President, the cannabis policy follows
the leading science that signals that health risks for
cannabis users are heightened for adolescents, persons with mental health challenges or a family history
of such, individuals with cardiovascular problems, and
pregnant women. These high- risk factors can be
worsened by initial cannabis use in early adulthood,
near daily cannabis use, smoking cannabis plant m aterial, and by consuming cannabis with excessively
high THC levels. Because illegal cannabis is of u nknown quality or could be laced with other more har mful chemicals or drugs, available data suggests that
contamination of street cannabis could be an aggr avating factor.
The Cannabis Licensing Act 2022 provisions
effectively address each of these risk factors. An ob-jective of the Bill is to restrict access for young persons and discourage inducements to use of cannabis,
specifically persons under 21 are not permitted to
consume or use cannabis under the Bill. It will, ther efore, be an offence to supply or sell cannabis to a person under the age of 21.
Licensees will also have a duty to ensure that
persons under 21 are not employed by retail shops and do not gain access to retail shops and that can-nabis or cannabi s products from retail shops are not
procured for persons under 21. Applicable offences
and penalties are included in the Bill with fines for
non-compliance [being] between $8,000 and $40,000.
Madam President, examples of other saf eguards provided in the B ill are such that the Minister
may, by order, exclude harmful strains of cannabis
from the licensing regime. Availability of cannabis is
being curtailed to approved premises meeting strict
guidelines, and clearly prescribed packaging and de-sign are required. Supply chains will need the approval of the Authority to keep out criminal elements, and
mechanisms for policies and resources and enhanc-ing education, prevention, and treatment for at -risk
groups are also included. Strict security requirements for lice nsed facilities and conditions on licences will be
imposed by the Authority.
Madam President, public education campaigns and outreach will be promptly executed so that
young persons and the general public understand the
known dangers of cannabis in the sam e manner as
we educate on the dangers of alcohol and tobacco.
The Department of National Drug Control and the A uthority will be tasked with collaborating to design and
deliver effective, targeted, prevention campaigns, i mproving understanding of drug abuse, and the development of the best possible responses to it.
The intended messaging will emphasise r esponsible adult use and will be sufficiently nuanced so
as not to demonise positive uses of cannabis. Public messaging ought to coincide and reinforce other
community -wide values exemplified by parents and
family members, educational institutions, and society in general. In addition, the messaging will promote
responsible attitudes and beliefs which will provide young people with the tools to decide on the m ost
healthy course of action in regard to the use of pote ntially addictive substances. Research shows that edu-cational programmes focusing on learning how to
manage emotions and stress do better in addressing the root causes of addiction and dissuading you ng
people away from using addictive substances rather
than direct programmes focusing exclusively on drug
abstinence.
Madam President, licensed cannabis activities
within the Bill’s licensing regime are ultimately d esigned to allow adults to access regulat ed, quality -
controlled cannabis plant material, medicinal cannabis, cannabis products and cannabis -infused food
products for medicinal and personal use. The licence categories are as follows:
• a tier 1 cultivation licence, to allow for the
growing, harvesti ng, drying, trimming or curing
of cannabis for adult personal use;
• a tier 2 cultivation licence, to allow for the
growing, harvesting, drying, trimming, curing
or packaging of cannabis for medicinal cannabis for commercial purposes;
• a cannabis retail shop licence, to allow for the
operation of a cannabis retail shop for the sale of cannabis or the sale and consumption of cannabis;
• an import licence, to allow for the cannabis
and medicinal cannabis planting material for
cultivation from any country from whic h it is
lawful to do so;
• a tier 1 manufacturing licence, to allow for activities relating to the processing of edible
cannabis;
• a tier 2 manufacturing licence, to allow for the
manufacturing of cannabis products or medi cinal cannabis products;
410 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate • an export licence , to allow for the export of l ocally cultivated cannabis to a country in which
it is lawful to do so;
• a research licence, to allow for the conduct of
scientific research relating to the development
of medicinal cannabis;
• a transport licence, to al low for the transport
of cannabis or medicinal cannabis in Berm uda; and
• a cannabis event licence, to allow for the sale
and supply of cannabis at authorised private
or public events of an infrequent, but temporary, nature.
Madam President, collectively, the proposed
Bill creates strict national regulations of cannabis to
be enforced by the Authority and police, each empowered under the Bill to control and regulate cannabis within the framework. HM Customs Department
Officers retain their role and powers f or protecting our
borders from drug trafficking. Ongoing cooperation between agencies will continue under the Bill and is
essential for the integrity of the regime.
Madam President, t he Government of Berm uda is pursu ing all diplomatic and legal options to deliver on its promise to our people, fully cognisant of
the UK’s role to ensure compliance with International Narcotics Conventions extended to Bermuda. However, Bermuda, as a small overseas territory of the UK,
democratically desires for social, cultura l, and public
health reasons to chart its own distinct course in the
difficult area of cannabis reform, while adhering to
international law to the greatest extent possible.
Madam President, the Government of Berm uda has consulted with the UK and Government House
during our law’s development. We also know Berm uda has already passed laws to decriminalise small
amounts of cannabis, and medicinal cannabis is a lready available under our existing law s.
Madam President, Bermuda can be confident
that the pathway t o a regulated cannabis [ legal ]
framework has been trail -blazed by Canada and 36
states within the United States of America. Other j urisdictions further afield, like Uruguay, have a com-pletely regulated cannabis sector with Mexico’s legal
cannabis industry expected to come online by the end
of 2021. Remarkably, Mexico’s legalisation was driven
by a Supreme Court ruling that cannabis use falls under constitutionally protected modes of individual self -
expression and that country’s desire to eradicate drug
cartels.
Canada and the USA , by enacting domestic
laws permitting personal adult use of cannabis and creating regulatory frameworks for cann abis industry ,
are in the position of “ respectful non- compliance” in
regard to the International Narcotics Conventions.
Notwithstanding, neither country has been subject to any sanction by the INCB despite Canada being
called an international rebel and the INCB declaring
its legislated regime to be weakening the drug treaty framework. It is unlikely that Bermuda’s cannabis reforms will be challenged by the INCB when two of the G7 state parties to the Narcotics Convention are notoriously in non- compliance with their treaty obligations.
Madam President, the cannabis policy and
laws emanating from the Americas and the Caribbean
region are more coherent with local views and culture.
Prevailing views in these regions, like those in Bermuda, recognise that contemporary science and risk -
based harm reduction strategies are far more effective at preventing cannabis misuse and illegal trades in
cannabis than a prohibition only approach advocated
by the INCB. The cannabis laws from the model juri sdictions informing this Bill are sensibly consistent with
the overall objective and purpose of the narcotics
conventions, that is, to be concerned with the health
and welfare of mankind.
This Government believes in keeping with the
conclusions of the consultation exercises that a regulated cannabis industry has greater likelihood of safeguarding the health and welfare of our population than
the status quo, systems that criminalise users and
continue to proliferate despite all the best law e nforcement effort s to suppress it.
Criticism that claims that the Bill and regulated
cannabis regime will not have sufficient safeguards for
youth and vulnerable groups can be debunked by the
fact that the Bill contains all of the hallmark provisions as modelled by Canada and other jurisdictions where
cannabis is regulated.
To reiterate, this Bill sets age restrictions for
youth. Participation and employment i n cannabis l icensed activities and criminalises procuring or selling cannabis to persons under 21. This is to protect the
developing brain of adolescents and comports with
the leading science in the area.
In addition, Madam President other saf eguarding el ements in this Bill include the scope for
regulations made under the Bill to set restrictions on
the promotion and packaging of cannabis to ensure
that it does not appeal to youth in the same manner
as alcohol and tobacco products; empower the Mini ster to direct that portions of revenue from licences to
be used for addiction treatment and mental health
programmes; public awareness campaigns to address responsible youths abstinence, first -time use for adolescents up to 21 years of age; public awareness
campa igns directed to pregnant women encouraging
cessation during pregnancy to prevent birth defects or
babies born with addiction and withdrawal symptoms
and criminal offences making it unlawful to provide
cannabis to persons under 21 are included in the Bill
with dissuasive penalties.
Madam President, if we are to consider how
the Bill and framework will ensure that the public health protections are implemented, we can be conf ident that new lawful ways to obtain cannabis and
cannabis -derived products will shri nk the illicit trade in
cannabis and improve the quality and purity of cannaBermuda Senate bis publicly available diverting responsible adults who
wish to take the benefits of cannabis to have options
other than illicit cannabis of an unknown quality. Strict
regulations setting out safety and quality standards for
cultivators and manufacturers will be made under the
ministerial powers contained in the Bill. Safe and controlled cultivation and production practices will be set
by the cannabis authority. Rules and safeguards for
growing cannabis at home will be set by the authority
within terms of the licence. Prohibition on certain
harmful ingredients will be set by the Minister in con-sultation with the cannabis authority. And the Bill sets
restrictions on where adults can l awfully consume
cannabis, for example, in private places, licensed
premises and events and in homes.
Madam President, we might also ask ourselves how the Bill and the Government’s policy and strategy for implementation address public education
to encourage responsible adult use. Some examples
include the cannabis authority will distribute education
materials and provide training programmes for deve lopment of medicinal cannabis and the cannabis i ndustry in general. The DNDC will continue to monitor
and trac k cannabis use data among young people and
adults and provide targeted prevention education pr ogrammes for schools as they already do. Cannabis education and public awareness campaigns will be focused in the same way as for alcohol. Regulations
under the A ct will allow for portions of the revenue of
the cannabis authority to be directed to social pr ogrammes for addiction and education. And charities and third sector stakeholders will be incentivised
through grant funding structures to take an active role on advocacy for responsible cannabis behaviours.
Additionally, Madam President, anyone who
believes the conjecture or the misinformation or perhaps the scaremongering designed to confuse the
public into believing that the Government needs to
use this Bill a s a way to agitate for independence or to
pick a fight with Government House or the UK misun-derstands the ongoing diplomacy required for us to
thrive in the status of a colony in a nation. In fact, the
Government of Bermuda and the UK representatives have a long history of working through challenges and
competing interests to defend and protect Bermuda’s autonomy, internal self -governance and self -
determination. No doubt a diplomatic resolution,
should the Governor decide to withhold assent to this
Bill, will be worked out. This cannot be a legitimate
reason for us as legislators to reject the Bill in this
Honourable Chamber.
Members should also know [that] the UK’s
contribution in response to the cannabis reforms contained in this Bill was to recommend scrapping a regulated cannabis regime altogether. Instead, UK bureaucrats proposed considering wider decriminalis ation of cannabis in the same manner as the Portugal
model where up to 25 grams of cannabis is lawful to
possess. Again, Madam President, what foll owing the Portugal model would essentially entail is a free- forall, unregulated, uncontrolled cannabis marketplace [which] would take shape in this country. Let’s think
about that for moment. The status quo of criminal e lements still running and controlli ng cannabis. There
will be no police or government intervention to put the necessary guardrails in place. It would be near impossible to establish effective safeguards for children,
adolescents and young adults and other vulnerable
groups.
So let us also be clear that the Minister r esponsible for drug prevention already has the power to amend the Misuse of Drugs Act by regulations such
that with minimal formalities cannabis and all of its
derivatives and by -products become fully lawful.
Equally the 7 grams decriminalised amount for pos-session could easily be increased without much legi slative formality. But both of those options would do
nothing to regulate or deter abuse and misuse or di smantle criminal elements.
Madam President, political dynamics aside,
cannabis has already gone mainstream. Industries are
emerging and growing steadily in all of our gateway neighbours. We have fixed our gaze toward Canada
and the United States for example. We are bold
enough to chart our own course to create economic
opport unities for our citizens. The Bill presented
opens the door for a viable, vibrant, equitable cann abis industry in Bermuda. There will not be large m onopolies dominating the industry. We have designed a
framework that encourages entry to business for small
and medium sized businesses, as well as large com-panies.
As we know, the Bill directly incorporates section 6A of the Human Rights Act 1998. Special pr ogrammes under the Act will allow the Government to
ensure that licences are reserved for marginalised
and excluded groups. Any challenges that the regulated cannabis regime will exclude participation by small businesses are not rooted in fact. Overall, the
Bill accomplishes an agile regulatory framework for
cannabis in Bermuda that can grow in line with the
evolutional needs of local industry and can be further
adapted as cannabis regulatory models emerge
across the globe.
Madam President, primary legislation like this
Bill cannot possibly at this stage of the legislative pr ocess capture every eventuality, answer every moral, legal or technical challenge the regulated environment
may face. Nor can it be tailored to match the myriad of
business proposals imagined. Thus we will find that there are regulation- making powers prescribed to the
Minister responsible t o work collaboratively with the
cannabis authority to add specificity to the provisions in the Bill for effective implementation and standard
setting by the regulator.
Expert technical input by industry experts, entrepreneurs, investors, the banking indus try, the Office
of the NAMLC will support and frame the development
412 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate of the regulations made under the Act. Each of these
stakeholder groups will have the benefit of the clear
legal framework of the Bill to inform future regulations.
With their expertise, t hey will have the best understanding of the potential risks associated with any
ambiguities in the licensing regime; identify ways of
improving security issues, safeguards, and dynamics
from within the specific areas they operate. Additiona lly, should it b e necessary, the principal Act can be
amended by regulation.
Madam President, it remains as true today as
it did one year ago, that the totality of the proposed
legislation provides a better effective regulatory control framework for cannabis to displace t he illicit ma rket, protect the youth and vulnerable persons and f inally, redress legal harms afflicting Black families. It
provides fair and equitable access to participate in the
proposed market at a time when the economy and
families are suffering and searching for new economic
opportunities.
Madam President, I must give thanks and certainly highlight today the incredible and tremendous
work that the Ministry and its team and the entire
Counsel have put in the work for this particular brief
and legislatio n. I certainly want to thank this morning,
Counsel Amani Lawrence as well as Alsha Wilson.
There are also other individuals such as Policy An alyst, Jason Outerbridge; and Executive Officer Kristina
DelValle that we certainly want to recognise this mor ning.
So Madam President, with these remarks, I
move that the Bill be committed. Thank you, Madam
President.

The President: Thank you, Minister the Honourable
Dr. E. G. V. Peets, Spokesperson for Legal Affairs and Government Leader in the Senate.
Would any Senator care to speak on this Bill?
Senator John Wight, you have the floor.
Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Madam President.
I would like to thank Minister Peets for his
opening remarks. While I may not share his concl usions, I do respect his views, nonet heless.
I voted against this Bill when brought to the
Senate last year and my opposition to it remains on
many grounds. This is a highly contentious Bill for
Bermuda. Many in our community support this Bill
and, conversely, many in our community are oppos ed
to it. I will choose my words carefully as I express my views on it.
My number one concern about this Bill relates
to the health of Bermudians, and particularly the
younger generations, when we send a clear message
that smoking weed is now an accepted norm in our
society. In a community with so many concerning
health issues, for starters, I am concerned about the
increased mental illness from these new users follo wing the adoption of this now being considered an ac-ceptable norm. The research that I hav e read concludes that cannabis use increases the risk of schiz ophrenia and other psychoses, depression and anxiety. Marijuana affects brain development, especially in
people under the age of 25. When people begin using marijuana as teenagers the drug inhib its the ability to
learn.
Let me repeat that. The drug inhibits the abi lity to learn.
As part of my research for today’s debate, especially in relation to Bermuda’s younger generation, which is Bermuda’s future, I reread Government’s
published National S chool Survey 2019, Report of the
Survey of Middle and Senior School Students on A lcohol, Tobacco, Other Drugs, and Health .
Madam President, if I may read an excerpt
form page 42 of that report, please?
The President: You certainly may, Senator Wight.

Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Madam President.
It states: “ A review of addiction studies show
that use of cannabis in youth is related to one or more
of the following: truancy, low self -esteem, delinquent
behaviours (stealing, vandalism, etc.), having deli nquent friends, hanging out on the streets in boredom, and other behavioural/mental health issues. ”
This is from Government’s own report.
Madam President, we need Bermuda’s
youngest generation to be energised and excited
about the future of this country. The excerpt I just read
is contrary to how I believe we need to be supporting Bermuda’s leaders of tomorrow.
Madam President, [I noted] in my research on
cannabis that when it became legalised in certain
states in the US, communities observed an increase
in hospital and emergency room visits and road traffic deaths, which Bermuda already is experiencing at a
very high and concerning rate. We had two very r ecent tragic deaths on our roads just this past weekend. The personal toll of risking in Bermuda what other jurisdictions have already experienced following
adoptions of similar legislation makes no sense to me.
Madam President, in a discussion I had r ecently with a professional of Bermuda who has been in the field dealing with young adults, I was educated
by her that we already have a percentage of our youth
who are unskilled and undereducated and addicted to
weed. These young people are the most difficult to
support because the weed has become a crutch to
numb the pain of their circumstances. Increasing access to weed is surely to compound an already diff icult job of getting young people healthy and contri buting to our workforce.
Madam President, from a practical perspective, I do not see this Bill as a means to creating jobs for Bermudians who may wish to create their own start-ups. Cannabis as a business is based on scale
and capital. Thus, the individuals most likely to benefit


Bermuda Senate financially from this legislation are not the unemployed
or underemployed who desperately need our support.
Finally, in closing, creating the infrastructure
of a government’s model with members of an authority
appointed, a CEO, and other supporting employees at a time when Government finances are already so
challenged, is not good in my view. My opinion is that
this Bill as brou ght forward is not good for Bermuda
and I will not support it.
Thank you, Madam President.
The President: Thank you, Senator John Wight.
Would any other Senator . . . Senator Michelle
Simmons, you have the floor.
Sen. Michelle Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President, I have spent quite some
time reading the Bill that is before us today, especially since we have had two opportunities to go into it in
detail. This is exactly the same Bill (and that has been confirmed by the Speaker of the House) that we considered in March 2021.
I always want to be fair to the process that we
are charged with here in this Senate and that is of
carefully considering legislation that comes before us.
I do not think that I would say I am intellectually lazy, because I have examined the Bill in detail. I once
again want to thank the Attorney General who gave us
quite a comprehensive briefing last year. That is, the
Independent Senator. And I also want to thank the
technical officers who supported her. And I wil l add, I
thank Minister Peets for his brief today. But Madam
President, my remarks today, although they will be
abbreviated from what I shared last year, are pretty
much the same. I am going to share what I feel is relevant to what we are doing today.
It is clear that the Government wants to establish a cannabis licensing regime, and Minister Peets has shared what the different licences will be. I do not
need to repeat any of that. One of the concerns I
have, Madam President, is that we are sending a very
confusing message to the public. On one hand we
have Government agencies that have been established to work toward drug prevention, drug treatment.
Now we have a new Government programme that is looking toward licensing various activities associated
with a drug that we know causes harm.
Let me just say very clearly, I support the use
of medicinal cannabis as prescribed by a practicing
physician. This has already been addressed in other
legislation, so, again, no need to go there. However, is cannabis a drug that we should be encouraging pe ople to use for recreational purposes? Because that is
what this new industry will consist mainly of. Or is it a
drug that we should be advising people not to use since we know it causes both physical and mental
impairment ? I know that some people say that the health
risk from the use of cannabis is lower or equal to the
health risk from alcohol and tobacco. But does that
take into consideration the period of time over which
someone is going to be using cannabis? Also, does it take into consideration the potency of the cannabis?
I have personally seen and worked with young
people who started using cannabis in their teenage years. And of course, I only worked with teenagers; I
cannot speak to children who are younger than t hat.
But those people who I have seen that have been using cannabis for many years and are now adults cannot function in society in any meaningful way.
Madam President, studies have shown that
cannabis use and addiction are affecting young peo-ple disproportionately. And I have figures from the
United States. I don’t have that much data from Ber-muda, but I will share what I’ve learned from the Uni ted States. People going to rehabilitation for addiction
to cannabis, of that number, 45 per cent are under 21
years of age —45 per cent! When those 24 and
younger are included, the percentage goes up to
55 per cent. That is alarming! As I said, I do not have
the figures for Bermuda.
My colleague, Senator Wight, has already
spoken of some of the effects of cannabis. And I just
want to reiterate that some of the effects on people who use cannabis on a regular basis include distor-tions of time and space, impaired coordination. Maybe
some of that is contributing to the increase of reckless
riding and traffic collisions on our roads. Young people
have difficulty thinking or problem solving. There is memory impairment and definitely there is learning
impairment.
In school -aged students, and Senator Wight
has mentioned this already, I will reiterate, I saw personally behavi ours like truancy, habitual tardiness,
fighting, stealing, vandalism, low self -esteem. Heavy
users of cannabis suffer damage to social life, work or
career status, and cognitive ability. Their mental pr ocessing is severely impaired.
Let me add, Madam Pres ident, that cannabis
use is also associated with increased rates of depression, anxiety and suicide, including adolescent su icide. I would not want to see more people using cannabis. Indeed, I would prefer to see fewer people, especially our young people, engaging in cannabis use.
The national school survey conducted by the
Government in 2019 showed that the onset of canna-bis use was as low as 9.6 years, i.e., students in pr imary school, Madam President. In addition, Madam
President, some of the studies I’ ve read show that
chronic, long- term cannabis use is found to correlate
with a greater incidence of psychosis and schizophr enia. This point is particularly relevant because of i ncreases in drug potency over the last two decades. The average potency, I am t old, has risen from 3 per
cent THC (that is Tetrahydrocannabinol ) a couple of
decades ago to now 9 per cent. And there are some
414 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate samples of cannabis that measure as high as a potency of 25 per cent.
Madam President, I think for me it is the mental health c oncerns that are the biggest concerns for
the long- term use of cannabis. And we have an ever -
growing number of people in Bermuda who are sho wing mental health issues. I cannot say exactly how that has happened, but I would guess, Madam Pres ident, that some of those people have been regular
users of cannabis and other drugs.
Then, Madam President, to make matters
worse, I have spoken with local drug treatment off icials and found the treatment programmes —this is
[those] right now, here in Bermuda—are struggl ing for
funding. So those programmes, if they are proven to
be ineffective, then changes need to be made so that
they can have the desired impact on the communities
who need the assistance.
So, in my opinion, much more needs to be
done to tackle the issues which are associated with drug use. And Government funding —Government
funding, Madam President —is critical to the continuation and the improvement (I would add) of those pr ogrammes.
I am going to refer to page 9 in the Bill.
Clause 15 subsection (4), sa ys . . . and if I may read
this, Madam President?

The President: You certainly may.

Sen. Michelle Simmons: “The Minister may direct
that a percentage of sums received from licence fees
be applied for the following purposes —
“(a) the strengthening of soci al programmes related to
drug abuse prevention and treatment;”
I am not quite sure, Madam President, why
that sentence, the first sentence, says the “Minister may.” Because it means that it is optional as to
whether the Minister will, or how much support the
Minister will give from the sums received from licence
fees.
One of the things I would suggest very strongly is that the “may” should be changed to “shall.” So
that it reads “the Minister shall direct.” And that was
something that I did mention last y ear.
Madam President, many of my comments
have deliberately been focused on the effect, the neg-ative impact of cannabis use on our young people.
According to this Bill, people under 21 will not be permitted to use [it]. However, if this Bill is signed int o
law, we will still, in my opinion, have the problems that we have today with many persons under the age of 21 somehow getting access to cannabis whether it is
through materials sold in licensed premises or, i ndeed, via the black market. We should not fool ou rselves into thinking that the illegal trade in cannabis is
just going to stop. It won’t.
Madam President, in the Bill the intention is,
and it is a good intention, that all cannabis sold at l i-censed premises should be consumed there. It
sounds good. But I don’t know how that will be enforced, and if it will be enforced vigorously. If someone
is, however, caught taking cannabis [away from] a
licensed premise, if they have no more than 7 grams than I think that they will be able to get away with it
because it will be legal —it is legal now, I believe —to
be in possession of no more than 7 grams of cannabis.
Madam President, I am nearing the end of my
remarks, but I just must touch on this notion that the Bill will bring real change and economic opportunities.
I really do not see it.
I spent some time researching how other j urisdictions which have a regulated cannabis trade, have seen economic opportunities extended to other
people who may not have had the opportunity to cr eate a small or medium size bus iness in the past. Let
me just share some information from two states in the
United States, first of all, the State of California.
Since January 1, 2018, the State of California
has had a legal, commercial cannabis market. Al though cannabis has been legal for medical use since
1996, in California the regulated market has just been a fraction of what it was expected to be due to the fact
that there are very few licensed stores. However, far
more cannabis is being grown in the state and is being sold illegal ly in the black market. That is a fact,
Madam President.
It has been estimated that the black market in
California is far larger, much greater than the legal industry and therefore tax revenue has hardly i ncreased at all.
Another state in the United States, Colorado.
Colorado has had legal recreational cannabis since
2014, Madam President. One report I read noted that
cannabis arrests, mostly for sales and possession, were cut by more than half from 2012 to 2017. But
arrests for illegally growing the plant increased by
more than 50 per cent. So, the illegal industry was
taking off. Still in Colorado, seizures of illegal cannabis have skyrocketed as people attempt to circumvent
the state’s licensing regime. I do not know [if] we
could expect anything different here in Bermuda,
Madam President.
So, to summarise my concerns about this Bill,
Madam President, my greatest fear about this Bill is
that there will be increased cannabis use. Even by
people who would never have considered using ca nnabis in the past. T his, in my opinion, will be followed
by an increase in the associated negative issues as-sociated with cannabis use. And I have already mentioned what they are. We do not need another legal
intoxicant in our society.
By the way, the research I studied show s that
there are more than 50 countries that have adopted
medicinal cannabis programmes while only (and ma ybe this is out of date) Canada, South Africa, and Ur uguay, and 14 out of the 50 US States, plus two Terr iBermuda Senate tories and the District of Columbia, have legalised
cannabis recreationally.
So, Madam President, in closing, I have to
ask, What will Bermuda gain if this Bill is signed into
law? The answer, as far as I am concerned is, nothing which will help to improve our community.
Madam President, my fellow Senators, to all
those listening on radio or online, we have to accept responsibility for keeping our families and especially
our young people safe. I am not afraid of criticism for
what I have said this morning. Some people may think that this is a big c oncern for me. I can assure you, it is
not. I would rather live with my conscience and do
what I feel is in the best interest of this country in
speaking against this Bill.
My greatest concern, once again, is this Bill
does nothing to keep our children an d young people
safe. We would be laying a very heavy burden on our
community right now at a time when we need to focus
our energies and our collective wisdom on finding
ways of pulling ourselves out of the economic dol-drums into which Bermuda has lapsed. W ill cannabis
do that? No way! A cannabis industry is not the an-swer.
Madam President, for those reasons I cannot
support this Bill.
Thank you, very much.

The President: Thank you, Senator Michelle Si mmons.
Senators, it is now 12:30. Minister Peets, we
can break for lunch.

Yes, Madam Pres ident.
I invite us to adjourn for lunch.
The President: So we will return at two o’clock.
Senators, the Senate stands adjourned until
2:00 pm. We will break for lunch. Thank you.

Proc eedings suspended at 12:30 pm

Proceedings resumed at 2:00 pm
(Sen. the Hon. Joan E. Dillas -Wright, President, pr esiding)
BILL

SECOND READING

CANNABIS LICENSING ACT 2022
[Continuation of debate thereon]
The President: Good afternoon, Senators and the
listening audience. We have returned from lunch and we are continuing with our Orders of the Day. And this
morning, prior to lunch, we were dealing with the Cannabis Licensing Act 2022 that was presented by
the Honourable Dr. E. G. V. Peets, Spokesman for
Legal Affairs and the Government Leader in the Senate.
We will now continue with the debate and I
would ask if any Senator cares to speak on this Bill?
Senator Robin Tucker, you have the floor.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President ,
and good aft ernoon to my Senate colleagues.
Prior to our going to lunch, a couple of my
Senate colleagues had spoken to concerns that they
have about this particular piece of legislation. I, too,
will add my concerns. And I apologise in advance b ecause I am going to be repeating several things that I
mentioned last year. The reason I have to repeat
those things is because, as we all know, at this time,
nothing has changed.
Many concerns were raised from the debates
in both Houses last year about this particular piece of
legislation, but, for whatever reason, Government has decided to ignore them and re- present the same piece
of legislation with no amendments. It is clear that Government remains steadfast in their pursuit to make
cannabis cultivation, use, and distribution legal without
directly addressing the issues of those who have already been negatively impacted by the justice system
and the social impacts that cannabis use has already had on the many of the vulnerable and others in the
community.
This Bill gives Government control of the local
cannabis industry and encourages persons, by way of creating opportunity, to be in a business that has negative impacts for our mainly Black Bermudian families.
So, Madam President , if you think about it,
mostly it will be —not all —but it will mostly be our
Black people cultivating, marketing and selling to each other. Locally the market is small, as our population is
small. So, as I believe my Senate colleague, Senator
Wight, mentioned where is the market share going to be? Because we need more people in this country.
So, Madam President , with that in mind then,
if we are selling to each other in terms of our Black cannabis entrepreneurs selling to our local Black peo-ple, who are we going to blame after that when things,
obviously, continue on the decline?
As stated last year, Madam President , this
legislation offers little protection for children and adolescents and persons with mental health challenges,
addicts or other vulnerable populations. And frankly,
Madam President , I am shocked at those who have
involvement with children and with other aspects that will be touched—the people—that will be touched by
this particular legislation in terms of the negative i mpacts. That they would support this is shocking to me.
Research regarding cannabis and teen deve lopment says that teen brains are not fully developed
until around 25 years old. We have heard this before
and it bears repeating. In my research I found that the
416 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate CDC noted that negative effects of cannabis for chi ldren inc lude: increased risk of mental health issues,
impaired driving, declines in school performance, and
potential for addiction.
Madam President , if I may, I would like to read
a quote that I also read last year from the Government of Canada’s Fact Sheet on C annabis. It says: “Cannabis use that begins early in adolescence that is fr equent and continues over time has been associated with increased risks of harm. Some of those harms
may not be fully reversible. Youth are especially vul-nerable to the effects of c annabis on brain develo pment and functioning. This is because THC in cannabis affects the same biological system in the brain that
directs brain development. ”
I do not know how much more we need to talk
about youth and the impacts that cannabis has on our
youth.
Madam President , the Bill allows for cannabis
retail shops to sell dried cannabis, cannabis oils, ed ibles and other forms of cannabis. Edible cannabis includes things like baked goods, like cookies and
cupcakes and gummies and candies and even swee tened beverages and ice cream. I was watching a
documentary not too long ago that talked about this
whole issue of edibles and they showed, obviously,
packaging and all of this and a lot of the packaging looks exactly like, for instance, I saw one of the packages that was modelled after KitKats. If you were not paying attention, it looks like a package of KitKats. So,
how, as an adult, if you are going to . . . if you disti nguish between what is the cannabis product versus
the original product, a child may not necessarily be
able to do that as easily.
So, Madam President , I would like to stay on
the issue of edibles and young children for a minute
because edibles can easily be mistaken for regular
food and pose risk of serious health impacts for young
children and will likely increase with the passing of this
Bill. A study published by the Journal JAMA Pediatrics
stating that “in Colorado” (which, obviously, legalised
cannabis for recreational use back in 2012) “the rates
of marijuana exposure in young chil dren, many of
them toddlers, have increased 150 per cent since
2014, when recreational marijuana products, like sweets, went on the market legally.”
Now, I do not know about you, Madam Pres ident, but I have little grandchildren and getting around
town and getting into, you know, going to events, I see
lots of little children around. Would I want to be the
one to stand before that parent who has had to take
their child to the Emergency Room because they have mistakenly ingested edibles, thinking that they w ere
cookies or candy or what have you? I would not.
Last year I raised this point and then I said
that there was not much stated in this Bill about man-dating child resistant packaging for edibles and appl ying appropriate warning labels. That, to me, is a very
big deal. And that, in my opinion, is low -hanging fruit that the Government could have made an adjustment
on because if, what I recall from last year, a lot of the
concern—not all of it —but a lot of the concern was
around the impacts that this legislation and what this legislation would have on our adolescents and our children. We have to do the best we can to protect
them.
It is no secret, Madam President , that many
young people —adolescents, teens and young
adults —in Bermuda are using cannabis. None of us
are walking around here with our heads in the sand
thinking that they are not, but they are. So, whether
they are smoking or vaping or dabbing or shatter, ea ting or drinking it, we have a duty and a responsibility
to make sure that we do not provide a framework for
these children that will have unintended consequenc-es by letting them think that this is okay. There are mental health ramifications, there are physical ramif ications. Every decision has a consequence.
Now, while some people might argue t hat it is
a parent’s responsibility to train their children —and
they are right, it is a parent’s responsibility to train
their children. However, it is also a community r esponsibility. When it is convenient we say that it takes
a village to raise a child— only when it is convenient.
But when we see . . . once upon a time when we used
to see children going wrong—and I am old enough to remember —we used to see children going wrong and
set them straight whether the parent was there or not.
And as a Government bo dy, the Government, one
would expect . . . certainly, I am a voter, I am a taxpayer, just like everybody else in this room and ever ybody that is listening. Government has a responsibility not to provide a framework that is going to be detr imental to the people.
I get the whole economic part of it. I get it.
However, I am not prepared to trade in making money at the expense of the people. That is what it was
about for me last year; it remains that for me this year. And I am surprised that . . . I am not the only one that
made mention of this last year. There were others as
well. And that is what is equally shocking to me, that
the Government has made no adjustments.
Madam President , on the mental health point,
from research that I have done, the Government of Canada noted that cannabis use increases the risk of
developing mental illnesses like psychosis and schi zophrenia . We k now it. Another troubling statement out
of Canada is that frequent cannabis use has been
associated with the increased risk of suicide, depression and anxiety disorders . We heard that earlier t oday. We heard that last year. Where are the guar drails, Madam President ?
We often talk about how much we care about
our vulnerable population. So what are we doing to protect them for real in this legislation? And I am not
saying . . . I am not saying that there is nothing in
here. I am saying that this legislation does not go far


Bermuda Senate enough to make sure that our children and our vulnerable populations are protected.
Madam President , despite popular myt hs,
people can become addicted to cannabis and develop
what is known as a cannabis -use disorder. This disorder has been added to the DSM- 5, which is the American Psychological Association’s Manual used for assessing and diagnosing mental disorders.
Madam P resident , there are local social and
medical . . . this is a question. This is a question:
Where are the local social and mental health cannabis
impact studies so that we can have reliable data that
speaks to what we can expect to see now and 10
years from now if this legislation passes? Because
that is where we are going to see the effects. We will
have people celebrating this day in 10 years’ time and
we will see the effects.
Now, I know that people in this room have
younger children. And right now, when you have
younger children you have more of that control. My
children are in their 30s. I have already been there in helping to guide them through with my grandchildren.
But, Madam President , the decisions that are made in
this Chamber and in the other plac e will impact those
children. And once the genie is out of the bottle, there is no going back. Are you prepared for what is coming
down the pipelines if there are no parameters in place to really provide some protection?
Our schools and social service agencies are
already challenged. We have heard it time and time
again. We pick up the newspaper. We see what is
happening with the children with the violence and the
issues that the young people are having. We have enough social problems in this country, Madam President, and this legislation does not help. Without putting those guardrails in place it does not help. What is
in this legislation is insufficient. For example, if som eone is in a cannabis retail shop and they sell to som ebody that is under 21, the penalty is like $2,000? Is
that a deterrent? I wonder. It is not a deterrent to me.
Research suggests that legalised cannabis
results in increased use. So what additional support services will be in place to assist? Now, I have heard that . . . and Senator S immons in her presentation
read out a section of the legislation that speaks to how some of these funds are supposed to be used in terms of education and all of that. But Madam Pres ident, we heard that with the sugar tax. How confident
can we be that this is actually going to manifest? And
what percentage of those funds is going to go towards
that?
I heard someone say not too long ago, that
we are going to break people, but then we are going
to invest money to fix them? That is a bit nonsensical
to me.
So, Madam President , to be clear, I have no
issue with the decriminalisation aspect. Obviously, the medicinal cannabis aspect has already been dealt
with. I have no issue with that. My issue is that there are insufficient guardrails to protect our children. T he
country already struggles with alcohol and substance abuse issues, physical and mental health challenges,
people are self -medicating. Some of the very people
that we are trying to make sure that this legislation
services are self -medicating. We have cri me, limited
and over -subscribed support services, our educational
outcomes are poor on a large front, job loss, I could go on and on. Why would we add another burden to
this country right now? It is nonsensical. It is nonsensical.
So, Madam President , I do not have much
more to say other than this. The question is, What
side of history do I want to be on? I am not a person
that cares about popularity. I am not moved by . .
. someone taught me a very long time ago, do not be
moved by people’s praise or their criticism. And I have
taken that to heart.
What I am worried about is the people of this
country. So, while sometimes things are going to be
unpopular, I am comfortable with that. What I aim to
do here is to add my voice that can hopefully bring about some changes at some point so that we can
meet the needs of those people who want this and
those people that do not. There is a median there
somewhere, but we have to make sure that our first
priority is protecting our children and our vulnerable population. And that is not just by our words; it is in
our deeds and our actions.
Thank you, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Senator Tucker.
Would any other Senator care to speak on
this Bill?
Senator Lindsay Simmons, you have the floor.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President , I want to thank the Atto rney General for bringing this Bill back through. I would
like to say, first and foremost, that I have never used
cannabis. But I support this Bill, Madam President .
This Bill, in my opinion, is doing all that it can to saf eguard our children, and that was my main concern
when reading this Bill.
Madam President , any policy on regulation of
cannabis has to primarily consider the potential i mpacts on children and young persons. The Gover nment fully shares public uneasiness about the potential for negative impacts on our young people. Madam
President , there is now an illicit market in Bermuda
already that exposes children to cannabis. I have seen this first -hand—children with laced cannabis. So,
I think that this will help to protect everybody, including children.
The Cannabis Licensing Bill creates more effective control to limit access to young persons. Pe nalties now exist for obtaining or giving cannabis to a
person under 21. A y oung person found with cannabis
418 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate will be automatically diverted into educational and
treatment services.
Madam President , this Bill sets an age r estriction of 21 to obtain a licence, to work in a licensed
establishment, and to consume cannabis or cannabis
products.
Madam President , Bermuda is following the
Canadian model which sets the age limit to 21 and not 18. Madam President , an age limit of any higher than
21 risks potential exposure . . . children age group . . .
to criminal supply of cannabis. Also, constitutional claims of discrimination could occur.
Madam President , the licensing regime will
also include restrictions on promotion and packaging of cannabis directed to the youth. So I think this ad-dresses what Senator Tucker was talking about. Add itionally, express provisions placing restrictions on packaging of cannabis and cannabis products so that
they are not seen to be appealing to youth will be i ncluded in the legislation package.
Madam President , the Cannabis Licensing
Authority will work in partnership with the Department
of National Drug Control to develop educational pr ogrammes for school -aged persons with an emphasis
on personal responsibility and abstinence. We are not promoting young persons to use cannabis. The DNDC
will continue to monitor and track cannabis use data among young people and adults to supply reports to
the Minister responsible for Drug Prevention.
Madam President , cannabis use is not to be
done in public. And also, Madam President , it is laid
out in the Bill that you cannot sell, or have a business
outside of a school or a church within 100 feet. So, this will also help to keep it away from our children.
Madam President , this also protects the public
from dangerous strains of cannabis. The Minister may
restrict the sal e, supply, cultivation, importation or
manufacturing of certain strains of cannabis or medical cannabis.
Madam President , also, can I read something
from last year —

The President: Yes, you may, Senator Simmons.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: —in our Hansard?
Madam President , Senator Robin Tucker, I
was just listening to her and I found it interesting be-cause this is what she said last year:

1“I have heard quite a bit in the community,
people have made comments that parents need to
educate their children. And that is 110 per cent true.
However, Madam President, if we are honest, not all parents are responsible. And some parents need to
be educated themselves on the potential harmful effects of cannabis. We have people in this country, we
have parents in this country who are using cannabis

1 Bermuda Senate Official Hansard Report 3 March
2021, page 189 with their children. We need to tell the truth about
what is happening here. Some parents have intr oduced it to their children. I know of a little child who is
five years old who has been taught how to roll a joint.
Not everybody is responsible.”
So, with that said, Madam President , if people
know that these things are happening, we need to
report them to the Department of Family Services, to
the courts, to the police. Because if I knew of som ebody that was rolling a joint as a f ive-year-old, I would
definitely have to —

POINT OF CLARIFICATION

Sen. Robin Tucker: Madam President , excuse me,
point of clarification, which I also clarified this last year
as well.
The point of clarification is that I knew of , and
this was quite some time ago. I only made the stat ement to make it relevant to what is happening today.
Thank you. I just do not want people thinking
that this is something that I knew about last . . . that
was recent last year.
Thank you, Madam President .

Sen. Lindsay Sim mons: And I am not saying that
you knew about it last year or the year before, my
point in bringing that up is that we all have a respons ibility, like you said, to protect our children from an ybody who is teaching them —especially at five—to roll
a joint. S o, I just want to emphasise that we, as a
community, have to do our part as well.
This legislation that is coming through is gi ving us a framework to help protect our most vulner able—our children.
Madam President , in closing I just want to say
the Minis ter that is responsible is going to make sure
to keep the operations of this Act under review. After two years of the law being in operation, the Minister is responsible for conducting a comprehensive review
and reporting this to the Legislature.
Thank you, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Would any other Senator care to speak?
Senator the Honourable Emily Dill, you have
the floor.

Thank you, Madam
President .
I would like to first of all thank Minister Dr.
Ernest Peets for his very thorough presentation of the
Bill and the information that he provided us this mor ning. I would also like to thank my Senate colleagues
for sharing their concerns regarding the use of cannabis, albeit they s omehow failed to address the issue of
regulation. It was my expectation that the passage of
time that has allowed the Government to address the


Bermuda Senate concerns that were raised last year and begin to put in
place necessary measures and, as Senator Tucker
said, guardrails that will complement the proposed
legislation, had also helped to allay the fears that were
expressed previously by my Senate colleagues.
We are also anticipating that it will assist us in
the expeditious approval of the Cannabis Licensing
Act 2 022 and the attaining of the assent of Her Excellency the Governor as we endeavour to put in place a
much -needed regulatory framework that will further
support the legalisation, which was passed almost five
years ago to decriminalise the use of marijuana i n
Bermuda.
Madam President , I can honestly share that
as a Minister of Religion, I was not initially supportive of legislation that, at first glance, appeared to encourage the recreational use of marijuana. However, upon
serious reflection, prayer, and a dive into the history of
the criminalisation of the use of cannabis in various
territories, including Bermuda, and the emerging r esearch related to its medicinal properties, I concluded
that I was much more comfortable with the adoption of
a less punitive modality to address and encourage the
discontinuation of the use of cannabis as a recreational substance and/or a panacea for emotional pain,
as opposed to the existing regulations, which had
criminalised the use of the substance and, in many instances, deprived individuals of numerous opport unities to advance in life, most of which were already outlined by Senator Peets in his brief. It will also allow
Bermudians access to cannabis as a medicinal substance without the involvement of a criminal element.
Madam President , as an educator, minister,
and counsellor, like you, I have seen first -hand the
effects of drug addiction and the devastation that it
can cause in individuals, families, and the community
at large.
But, Madam President , I have also seen first -
hand young persons who have experimented with
drugs or turned to them as an escape from the pain
they were experiencing at a particular time, turn
around, learn new coping strategies, and go on to
forge bright futures and make tremendous contrib utions in their field of endeavour and, ultimately, to this
community and even the world at large. And I dare say that the latter far outweighs the former. With car-ing adults investing in the lives of our youth, including
teachers, counsellors, sports coaches, parents,
church congregants, and even loving neighbours, we
have seen lives transformed and countless individuals
go on to realise their full potential.
I especially would like to highlight the multi -
ministry initiatives that have been developed to address the issues that both youth and adults face, the
continuing efforts of this Government to address matters that may arise and, most importantly, putting a regulatory framework in place.
Madam President , I therefore, applaud legisl ation that no longer demonises t he choices that indivi d-uals make in an effort to self -medicate in order to
numb the pain caused by their stark personal realities. With that in mind I resolve that legislation that elim inates the criminality of the use of cannabis requires a regulatory fra mework that governs its cultivation and
ultimate distribution. It is also necessary to protect
individuals from prosecution and safeguard our community from illicit trading, which in recent years has
seen an increase in tainted supplies that have been
laced with other substances.
These regulations also provide for the esta blishment of businesses that will allow individuals to develop as entrepreneurs, and the Bermuda comm unity to have access to new health alternatives that
have been used in other jurisdicti ons to address a
wide range of maladies.
Madam President , I listened with interest to
the House of Assembly last Friday and I also read the
[Hansard] of the March 3, 2021, sitting of this Senate
Chamber in order to understand the reluctance of some of my esteemed colleagues to the passing of
this proposed Bill. While some of the arguments raised last Friday seemed somewhat foolhardy or, at
times, even laughable, I noted that the majority of the
objections that were raised by the Members in this
body were borne out of a genuine concern for the
youth in our community and the future of Bermuda as a whole. Serving on these honourable bodies brings with it a weightiness.
Madam President , I believe that we all have
assumed this role out of a sincere desire to posi tively
contribute to our community and to ensure a better Bermuda for the generations to come. Therefore, we
must be careful not to be governed by fear and images of the worst -case scenarios. In our quest to a dvance our particular argument or political vie wpoint we
must be sure that we are not inadvertently falsely
magnifying situations in order to make a point and
mislead the community at large regarding the issue at hand. The discussion regarding the decriminalisation
of cannabis took place in 2017 and this honourable
body voted in favour of that Bill passing at that time.
We must now choose between an illegal market of
cannabis versus a regulated market.
Madam President , we must now do due dil igence to ensure that the regulatory framework is put in place to further advance that legislation and keep
our community safe—safe from getting cannabis
laced with other poisonous substances, safe from r esponsible adults having to sneak to purchase cann abis, safe from being demonised and labelled as crim inals for the use of a substance that is less harmful . . .
that has been determined to be less harmful than alcohol and tobacco, which are both legal and have
regulatory frameworks in place that govern their acquisition and distribution. [And keep our community]
safe from the advancement of diseases that can be
treated by the use of cannabis.
420 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate Madam President , in the limited time that I
had to prepare for this discussion I attempted to r esearch the effect that the legalisation of cannabis has
had on multiple jurisdicti ons. I found that there were
multiple studies that attempted to advance both points
of view, some of which we heard this morning. But at
the end of the exercise, I found that a study by the
CATO Institute entitled “The Effect of State Marijuana
Legalizatio ns: 2021 Update” best told the truth. This
Policy Analysis No. 908 by the CATO Institute con-ducted a study of the 13 US states that have legalised the personal use of marijuana since 2012. And may I
please quote, Madam President ?

The President: Yes, you m ay, Senator.

“New research finds
that the strong claims made by both advocates and
critics of state ‐level marijuana legalization are substantially overstated and in some cases entirely wit hout real ‐world support. ”
It goes on to state, “ The absence of significant
adverse consequences is especially striking given the
sometimes ‐dire predictions made by legali zation opponents. ”
Madam President , with this in mind let us r emain focused on the issue at hand and responsibly
pass this legislation, which will put in place a regulat ory framework that is necessary to support the former legislation that was made to decriminalise the use of
cannabis. In response to the presentations made by
my esteemed colleagues, some of the research I
found showed that one state reported a 50 per cent
decrease in the rate of alcoholism following the legal isation of marijuana and a resultant decrease in
healthcare costs [due] to the reduction of ailments related to heavy drinking, such as liver disease, pa ncreatitis, cancer, ulcers and gastro- intestinal pro blems, immune system dysfunction, brain damage, osteoporosis, heart disease, m alnourishment, and vit amin deficiencies, and fewer accidents and injuries.
There is also an ongoing debate in the field of
psychology as to whether the mental illness seen in
patients that use marijuana is as a result of their mar ijuana use or whether their use of marijuana has d eveloped as a result of their mental illness. So, there are, indeed, varying perspectives.
As we continue to work with the US Depar tment of Immigration to address issues surrounding the US Stop List and with the appropriate local autho rities on the expungement of records, we can be conf ident that those who have been erroneously labelled as criminals will soon see a turnaround. In the mean-time, we must do the work today of ensuring that we
pass this Bill to put a regulatory framewor k in place for
the cultivation and ultimate distribution of cannabis in
Bermuda.
Thank you, Madam President .
The President: Thank you, Senator Reverend Dr.
Emily Dill.
Would any other Senator care to speak?
Senator Ben Smith, you have the floor.
Sen. Ben Smith: Thank you and good afternoon,

Good afternoon.

Sen. Ben Smith: Madam President , as others who
have spoken today have stated, we were here last
year when we debated this Bill the first time. We have
had a year to reflect on it and on what was debated
when we were here during that last session. And the
decision was taken to turn back this Bill.
Madam President , I remember, maybe a couple of weeks after that decision had happened, hear-ing on the radio a public servi ce announcement, that I
believe came from the National Drug Council, regar ding the use of cannabis and trying to dissuade our
young people from participating in cannabis. And I found it interesting at the time that we had just turned
back this cannabis Bil l to now hear this public service
announcement on how we needed to protect our
young people from something that we had just di scussed commercialising.
As I was preparing for this debate, Madam
President , the thing that I started to think about was
that i t is not just the message that you give, but som etimes it is the messenger. So, Madam President , on
one hand we are telling our young people that they should not be participating in cannabis. And Madam
President we all know that there are young people
that are partaking in cannabis today. We also know
that there are young people that are partaking in t obacco usage and alcohol usage. And there is regul ation already in place for tobacco and for alcohol and
there is a still a continuation of young people using
them. And the access to those is quite open because
of that regulation.
So, you draw a line while you are trying to
help, but you have to look at the entire picture. In that picture some people will say that by making alcohol
legal you got rid of the outl aws, you got rid of the pe ople that were being incarcerated for dealing with that
drug. But at the same time in Bermuda now there is
access, right? So, that is the trade- off. It is comfortable for everyone to participate in drinking alcohol and
it is accep table. Over an extended period of time that
is what it has come to. Yes, there are some people in
our country that do not participate and do not think
that it is the right thing for our country, and we also
see that there are results of drinking alcohol wi th
some of the deaths on our roads, some of the same
issues that Senator Dill just pointed out that can be
physical impacts on your health from alcohol.
But Madam President , when you move cannabis in the direction that we are moving it, with the


Bermuda Senate goal to make it safer, with the goal to regulate it so
that our young people are not participating in it, with
the goal to change the illegal black market from happening, are we also regularising, making people feel
comfortable with cannabis in a way so that, as we move forward, the usage of it becomes more popular?
So, I asked the question of some young people who are athletes, Do you have classmates that are
using cannabis? And quickly the answer was yes. It is
quite widespread in Bermuda, as we have heard from
some of the data that has been provided. The difference that they have said to me is that they have to
really work hard to have access to it. I am not saying
that this is good, because it is illegal; what they are
having to get is illegal. What I am telling y ou is that at
present, even though it is illegal for young people to
have access to alcohol, because alcohol is widespread in the Island they have the ability to get it . . .
from maybe a liquor cabinet in a house or from som ebody else who has purchased it . We would be naïve
to think that this is not going to happen with the reg ulation because it will.
But back to my point of not just the message
but the messenger. I remember the first time this topic
came up, and I thought to myself it is a very difficult
thing to have the Minister of Sport have to be the person that speaks to this subject, specifically, because
everything that the Minister of Sport is supposed to do is about the development of our young people in a
positive way. But, Madam President , we have a portion of our athletic population that cannot be selected
on national teams and cannot travel —not because
they are on the Stop List —because they cannot pass
the weed test. That is not something that is not true.
We have a testing policy in place in Bermuda
to protect our athletes from that behaviour. But today,
the Minister responsible for those athletes is having to
stand up here and embrace that exact item that is
keeping all of those athletes from being able to parti cipate for their country.
Madam President , the Minister of National
Security (and here, the Junior Minister of National S ecurity) is responsible for all of those different agencies
in charge of protecting [Bermuda]. Well, Madam President , at present there are multiple people who would
love to be employed in those services but they cannot
because they cannot pass the weed test. That is the
reality of what we have. Once again, the message that
we are sending is that the people who are responsible
for those Ministries are having to speak out in support
of something that a public service announcement tells
you is not good for you.
We cannot get confused. The medicinal
side—everybody in here echoes the same thing—[we
are] 100 per cent behind it, 100 per cent support, and
last year it was the s ame. Nothing has changed. But
then we have the decriminalisation, which was the
original position . . . this is what we are trying to stop.
We are trying to stop our young men and women from losing opportunities because of getting caught with a
small amount of cannabis that impacted their lives.
There are people that have had their lives ruined for a
small amount of cannabis.
But, Madam President , we have heard it r epeated here today. Decriminalisation already hap-pened. The OBA was putting it together; the Gover nment took it over the line. So, I guess my first question
is . . . the Minister who gave the initial brief talked
about what happened in 2017. Can we have the st atistics that show what impact decriminalisation has had on convictions for possession as we moved into
the following years to see if that change that we i mplemented actually had the impact we were looking for? Because Madam President , as we sit here our
decision should be based off of real data.
We can look all around the world at different
jurisdictions that have implemented their plans and
programmes. But Madam President , a year ago this
Senate Chamber turned this back and we gave rea-sons why we were turning it back —multiples. And I
reject the idea that this was intellectual laziness by us.
To not do anything in between there, to bring back the exact same Bill from last year only changing the date,
without implementing the things that were discussed
in this Chamber, seems extremely odd to me.
And yes, yesterday a request came across for
us to potentially put questions to technical officers.
But, Madam President , with the amount of things that
we discussed last year that needed to be changed
within the Bill, we are not going to be able to fix that in
24 hours. That is a discussion that should have ha ppened over the past year that did not happen.
Madam President , as we are discussing the
Bill— the same Bill that we discussed last year —I think
it is important that we get some answers, because
there has been a year for those answers to be provi ded. So, when you look at what has happened in other
jurisdictions —bigger jurisdictions, that have more f inances, more support, in order for them to take care
of their population —we have sat in this Chamber over
the last few days realising that Bermuda does not
have those resources. We cannot take care of our
people the same way.
So, we have to decide which group we are going to help. And I, along with other people in this Chamber, have spoken to the good people in social
services and rehabilitation and they are saying that
they are stretched to the limit before we pass this Bill.
The people in mental health are stretched before we
pass this Bill. Our young people are falling behind in
education. What is our answer for the impact that
cannabis has on learning? We cannot just push it
aside and say because presently there are young
people who are smoking weed we should just co mmercialise it and make it more available. That is not how we fix that situation.
And Madam President , this idea that we are
going to protec t the people by putting a line on it that
422 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate says it is 21 years old, some of my Senate colleagues
before me have spoken to the age of development —
25. In some cases, you will read that the male brain
takes until 28 to fully form.
Madam President , we have a pr oblem in
Bermuda with our young Black males being able to be employed. There are generational obstacles that have
been put in front of them. We have discussed them
over and over again. There are people who are doing
everything they possibly can to change t hose issues
in our community. Just because, presently, that group
of people—some of them, not all of them —are partic ipating in the illegal cannabis business and in the ca nnabis consumption, does not mean that we should
say, That’s okay, and we can give it to you. At some
point you have to decide, well, what is in the best i nterests of the community? Because I heard earlier that
the Senate that turned the Bill back was speaking on
behalf of the minority because the Government had a
mandate to put this forwar d and the unelected turned
it back, including the unelected from the Government
side who were in this Chamber to have their position
heard.
So, yes, you can continue to say that the
Senate Chamber is irrelevant. But, Madam President ,
we have a role to play . And last year the Senators in
this Chamber took their responsibility seriously and
asked too many questions that did not have answers.
And for that reason, we voted it down. One year has
passed; no answers. And now we are expected to
change our position without having the answers pr esented to us.
So, Madam President , we are in a position to
get rid of the black market based off of the regulation
and commercialisation of cannabis. So, today, how
much is it that the black market is charging for a gram
of cannabis? The reason I ask that question . . . and I
know that there is an answer out there because, obv iously, when somebody gets caught with cannabis,
there is a street value to it. So there is an assumption
that we know about what that cost is. I want to know,
now, since we have done all of our homework to pr ovide what is going to happen next, what is going to be
the cost of the regulated version of that gram that will
include health insurance and social insurance and
electrical bills and all the other thi ngs that happen
within our country? because We cannot be naïve that
this is not what business looks like in Bermuda.
Being in business in Bermuda is expensive.
Being in business in Bermuda has a bunch of red tape
attached to it that you have to get through those hurdles in order to have the business operate. We know that because we spend hours here discussing all of
those regulations that we have to put in place one after the other. The black market does not deal with
that.
So, the question is, oh, well, t hey are going to
move from the black market over to the regulated ver-sion, can the Government provide the statistics of what has happened in all the jurisdictions that we
have heard about up until now on implementing that
regulation and what the cost of im plementing that regulation is? Because remember, everything that we do in Bermuda is expensive. Increased regulation means [more] people having to deal with that regulation. It
means our police force is going to have to enforce the
things that are going to be changing because of this
regulation. And we know that the police force does not
have a budget big enough to deal with what they have
[to do] today.
So, as we move forward, we should have
these answers in advance. How much is it going to
cost to increas e the support in psychotherapy, in
healthcare for people that, potentially, as my colleague mentioned, inadvertently eat an edible and end
up in our ER? I know we are not supposed to be in the game of scaring people away because we cannot talk
about what m ight happen. But, Madam President , it
only takes one child in Bermuda to end up in the ER in
psychosis because they have eaten an edible that
looked like a brownie or a gummy bear. One! You
think the parents of that child are going to think, Well,
it’s jus t one child? This is not about scaring anybody;
it is about having the information in place, putting the
structure in advance, before we let this out.
Madam President , healthcare is already expensive in Bermuda. We have talked about it endles sly. How is ha ving cannabis commercialised helping
with that? Has there been analysis done on the potential impact on our community and on our healthcare
system?
Has there been analysis done with the Bermuda Tourism Authority on the impact that it will have on our tour ism product? Because, Madam President ,
we are an expensive high -end jurisdiction, we have
been told over and over again. So, yes, there are
some people who travel for cannabis use. Is that the
product that we, presently, are aiming for? Because I am not sure that the same people who are coming in
for the $650 room is the target audience. I could be
wrong; but I will hope that the Government has the
answer to that question.
Madam President , we are an international
business jurisdiction. We found in the last couple of weeks that international business has taken on most
of the employment in our country. Presently, we are a
very specific kind of jurisdiction and we know that the
entire world is battling for the same market. Does this
affect our image? I am not s aying one way or the ot her. My question is, where is the analysis presented to
us that lets us know that everybody should feel comfortable with where we are going? Because, as has
been said before, you cannot put the genie back in the
bottle. And the quest ion is, are we actually sure that
the majority of our population is in agreement with this—the majority? Have we done something that lets
us know for sure? Because the Government has di smissed [the reason] that the Opposition and IndeBermuda Senate pendent Senators turned this back, that reasons to
protect the population were incorrect and that we had
not done our homework and that we were saying
things that were not true. But in one year they have
done very little to address what was presented.
Madam President , have we seen in other j urisdictions increases in behaviour that, in Bermuda,
we cannot afford to increase—t he black -market bus iness that we have heard several times we are trying
to challenge against? Will we have a situation with the
setup of this framework that we are actually increasing
the amount of criminal activity? Increasing the level of
criminal activity?
Some people might ask, Well, why would he
say that? Because presently we have people that are
robbing the supply chain of the black market. If they see money that is being created, that we are taking
from the same pie . . . because, remember, Berm uda’s population size is not growing. We do not have
the ability to increase that overnight. So what you are
doing is taking the resources from the group that has been doing this all this time. Now the Government can
tell me whether the black market has been wiped out
in all those other jurisdictions that we heard about. My
initial research tells me that this is not the case. The
black market is flourishing. And I brought up the point
earlier about the cost of it.
The other piece is that the Government is tel ling us that they want to regulate the quality. Well, that
means they also want to regulate the THC level. But
people who are smoking weed to get high are act ually
looking for the THC level. That is not going to stop. So
now if the regulated version is more expensive, and the regulated version does not give them the same
high, how are we impacting their business model?
The danger is that what we are doing is increasing the
people who want access to cannabis. Because now
that it is legal, the ones who thought about doing it but
did not want to deal with the illegal version are now
more willing to try.
Madam President, there are too many questions [about] what our country is going to look like af-ter this regulation, which have not been answered, for us to support this blindly. And then after all of that, we
get to the crux of another issue.
The Government presented a Bill that was
turned back by the Senate. A year later, the same Bill,
except for a changed date, has been presented. In
between those two dates, we have heard that the
Governor and Government House, potentially, will not
give this royal assent. Knowing that information, why
wouldn’t we make some kind of change? Why
wouldn’t there be some consultation to figure out how
we can get around it? And if we cannot, and you know
that the Bill is putting us in that situation, then bringing
it today is for what reason?

Sen. Owen Darrell: Point of information, Madam
President. The President: Yes, Senator Darrell, what is your —

POINT OF INFORMATION

Sen. Owen Darrell: I have been made to understand
there was an offer [by] the Opposition to offer
amendments to this Bill, to offer some change, and
none were coming.

Sen. Ben Smith: I already spoke to that.
Madam President, I already spoke to that. I
spoke to that earlier in my statement. I said that yesterday we were given the opportunity to send questions for the technical officers. It was within 24 hours.
The P resident: Speak to the Chair.

Sen. Ben Smith: Madam President, knowing that this
is the case, then what is the real reason? What is it that we are doing?
It was brought up in the Minister’s brief to tell
you that they know already that there is some talk . . .
that it seems to be that we are just picking a fight. B ecause if you know that it is going to be turned back, and you know that you spent a year without making
changes, then it seems to be that you are doing it for
a specific reason.
Now I do not k now that. I do not want to put
words in their mouth. But the truth of the matter at this
point is that there are questions that come about when
looking at a year that was given and no changes were
made. I don’t know. Maybe the independent Senators were ask ed to come to a meeting to try to make
changes so that we would vote for the Bill the second time around. But I know that did not happen for us.
The Junior Minister of Education interjected
just now, but he has not interjected to say that that
meeting was pulled together, because it did not ha ppen.

Sen. Owen Darrell: Point of information, Madam
President.

The President: Minister Darrell, what is your point of
information?

POINT OF INFORMATION
[Misleading]

Sen. Owen Darrell: I believe that the Senator is misleading the Senate, as I have been made to under-stand that an offer to meet was made to other Senators.

Sen. Ben Smith: Well, maybe he can forward that to
me, because it is my recollection that this did not ha ppen, and the first time that we had any questions
asked was yesterday, less than 24 hours before the
debate started.
424 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate So, Madam President, when we know all the
changes that are going to happen because we are
implementing the commercialisation of cannabis, and
the impact that is not just going t o have on our young
people but on our population as a whole . . . because
it is not just the young people that are involved. There are working- age people in Bermuda who are in a
tough situation because of their addiction to weed. It
has impacts on how they do their job. And because of
it, maybe they are missing out on promotions. Their time management skills are not what they should be. They are not attending work all the time when they
should be. It is our job to do everything we can to help
our population. And I cannot see how making this
more available is helping them.
So, with all of those challenges and the cost
that will be associated with enforcing regulation and helping all the people who will be challenged after we
do this Bill, I ask the Government: What is the percentage of tax that will be implemented on cannabis in
order for us to pay for all those regulations?
And the reason I ask that question is very
specific, because what has happened in other jurisdi ctions where originally it looked like high amounts of
tax were going to [be paid], they realised that the
regulation and the enforcement of the regulation was
so expensive that they spent all the tax. And right
now, we do not have a tax in here. There are some
fees. So that is just being naïve that a bunch of things
are going to happen to our population that we are going to have to look for support and help for . . . why
are we not setting that up in advance? Why don’t we
know what the cost is and then put in a percentage of tax to pay for that so that we are not here a year from
now in the Budget Debate trying to figure out how we
are going to pay for all the bad things that have ha ppened?
Madam President, I and the Opposition continue to oppose this Bill, because the answers that we have been seeking have not happened. The comfort
for this population, that the changes that we will
make —which will not be reversible—do not have the
full analysis and data to let us be comfortable that
they have been handled.
Madam President, we have multiple people
who are in leadership positions that our young people look up to. And right now the messengers have given
them a confusing message: Don ’t do it. Stay away
from cannabis because it ’s bad for you, but we support it because it can make money. And we’re goi ng to
regulate it, but we’re not actually sure whether it’s going to wipe out the black market.
Or are we going to get rid of the black market
by actually making more criminals? Because it is legal
now and we do not seem to be able to get rid of the
black market. So what is going to change other than
there is going to be a group that is paying the licensing fee and part of this commercialisation is going to
want the Government, the regulators and the police to enforce the rules so that they can protect the ir profit
line. That will be the change.
If our goal is to keep our young Black men
from being incarcerated and becoming criminals, I am not sure that is setting us up very well.
So, Madam President, as we go forward, I am
hoping that the Minister and whoever else from the
Government is going to speak is going to give us answers that gives the population comfort that they have
done everything they possibly can to protect our youth
and the rest of our population from what potentially is about to come down the pipeline, if they can get this
royal assent in the first place.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Ben Smith, O pposition Leader in the Senate.
Would any other Senator care to speak on
this Bill?
Senator Arianna Hodgson, y ou have the floor.
Sen. Arianna Hodgson: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President, at the end of my remarks
last year, I noted that while the lack of support was
disappointing, the positions of the OBA and Independent Senators were consistent with the historic
narrative that has never benefited our people. I also
noted that the journey had just begun. Today, Madam
President, we are continuing on the journey to create
a regulated framework for cannabis industry licensed
activities and responsible cannabi s use for adults over
the age of 21.
Madam President, before I go any further, I
want to make it crystal clear to the Members of this
House and the listening public that nothing in this Bill
signals that smoking cannabis is acceptable or that it is good. This Government has never and will never
intend for cannabis to be used by children, vulnerable persons, or persons prone to addiction. I believe that
both the OBA and Independent Senators understand
the facts but are unwilling to see beyond the negative
health effects of cannabis, unable to see the opportunity in this Bill, and unable to see beyond the nega-tive connotation associated with cannabis.
Madam President, although the Minister has
referenced this in his brief, I feel that it is important to
speak to the many comments that nothing has
changed in a year, that the PLP has ignored concerns
and arrogantly retabled the same Bill on the 4
th of
March 2022. Madam President, as indicated in the
Minister’s brief, we are simply following a process.
Luckily, the Constitution affords us an opportunity to
challenge the decision of an unelected body to strike
down legislation passed by the democratically elected
Members of the Honourable House of Assembly.
It is true, Madam President, that the Bill’s pr ovisions will exceed the prescribed limits of various
narcotic conventions and that the UK is tasked with


Bermuda Senate ensuring compliance with the international Convention
on Narcotics extended to Bermuda. It is also true,
Madam President, that while we may be small, this
overseas territory is capable of charting our own
course in this space while also adhering to international law to the greatest extent possible. And so,
Madam President, as the rest of the world looks at
ways to relax restrictions on the use of cannabis, this
Government has made the decision to forge ahead to
make our position clear on behalf of the electorate.
We have said it time and time again, Madam
President: This PLP Government will explore all op-tions in order to deliver our promises to our people.
And, Madam President, if you know our Attorney
General, we definitely mean all.
Madam President, when I think back to clas sroom and even to school debates; I remember the
goals being to develop one’s communication and li stening skills. And quite frankly, Madam President, it
seems as though my fellow Senators simply do not
want to listen or communicate on the matter before us today. If you look around, if you talk to our people—
your people, Madam President —there is a clear appetite for change. Our role as Senat ors requires us to
draw from given information and to make and defend against arguments with logical and rational thinking.
Madam President, it truly bothers me that
when given the opportunity to suggest or make any appropriate amendments to the Bill, the Opposition
and Independent Senators both failed to provide any
viable legislative or policy alternatives to advance.
Once a Bill is presented to the Senate, Madam Pres ident, it is subject to the amendatory process. And so
for anybody who questions an identical Bill being put
forth in 2022, I would actually flip the question and ask
the Opposition and Independent Senators to have a
real conversation about a regulated scheme, not the
social implications of cannabis use.
Madam President, as we know, we simpl y
cannot have it both ways. In previous sessions, this
Government took criticism that we were doing too
much to try to regulate medical cannabis. Today,
Madam President, the thought is that we do not go far enough. Madam President, we have all heard the
concerns from the Opposition and Independent Senators. And yes, Madam President, those are valid co ncerns. However, Madam President, what we cannot
do is allow these concerns to deter us from our pursuit
to implement these necessary changes that are r equired to safely regulate the use of cannabis on our
Island.
Madam President, during last year’s debate,
Senator Jones had insinuated that this Government is
simply commercialising corporate cannabis. Again
today, Senator Smith alluded to a similar notion. And
this is simply not true, Madam President. I find it particularly interesting that the OBA included a line in
their response to the budget that said that they would
re-examine cannabis growing legislation to ensure that any legislation would provide real ent repreneurial
opportunities. And so, Madam President, I welcome the Opposition’s support so that we can move forward
to provide the support that our entrepreneurs will
need.
Madam President, I spend a lot of time talking
to persons of all backgrounds. Regar dless of where
they sit on the matter —whether they feel that cannabis is a better option to pharmaceuticals, whether they
believe that legalisation will reduce criminal activity or
at least displace antisocial activities in our communi-ties—I would say, Mad am President, that our people
are ready and that they are losing patience, Madam
President.
Much of our time has been spent listening to
the concerns [about] our children, both today and last
year. And I said it last year and will say it again today, I do believe, Madam President, that our children are
ready for the important conversations to be had surrounding cannabis. Madam President, I can agree that
there are some things that parents would certainly
prefer not to talk about, either out of embarrassment or out of fear of saying something wrong. Still, Madam
President, there are topics that have to be discussed
and demystified in order to help kids grow in a more
holistic and informed way.
I even recall comments from Senator Smith
who mentioned that cannabis is bad, and I do believe that we need to change this narrative, Madam Pres ident. Just as we discussed the importance of acknowledging the negative impacts of social media and
bullying, just as we discussed financial education and finances and discuss ed police brutality and sex and
sexual abuse and alternative lifestyles in our comm unities, I think it is about time that we start being honest
with our young people.
Madam President, I will not go into comparing
our general acceptance of tobacco or alcoh ol, but I do
urge us to think about the groups of people who have
historically benefited from the import and export of
such items.
Last year, Senator Jones urged this Gover nment to give a compelling argument that the passage of this Bill would do its best to protect the vulnerable in
our community from physical, mental, and social effects —most importantly, our youth, the most valuable
asset in our community, the next generation. And we
have done exactly this, Madam President.
I believe that there are unli mited opportunities
before us today, opportunities beyond economic sti mulation and job growth, Madam President. We have an
opportunity to educate children and adults, opportun ities to improve the protections, opportunities to have
some real conversations about the historic disa dvantages that our people have had to endure for far
too long.
Madam President, we understand the i mportance of education and protecting our young peo-ple. Over years of consultation with various stak e426 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate holders, we have focused on acces s to and availability
of the drug among adolescents, informing and protec ting consumers, and protecting third parties and vulnerable populations from the potential consequences
of the use of cannabis. This Bill does not undo the work of our community partners who are working to
reduce the harmful effects of drugs.
Madam President, I take comfort in knowing
that as time passes mind- sets will change and new
ideas will be explored. We’ve all heard the arguments
for and against cannabis use. We are aware of the dangers to individuals and to society. But we must do
something different, Madam President. We often hear
calls for the Government to get creative, to think outside of the box, and to right the wrongs of the past. Yet when given an opportunity to do things differently,
we are met with a lack of support from the very people
who are expected to act in the best interests of our
country.
Madam President, earlier today we talked
about making history, and I truly believe that we are in
for some radical transformation. I believe that it is up
to each of us to decide which side of history we will
stand on. I stand on the side that says that this Bill
establishes responsible regulation for cannabis to r eplace the status quo of unlawful, unregulated, unsafe
access to the illicit cannabis market in Bermuda under
which the only people who profit are the criminal suppliers, importers, and cultivators.
Madam President, as always, we are up for
the challenge. And so, if anything, I am excited to see the Attorney General and this PLP Government take
this Bill forward.
Madam President, in closing, we have wi tnessed profound social and structural changes in the
past two years in particular. I want to urge each of us
in this room to think about future generations and be
cognisant of the ways in which we interpret and speak
about the issues before us, particularly in this Chamber.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Arianna Hodgson.
Would any other Senator care to speak on
this Bill?
Senator Owen D arrell, you have the floor.
Sen. Owen Darrell: Thank you, Madam President.
Madam President, I grew up in the AME
Church. And I’m proud to sit in a Senate that actually
has an AME preacher who sits behind me on my side. One of the things I used to always enjoy about going
to church, believe it or not, was the sermon. And AME
pastors and ministers have, I guess, a characteristic
of naming their sermons, coming up with a title. So, Madam President, I want to give my presentation t oday a title, maybe in the s pirit of the AME minister si tting behind me, PLP Senator Reverend Emilygail Dill. I want to title my presentation today, Madam Pres ident: “Does the Senate Matter?”
Does the Senate matter?
Madam President, I remember coming to the
Senate maybe a year and a half ago being excited about giving a presentation, a speech. And I asked
one of my friends: Did you hear me on the radio? I
gave a speech.
My friend said: Nobody listens to the Senate.
The Senate doesn’t matter.
I was a little taken aback. My feelings m ight
have been hurt for a moment. I thought about it for
some time. And I [thought]: Well, what does that
mean? Does that mean I just stop talking? Does that
mean that I assume that nobody listens, so nothing I
say matters? And then I got a vision, Madam P resident. I got a vision of July 2017. I actually have a pi cture of what Court Street looked like from an aerial view on July 2017. Madam President, what some may
recall is that that aerial view showed scores of people—hundreds of people —lined up in the st reet on
Court Street from Alaska Hall all the way back to the
junction of Court and Victoria [Streets]. There were
people in jubilation, people happy, people excited because the party that wears green, the party that I re present, the party that the Senator s on this side repr esent—the Progressive Labour Party —had won the
election of 2017.
Believe it or not, Madam President, the headline in the Royal Gazette, that is often less than flattering of the Progressive Labour Party, had a huge headline. They even dr opped off complimentary copies to
us. (Thank you very much.) And the headline said
“Landslide.” Just to remind individuals, I think [the
landslide] was 24 to 12 at the time.
So when I [think] back to my friend saying the
Senate doesn’t matter, I remember w hy I come to this
place on Wednesdays and I speak on behalf of the people that the Progressive Labour Party represents. And those individuals that were on Court Street that
night in 2017 many of which, even more in the middle
of a pandemic, came back on the night of October 1,
2020, to celebrate that there’s a party that puts Bermudians first. There is a party that is trying to pr ogress this country forward. There is a party that goes
out into the community and listens to what individuals
want.
It is quite disappointing, and I was dishear tened a year ago to sit in these Chambers and watch this Bill go down in defeat by individuals, Opposition
Senators and otherwise, who flat out rejected a Pr ogressive Labour Party election promise, flat out r ejected a manifesto, or topic in the manifesto, that
many Bermudians have cried out for.
I sat here, Madam President, last year, and I
gave a speech and talked about a dear friend of the
class of 1997 who passed away awaiting clearance to get medical treatment in the Uni ted States, [which was
denied] based on a small cannabis conviction many


Bermuda Senate years ago. Madam President, I sat here last year, and
I talked about a close family member of mine who
worked hard then, continues to work hard, has a
booming business, and the instit utions of this Island
will not allow him to open a bank account.
Madam President, I sat here last year, and I
talked about going to sporting events. It may not be
swim meets but other sporting events. And the use of
cannabis is widespread. It is to the poi nt where ever yone at those facilities knows which corner it is in. As a responsible parent, I would not dare take my son over to a particular corner of that sporting event, but that is
what responsible parents do.
And that is why when we look back at this Bill
. . . which I am not sure some Opposition Senators
actually read. They were very busy giving me all of the medical and psychological and every single bad thing
they could find about cannabis they seemed to r esearch, but they did not seem, some Senator s, to
have actually read the Bill which the Progressive L abour Party has put in front of us again for the second year running. Because what we have in front of us is
actually a regulated cannabis regime.
Going back to my topic of “Does the Senate
Matter?” , I smiled as I sat here. My phone is going off,
and individuals, friends of mine who I didn’t think had
time on a Wednesday afternoon to listen to the Sen-ate, were in a full out debate of their own about what
was being said in this place.
Madam President , if I may, I will just pull out a
few of the comments the individuals who are in my social circles, individuals that do not really have time
to do a whole lot of research about cannabis, but can tell you what they see and what is pretty obvious
amongst us every day, every week. And this is why
my voice and our voices, Progressive Labour Party
voices, matter, Madam President.
One said, I find it weird that it’s all this talk
about protection. Anyone can get cannabis at any
time right now. The underground m arket is open to all.
There are no age limits for drug dealers. There are no
age limits as to who buys cannabis right now, Madam President.
Another one who’s a little short in talking just
said, I can’t listen to much more of this, Darrell (that is
what t hey call me) because it seems like some of your
colleagues don’t know what they’re talking about.
These are people that the Progressive Labour Party
represents.
Another one, Madam President, said, I don’t
smoke, and I don’t want to. And legislation won’t i mpact my decision. Those that want to smoke have the
same argument. If I choose to, I will.
The conversation went on, Madam President.
Shockingly, the Senate does matter and what we say
does matter, because another one said, Hmmm. Why
does it seem like no one’s raising any possible sol utions ? All I keep hearing is what’s wrong. The last one from the man on the street says,
They (I don’t know who they is, maybe the Senators
who spoke before me.) are making it as if [the] cannabis issue is something new, li ke it’s not already here
freely. They go on to say, I applaud the G overnment
as they’re trying to regulate it and make i t safer. They
are actually doing something to progress this country
forward, like offer jobs.
I might respond to a comment by the Senator
from the Opposition a little earlier who kept asking for
numbers, the [number] of people who are crying out for a regulated cannabis market. And, yes, he mentioned that he talked to some of the athletes that he
trains. And I have always congratulated him on the job
that he does, but I think, Madam President, he may
wish to expand his reach of who he speaks with, because the friends that I associate with, the individuals of the club of which I am a member, can all identify
and point to at least one individual in their family
whose has been negatively affected . . . scratch that.
Lives have been ruined by cannabis and the way the
authorities have treated them and cut them at the knees for maybe a small bit of recreational cannabis.
So, Madam President, does the Senate matter? I would say absolutely.
You may have seen me smiling as I was si tting here, as the Opposition was speaking. In the 2012 election campaign, which shockingly went in a direction that I was surprised with, there was a commercial with some puppets. And the title of the commercial was “Both Ways OBA.” And here we have it
10 years later, almost, the OBA and their two ways have not changed. One minute the Progressive L abour Party and the PLP Government is too restrictive. The next minute we ha ve legislation that will single -
handedly change the lives of many, and we hear that
we’re not restrictive enough.
Other Senators who spoke earlier today,
Madam President, were on a steady line of doom and
gloom. When we are talking about cannabis legisl ation, and the title used to describe it is “ weed ,” I would
say that is purposely put there to bring negative con-notations. When we hear presentations where the
term “ drugs ” is used over and over, I would say that is
purposely put there to sway people’s opin ions to all
the negativity surrounding cannabis.
Words such as “ shocking” are bellowed out in
this Chamber from Senators on the other side. But as
I said in my speech last year, Madam President, in an
opening line to a lady very close to me, I said to her ,
What do you think about cannabis? She went on for
10 minutes about how it’s bad. No, I don’t think it’s
necessary. But then I went through the legislation that
the Progressive Labour Party has. And I said, Well, this is the regulation. This is what it wo uld mean.
These are the safeguards in place. After a short session of the modern teacher teaching the old school teacher, she was able to get it, Madam President. She
was able to understand that, Wow , the Progressive
428 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate Labour Party is actually progressive. T hey actually
thought about things in this B ill that I would never
have thought about, things that will safeguard our
community.
We passed a Bill earlier, Madam President,
that was related to increasing the tourism product in
Bermuda. And I actually smiled as I was reading it,
because here we are in 2022 still debating casinos.
We cannot be serious that we want Bermuda to be a
top tourism destination and here we are in 2022 still
going back and forth about who can, who can’t, where should [we allow] casinos . I have been traveling for a
long time as an adult. I like to play a little blackjack.
And a lot of my choices as to where I go on vacation
are about casinos. And for years now . . . here we are
in “Last Place Bermuda.”
Tourism around cannabis has been a big deal
for a very long time. In my presentation last year I referenced a friend of mine and my visits to Colorado.
It’s almost (when you go to Colorado) second nature.
So yes, Madam President, I am happy to use this o pportunity in the Senate to actually speak to the ind ividuals who the Progressive Labour Party represents. And the Opposition is simply just doing what the O pposition does.
Some rhetorical questions are: Why does the
Opposition want Bermuda to remain last? Do you have [so] little faith in us as a people? Look how this
country led in the pandemic. I would say the Oppos ition cannot be afraid to let Bermuda continue to pr ogress under the Progressive Labour Party.
I go back to my topic: Does the Senate Matter? For some people, the answer would b e no. And
this is their argument for why it doesn’t matter —
because the first time that this Bill went to another
place of elected officials —elected by the people,
where it is a majority of 30 to 6, based on, again, an election promise—they passed it overwhelmingly.
There were people literally dancing in the streets that
Bermuda is finally getting up to par with other jurisdi ctions around the world, only to see it come to the
Senate where they said: The mandate of the people
doesn’t matter. We don’t think th at the Government
has the ability to look into safeguarding our children.
So they kicked it out. It came back.
And I find it telling that the Senator from the
Opposition says that they were contacted 24 hours
ago to ask if they had any changes. For 12 months I
asked the Senator . Did he ever reach out to my Senate Leader to offer any solutions or changes to the Bill that they rejected a year ago?
A point of order?

The President: Senators, address the Chair.

Sen. Owen Darrell : So, Madam President, I would
reiterate one more time what this Bill does. It ushers in
a new regulatory regime. It licenses all activities i nvolved in cannabis, directly or indirectly. We are tal k-ing about the cultivation of cannabis, the importation
of cannabis, the possible export of cannabis, production, sale, supply. For the last two years we have been
celebrating scientists that we have on this Island dea ling with the pandemic. Imagine the science and r esearch that Bermuda can be doing if we pass this regulatory regime. This Bill regulates the transport of
cannabis, the medicinal use of cannabis, products
derived from cannabis. It is quite comprehensive.
So, Madam President, while I do not know
what is going to happen in a few moments, I know what probably is going to happen. And I do not know
what is going to happen once this Bill leaves this
place. But I can leave the Senate Chambers today,
Madam President, knowing that my voice and the
voice of the Progressive Labour Party Senators who
represent the overwhelming majority of peop le in this
Island who voted for progression, who voted for inn ovation, who voted to bring people hope, we are proud
of the job that the Attorney General and her team
have done with this Bill. They will be proud of the
people who have spoken to their issues today. Madam President, to answer the question of which I star ted as far as the Progressive Labour Party goes, the
voice in the Senate does indeed matter.
Thank you, Madam President.

The President: Thank you, Senator Owen Darrell.
Senators, I have listened all day to each of
you. And each of you in the Senate has spoken. I
would like to just say at the outset that my experience
. . . I have been working in the field of addiction for
many years. I worked in general medicine in London
and teaching hospital s in ICU, as well as nurseries
where babies are treated, and I have been back wor king with the Bermuda Hospitals Board for over 30
years. A lot of my time was spent at MWI, formerly known as St. Brendan’s Hospital. I have worked with
the psychiatrist and t he psychologist who had to deal
with people with addictions, those who had schiz ophrenia or whatever. And we were deemed as having
high incidents, particularly from our admissions, of
young people, teenagers.
Last year when I spoke about this, I think
there was an interpretation that I am old school, that history does not matter anymore, that I am not up to
date. I am very, very much up to date. I read repea tedly. I spend a lot of my time reading about the r esearch. I do know about many of the areas in Col orado and other places where marijuana, cannabis , has
been legalised. And I have heard from most of you
this morning that you had read the same research.
And the research shows that even though a regulated
cannabis regime has been put into place, the black
market has not diminished. I have read that in Color ado, as well as in so many other places, a major concern is (and it has been mentioned today) the i ncrease in hospitalisations, the increase in young people and teenagers in school using.


Bermuda Senate You have all m entioned the fact that young
people, when they start smoking . . . True enough,
their brains are not going to be developed until they
reach age 25 or 29 for male or female. And, therefore,
what has been noticed is that there has been deteri oration in their performance. Many of them have even
dropped out of school. And this is reflected here in
Bermuda as well.
The issue ( I think that even in the other place)
of the protection of our young children in this Island is
very important. Our birth rate is low. We do not even
have 500 births a year. And certainly, last year there
were only 490 births in Bermuda. Now, that tells us
that our population is dwindling, and we must be even
more concerned about the development of our chi ldren and trying to keep them safe. And this also has
been mentioned in the House, in the other place. Concern has been mentioned about children and our
young people, and you have all spoken to that today.
Yes, I have read this B ill. And I was particularly interested in the fact that it was mentioned that in
clause 4 of the Cannabis Licensing Act, there was a
reference to section 6A of the Human Rights Act
[1981] of the Bill, pertaining to approve in writing any
special plan or programme designed to relieve har dship. My question is: How does this cannabis industry
achieve that objective when a limited number of l icences will be given?
More importantly, such licences are expe nsive, and you see the quote. And the whole process of
setting up such a business would be expensive. And
you have spok en about that also today. Why would
we allow individuals to sell a drug which has the potential of a deleterious impact on our population?
No mention in the B ill seeks to address the
education and the treatment of individuals who may
exhibit signs of addic tion. If there is, there is minimal.
In fact, in talking to the therapists in the community,
many of them have stated that first there are insuff icient therapists to deal with people who have addi ction, and they do not really have money. Sometimes
we do not even have treatment facilities here, and it is
costly to send them overseas. But there is no money to send them overseas for treatment for those who
actually need it.
The Bill does not address the issues of the US
stop list, the individuals who have a dr ug conviction
and the fact that marijuana is illegal at the federal le vel. We cannot do anything about the federal level. If it
is illegal, it is illegal.
Some of you have mentioned about applic ation for jobs, people applying for jobs. People applying for jobs are tested. I know at the hospital they are
tested. I was involved in that process some time ago.
And people many years ago . . . and it is still going on.
You have to test people when they apply for jobs. And
not just in the hospital, but just think about all the ar eas in Bermuda where people have to apply for jobs,
and they are tested. And if an employer says, Sorry, we cannot employ you because your test was positive
. . . maybe they are repeated. I know we used to r epeat it at the hospital in three months’ time. But even
then, it is not done in every case.
So, our young people . . . they are affected in
the educational system because we see the evidence
of their performance, when we read in terms of the . . .
We have just gone through a debate on education,
and we have looked at the statistics with regard to
math and the sciences. And it is not a good reflection.
So again, we have to be mindful about our children.
I remember when the Attorney General spoke
to the I ndependent Senators last year before the Bill
was presented. And the comment was made that there is a lot of money to be made in in this whole
cannabis licensing regime. And my question is: Is this
to be a pillar of the community? Is this something that we would want [for] this Island to say it is a pillar of the
economy, because there is money to be made? I think
not, particularly because of its impact on our children
and on our people.
I have indicated that the Bill does not address
the stop list. We also have to realise that even in the
UK, aside from the US where marijuana is illegal at
the federal level, in the UK it is also. It is viewed as a
Class B controlled drug. So, the UK has not liberalised
it. Yes, medical marijuana. And I will not go into all the details about its benefits because there certainly are benefits. There are many benefits in fact.
I cannot in good conscience support this B ill
because I have a concern about the future of this I sland, about the number of children that we have, the impact at the school level. So, Senator s, I . . . regar dless of whether or not we are viewed as Independent
Senators as not having a voice or not caring about
this community or caring about the Island, I can tell
you that in my many years of existence here, I have
done nothing else. And I am sure that each of us here
cares about this community.
We care. We have been appointed, and we
care about the community. And our voice is important.
I have talked to doctors and various other pr ofessionals in the community, and I can tell you I do not
just speak for myself. And those who want to dismiss
my experience in the addiction field or the counselling
field, I cannot speak to that. I know that those whom I
speak to and who send me emails and who call me up
on the phone and express their own views and their
concerns about this particular Bill, I can say that I do
not just represent myself when I sit here. And neither do you.
So, Senators, I am in the same position that I
was in last year in that I cannot in all confidence support this B ill because it ha s not addressed . . . and I
have not even spoken about money laundering and
where the money is going to be deposited. That has
been mentioned but has not been addressed.
Those are my comments at this time. And I
will just leave it there for the moment. Bu t I cannot in
430 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate all consciousness —having heard everything and ha ving read reports, studies [from] all over the United
States and elsewhere—I cannot in all [good] conscience support regulating cannabis in this Island.
And also I do not think that it is going to do away with
the illegal, underground method of cannabis in this
Island. And those are my comments.
Minister Peets, do you have a reply?

Thank you, Madam
President. And also thank you to the Government
Senators. And tha nk you to the Opposition and I ndependent Senators for their comments and questions.
Obviously, this particular B ill does have a lot
of contention as it relates to individual views. Madam President, I did listen very, very intently to everything
that was shared because it does matter. And I took a
bunch of notes. But what I can say, Madam President,
in reply as we sort of wrap up this conversation is that
a lot of the concerns that were raised, the brief does
address. If need be, I could quote certain pages and sections out of the brief. But having said that, Madam
President, I do not actually think that will change the
situation very much. Perhaps, we are not actually arguing facts. Perhaps today this conversation is an i llustration that philosophically we are just in two different camps. Arguing back and forth about facts will probably amount to very, very little.
I did indicate in the brief , and of course the
Government did make it quite clear , that a regulated
market is far better than an unregulated market. This
Bill of course cannot do certain things such as make
significant changes to how US immigration decides to
do what it does or does not do, because that situation
falls completely in their remit. But if this regulated
market for cannabis did come int o fruition, it certainly
would curtail or change the information that other au-thorities may have and how they treat that information.
I think there is also a bit of a philosophical
misunderstanding that . . . because sometimes I have
heard today , and not just in this go around but in the
previous go around last year . There is a huge difference between a legal market and a regulated market. And I have heard instances where somehow individuals have thought that the two were synonymous which
is not the case. This Bill does not make marijuana l egal. What this Bill does is create a regime and a
framework for cannabis, and anything that is outside
of the regime is illegal.
The other thing that I think that we sort of
brought to fruition, or at least to the forefr ont, is that
we have a comparison for example. It does not a ppear that we have a problem with a regulated market
for alcohol, a regulated market for tobacco for example, but somehow, we have a problem with a regulated market and a regime for cannabis. That , to me, is
nonsensical. To penalise cannabis but somehow not
hold tobacco and alcohol to the same account is nonsensical. I have spent hundreds of hours inside r e-covery rooms. And every time we have meetings in
recovery rooms, it is a direct quote, everyo ne in r ecovery knows that alcohol is a drug.
I do not think we are sending a confusing
message to the public; rather, Madam President, I
think we are confused by the message the public is
sending us. This Bill recognises that people use cannabis regardles s of what we say or what we do. What
this Bill does is create a regime that will allow us to do
even more.
The Government has already addressed the
issues around criminality, around the societal issues
for a cannabis regime. We have diversion courts, specialty courts. We have monies for treatment. We have
monies for prevention. We have money for prison. We
have money for reintegration—all those programmes.
And those programmes will not disappear because we have a regime. The problem of tobacco and alcohol
and cannabis will not disappear if we do not do an ything about this particular Bill.
There was a point in the brief where we talked
about the packaging and how that would be handled, so that it would allay the concerns that some of the
Senators had rais ed. But perhaps that was missed.
We talked in the brief, of course, about education and
prevention. But perhaps that was missed in the brief.
We talked about how edibles would be governed under this regime. But perhaps that was also missed.
We did talk about penalties. I think the Senator had mentioned that there was a $2,000 penalty
fee, but actually it is $4,000 upwards to $40,000— that
was also in the brief.
Someone had quoted guardrails. Guardrails
were mentioned all throughout the brief, but perhaps
that was also missed.
I say all those things that were missed because there was this idea that, Hey, you know what?
This Bill is the exact Bill that we had last year . Why
has it not changed? We answered these concerns last
year. We answered those concerns this year. So, to
me, sometimes it feels a little frustrating, particularly
on this issue that it does not matter how many answers we provide it does not change what people
think or what people feel —simply because, perhaps,
we are not arguing over facts. W e just have a phil osophical difference of opinion on this matter.
Madam President, I think the public has had
an opportunity to hear everything that was said today.
I believe everything that was shared from everyone
here in these Chambers has significant value, and we
pray that, of course, as this Bill makes its way to Go vernment House that, I guess, we will have to wait and
see how Her Excellency decides to move forward. But
as indicated from the Government ’s point of view, this
is a promise that we have made to the people who
have elected this Government and we are constit utionally bound to represent their issues and to bring
forth legislation based on our election platform and
election promise.


Bermuda Senate Having said that, I want to certainly thank ev eryone at th e Attorney General’s Chambers for all of
their hard work for this particular piece of legislation
and of course everyone at the DNDC who also do
amazing work providing treatment as well as preven-tion.
Madam President, with those remarks, we are
certainly in your hands

The President: Do the second reading and the third.
Follow the process.
Thank you.

Second time.

The President: Second time first. Is there any objection to that motion?

Sen. Ben Smith : Yes, Madam President . I object.

The President: [Are] any other Senators objecting?
Senator Tucker. Two objecting; it requires a
vote, and I will ask the Clerk to take a vote.
[Pause]

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

SENATE VISITOR

The President: Senators, I would like to just interrupt
and recognise the Premier, the Honourable David
Burt, in the Senate Chamber.
Welcome to you, sir.

[Debate on t he Cannabis Licensing Act 2022 , continuing]

[Pause] The Clerk: Okay, Senators, we are now voting on the
second reading of the Bill entitled the Cannabis Licensing Act 2022. Those in favour will vote Aye and
those against will vote Nay. I will now call the names.

DIVISION
[Cannabis Licensing Act 2022]

Ayes: 5 Nays: 5
Sen. Hon. Dr. E. Peets Sen. Ben Smith
Sen. Owen Darrell Sen. Robin Tucker
Sen. Arianna Hodgson Sen. John Wight
Sen. Lindsay Simmons Sen. Michelle Simmons
Sen. Rev. Dr. E. A. Dill Sen. Hon. J. E. Dillas -Wright

Absent: 1

Okay, Madam President, we have a tie
vote.

The President: Senators, we have a tie vot e, and I
will read the decision on the equality of votes: “ On an
equality of votes on any motion the motion shall be
deemed to have been lost. ”
The Clerk: That is Standing Order 15.

The President: That is Standing Order 15. Move on
to the next item, then. We can’t pass it.

[The Cannabis Licensing Act 2022 was defeated pursuant to Standing O rder 15 .]

The President: Thank you, Senators. We will now
move on to the next item on our agenda, Orders of the
Day, and this is the second reading of the Children
Amendment Act 2022 and that is in the name of Sena-tor Lindsay Simmons, the Junior Minister for Social
Development and Seniors.
Senator Simmons, you have the floor.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons : Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President, I move that the Bill entitled
Children Amendment Act 2022 be now read a second
time.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection.

BILL

SECOND READING

CHILDREN AMENDMENT ACT 2022

432 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I am
pleased to present the Bill entitled Children Amendment Act 2022 , which was introduced to the Senate
on 28 March 2022.
Madam President, the purpose of the Bill is to
modernise the law and to introduce new and revised
provisions under the Children Act 1998, the principal
Act, which are long overdue. The amendment will ensure that a new body, namely the Children In- Care
Advisory Council is established to replace the existing Child Care Placement Board. The new Children In-Care Advisory Council membership is designed to
include persons with skill sets in specific areas such
as medical, legal and educational fields, and a Standing Committee is established to provide a forum that
guarantees children in- care who are capable of for ming their own view s, have a voice on matters related to
their own social development and well -being.
Madam President, the additional responsibil ities of the Council will include:
• inquiring into and reporting upon any matter s
referred by the Minister ;
• informing the Minister of and making recommendations on matters relat ing to social d evelopment and well -being of children in- care;
• promoting and protecting the rights of children
in-care;
• considering the effect of any legislation, Go vernment policies, programme or standard may
have on children in- care and making recommendat ions to the Minister; and
• raising public awareness of and encouraging
community interests in issues affecting chi ldren in- care.
Madam President, additionally, the Depar tment of Child and Family Services intends to intr oduce a non- statutory youth panel for children in- care
to sit on. The youth panel will have the opportunity to
present their thoughts and/or concerns to the new Standing Committee of the Advisory Council which will
be referred to as the Advisory Council Committee. Madam President, the Advi sory Council
Committee will be established under clause 4 of the Bill and will introduce a new section 12B of the princ ipal Act ultimately assuring that there will be legislative provision s in place to take into consideration the voice
of children in- care. This application of the law would
allow the intent of Articles 12 and 13 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child to be enshrined in
the principal Act.
Article 12 of the Convention says:
“1. States Parties shall assure to the child who is c apable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the
child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.
“2. For this purpose, the child shall in parti cular be
provided the opportunity to be heard in any judicial and administrative proceedings affecting the child, either directly, or through a representative or an appropriate body, in a manner consistent with the proc edural rules of national law.”
Article 13 of the UN Convention on the Rights
of the Child states:
“1. The child shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, r eceive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either oral ly, in writing or in
print, in the form of art, or through any other media of the child's choice.
“2. The exercise of this right may be subject to certain
restrictions, but these shall only be such as are pr ovided by law and are necessary:
“(a) For respect of the rights or reputations of ot hers; or
“(b) For the protection of national security or of
public order [ (ordre public) ], or of public health
or morals.”
Additionally, Madam President, currently section 12(2) of the principal Act provides limited information about the composition of the Board in comparison to other legislation.
Clause 5 of the Bill enhances the principal Act
by inserting the Fourth Schedule in the principal Act which introduces vital information concerning the
Children In- Care Advisory Council such as :
1. the composition of the Council membership is to be included, but not be limited
to, persons with certain skill sets, such as
medical, legal, and educational fields.
Madam President, I must take this opportunity
to highlight that persons who were former children incare with the Director of Child and Family Services will
have the opportunity to serve as members of the
Council. It was key to ensure this specific provision
was in place as these individuals will bring a unique
perspective to the Council through their own exper ience as a child in- care.
2. The Director of Child and Family Services and up to three other public officers of the
Department of [ Child and ] Family Se rvices designated by the Director shall be
ex officio members with no vot ing powers.
Madam President, this provision will allow
for the Council to work collaboratively with the Department of Child and Family Services to ensure the voice of a child in-care
is heard and considered when decisions
are being made about their social devel-opment and well -being.
3. The remaining provisions ensure that Council membership reflects a gender
balance. The term of the office a member
can hold, which is not to exceed three
years, addresses vacanc ies in membership, quorums of the Council, powers co nferred by the Minister to declare the office of a member vacant, provisions for reBermuda Senate appoint ment and resignation and authority
for the Council to regulate its own proc edures.
Madam President, to provide some context to
this new amendment it is important to note that the
Children Act of 1998 was designed to benefit all chi ldren in Bermuda, regardless if they are in the care of
their parents or guardians or the Director of Child and
Family Services. The purpose of the Children Act
1998 is to :
a. protect childr en from harm ;
b. promote the integrity of the family ;
c. provide protection for the rights of children
among persons who have regular contact
with children; and
d. ensure the welfare of children.
With th is understanding, the legislative
amendments being introduc ed by this Bill, the Children Amendment Act 2022, will provide important enhancements to the Children Act 1998.
Madam President, I would like to take this opportunity to remind m embers of the Senate and the
public of the 2020 Speech from the Throne delivered on 6 November 2020, that states, “The seed of the
‘new liberty ’ will be planted in the Island’s vulnerable
children. The outdated Child Care Placement Board will be replaced by a Children’s Commission, whose remit will be to advocate for the children i n care, pr omoting best practice policy , programmes and service
responses to meet their needs.”
For your reference and for public information,
Madam President, a child in -care is one who is placed
in the care of the Director by the courts of Bermuda. The courts are able to exercise their powers to make
either a care order or an interim care [ order ] under
section 25 and section 32 of the Children Act 1998.
Overall, Madam President, this Bill confirms
the Government’s commitment to planting the seed s
of new li berty by upholding the best interests and well -
being of children in- care so they can exercise their
right to have their voice heard on matters affecting
their own social development and well -being in care.
This is truly an innovative legislative change whi ch will
empower our most vulnerable children.
Finally, Madam President, it should be noted
that extensive research [ was] conducted on various
children’s commissions in multiple jurisdictions, nam ely, Malta, England, Jersey and Jamaica. The analysis conduct ed by the Ministry of Social Development in
conjunction with the Department of Child and Family Services indicates that a majority of children’s commissions in other jurisdictions are independent of par-liament and government, are not specific to children
in-care, and have commissioners that are appointed in
full-time posts with support staff.
Locally, Madam President, the Ministry engaged in consultation with non- profit agencies and
committees that work with, or for the betterment of,
children in our community. I am pleased to notify members of the Senate and the public that responses
were submitted by the following agencies and commi ttees:
• The Bar Council Sub- committee that focuses
on family law ;
• The Coalition for the Protection of Children
(CPC);
• Family Centre;
• Inter Agency Committee for Children and
Family (IAC); and
• Saving Children and Revealing Secrets
(SCARS).
The comments received by these organis ations were in depth and informative and taken into
consideration when crafting this Bill.
Madam Pres ident, representatives from these
organisations were also invited to attend a follow -up
meeting that gave the Minister of Social Development
and Seniors an opportunity to update them on the
process and inform them that the body that would be
established to replace the Child Care Placement
Board would not be called a Children’s Commission
but will be designated to achieve the same aims and
protections. During this meeting the Minister received
positive feedback regarding the direction the Ministry
was taking.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank
the representatives of the Bar [ Council ] SubCommittee that focuses on family law, the Coalition
for the Protection of Children, the Family Centre, the
Inter Agency Committee for Children and Family, and
SCARS, in taking their time to submit in depth submissions and /or participat e in the virtual meetings.
Madam President, to ensure the Ministry consulted with the general public , the Ministry provided an
invitation for the public to make submissions on their
views on the proposed Children’s Commission by way
of the Royal Gazette article published on 23 August
2021, entitled “Children’s Commission submissions
can still be made.” I can report that th e Ministry did not
receive any submissions from the public.
Madam President, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Director of Child and Family Services , his technical team , the team at the Attorney
General’s Chambers, the Permanent Secretary , the
technical staff at the Ministry of Social Development Headquarters for their continuous dedication to e nsure this Bill materialised.
Madam President, in closing, the Government
has remained steadfast in the commitment to our
most vulnerable children to ensure they too feel empowered by knowing that they have a right to have
their voices heard on matters impacting their social
development and well -being while in care of the Director of Child and Family Services. The provisions in this
Bill will enhance the Children Act 1998 and ensure it
continues to comply with international Conventions.
Thank you, Madam President .

434 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons, the Junior Minister for Social Development and
Seniors .

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

SENATE VISITORS

The President: Senators, before I open the fl oor to
questions, I would like to acknowledge the presence
in the Chamber of the Permanent Secretary, Ms. Marva[-Jean] O’Brien, as well as the Policy Analyst, Ms.
Kleita Pitcher , and other members of the Ministry.
Welcome to you all.

[Debate on the Child ren Amendment Act 2022, continuing]

The President: Would any Senator care to speak on
this Bill?
Yes, Senator Robin Tucker , you have the
floor.

Sen. Robin Tucker : Thank you, Madam President .
Good afternoon, once again, to everyone, all of my
Senate colleagues.
Thank you to the Junior Minister for bringing
this piece of legislation. I am very excited to see it and very happy to learn about what it is going to do and
certainly its ability to be able to provide some added
protections —we have been using that word a lot t oday—added protections for our children, so that is
wonderful.
I was also very pleased to hear about the
amount of collaboration that the Ministry did with ex-ternal stakeholders as well to make sure that all parties had been consulted, or at least sufficient numbers
of parties had been consulted to give the best option
for this particular piece of legislation.
I have a couple of questions that I would like
to ask. One question is, I would like to know in pract ical terms how this is . . . and in practical terms I mean
if the Junior Minister could sort of explain in layman’s
terms what this piece of legislation is doing in terms of giving children an actual voice. I would like it if she
could sort of let us know what the current process is
and w hat improvements this legislation is actually d oing—just in layman’s terms would be wonderful.
The second question— well, actually, I will let
her answer and then I will ask a second question.

The President: While the Junior Minister is obtaining
some inf ormation, would any other Senator care to
speak?
Senator John Wight, you have the floor.
Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Madam President . This is certainly not my area of expertise, so I
am just going to ask a couple of questions just for
clarification.
So, we seem to be moving from one gover nment’s model to a new one—so the current model being the Child Care Placement Board, we are moving to a Children In- Care Advisory Council with speci fic requirements as mentioned under the Fourth
Schedule being the per sons with, you know, psychology backgrounds and the like. So, is the movement in the model in reference to the current government’s model not working effectively to address the needs of
our children? That is my first question. The second
question— there was reference to fees being paid to
members of the committee. Are these new and additional payments made or have payments been made
to the existing Child Care Placement Board and these are new and additional fees being paid under the new
Advisory model? So, t hose are my two questions.
Thank you.

The President: Thank you, Senator John Wight.
Would any other Senator care to speak? Se nator Tucker, you have—
Sen. Robin Tucker: I do.
The President: —additional questions?
Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you, Madam President .
I do have an additional question. As it relates
to the forming of the Council itself, I would like to know
. . . because there is a chairman and a deputy chai rman appointed along with various other professional
groups, one that is not necessarily a professional,
which is really great, and that is a former child in- care.
I think that this is a very important addition. But my question really is around the chairman and the deputy chairman. I would like to know what specific qualific ations will be appl ied to these particular positions. That
would be helpful to know, particularly as we have all of
these other professional groups represented.
This will be my last question. I would also like
to know . . . I have a lot of questions, as you know, but
this is obviously my last question. But I would like to
know whether with the Director of Child and Family
Services and three other DCFS staff being a part of
the Council, whether there is any, for lack of —now, an
overused term —any protection for the children if they
have to go before the Council to sort of speak and
represent themselves. So, just to make sure that there is nothing that would prevent them from being able to
do that, or to give sort of free opportunity for children
to be able to do that if that is part of the model, if we
understand that from the practical point of view.
[I am] just concerned that if the children are
going to be going before the Council themselves and
having the Director of DCFS, especially if the child
wants to express something having to do with DCFS,


Bermuda Senate then I could see that there being some kind of potential intimidation or what have you. So, just wanted to
know if that is also part of the model and if there was
any sort of plan in place to sort of mitigate—

The President: Repres entation or preparation of the
child.
Sen. Robin Tucker: —that experience. Yes —

The President: Representation—

Sen. Robin Tucker: Representation.

The President: —of the child.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Yes. Thank you, Madam Pres ident.

The President: Would any other Senator —yes, Senator Michelle Simmons, you have the floor.

Sen. Michelle Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
I am asking this question mostly because I
think it would be helpful to the listening public to hear
the answer very clearly. We have h ad a number of
high-profile cases of young people in- care who have
been sent overseas and I just want it to be very clear
for all of us: do children in -care refer not just to chi ldren resident in Bermuda but also in overseas facil ities and places?
Thank y ou. I may have another question
based on the answer to —

The President: Your question.

Sen. Michelle Simmons: —clause 4.
The President: Thank you, Senator Michelle Si mmons.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
In relation to the fees, regular members would
get $50 per meeting and the chairman $100.
To answer your question, Senator Tucker, the
Bill allows for a statutory Standing Committee to meet
with non- statutory youth panel to ensure the voices of
the children in- care are heard. Prior to this, it was not
a law; so now, by law, the youth panel can now speak
for the individual child.

Sen. Robin Tucker: Thank you.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: For specific qualifications,
the chairman nor the deputy chairman have to have
specific qualifications. But on the board, the panel, it
has to have, in the Fourth Schedule, those are profes-sionals registered as someone with a medical bac kground, a psychologist, a psychiatrist and an educ ator. And I am getting some more answers for you. One
second.

The Pres ident: Senator Tucker, you have a follow -up
question to that answer?
Sen. Robin Tucker: Yes, I do. Thank you, Madam
President .
Thank you to the Junior Minister for answering
the questions concerning the chairman and the deputy
chairman. I am just wonderi ng, will both of these pos itions be Minister appointments , or will they will be a ppointed from within the —

POINT OF ORDER
[Standing Order 17]

Sen. Owen Darrell : Point of order, Madam President .
Just seeking clarity on the Standing Orders. I thought
that this was an actual debate on the Bill, and this is
not question- and-answer. So, I am just seeking clarity
from you, Madam President, because this is actually
the third time that the Member has spoken. I am just seeking clarity on the Standing Orders on thi s point
because I thought it was a debate and once you speak once, it is over.

The President: Indeed, certainly, you are right in that
point. But because we are not going into Committee,
we wanted to at least allow the Senator to ask the ad-ditional questi on. But you are right in that they are only allowed to speak —

[Crosstalk]

The President: Normally, yes. So, that is —
[Crosstalk]

The President: You will need to string your questions
together when you respond.

[Pause]

The President: We are waiting f or Senator Lindsay
Simmons to liaise with the technical officer and the
Permanent Secretary to get responses to the other
questions that were asked.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Children that are sent overseas, it is a sep arate boar d that deals with that. There is a psychoeducational committee that makes those decisions,
not this board.
Madam President, to answer another question, children in- care can be under an interim care or436 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate der or care order, and some of these children can be
abroad.
Please note all children in- care are abroad in
the psycho- educational programme, as I just stated.
Madam President, this is an open model of a
child sharing their thoughts and views. The current
process is by way of filing a grievance which sounds
very formal, and they aim to prevent grievances. They
will have the opportunity to openly share concerns on
safety, food, clothing, rest, play, culture and respons ibility of parents.
Thank you, Madam President . I hope this answered the questions.

The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Any other questions from any other Senator?
No. Then Senator Simmons, it is over to you
to do your second reading.

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President, I move that the Bill entitled
Children Amendment Act 2022 be now read a second
time.
The President: Is there any objection to second rea ding?
No objection.

SUSPENSION OF STANDING ORDER 26
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President , I move
that [Standing Order] 26 be suspended in respect of
this Bill.

The President: Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection.

[Motion carried: Standing Order 26 suspended.]

BILL

THIRD READING

CHILDREN AMENDMENT ACT 2022
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President , I move
that the Bill entitled Children Amendment Act 2022 be
now a read a third time.

The President: Is there any objection to the third
reading?
No objection.
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Madam President, I move
that the Bill do now pass. The President: It has been moved t hat the Bill ent itled the Children Amendment Act 2022 do now pass.
Is there any objection to that motion?
No objection. The Bill is passed.
Thank you, Senator Lindsay Simmons, —
Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.

The President: —and Senat ors who have responded
and to the technical officers and the Permanent Secretary

[Motion carried: The Children Amendment Act 2022
was read a third time and passed.]

The President: That moves us now to Item 14 on our
Orders of the Day.

MOTIONS
The Pre sident: There are none.

CONGRATULATORY AND/OR OBITUARY
SPEECHES
The President: Would any Senator care to speak on
this?
Senator John Wight, you have the floor.

Sen. John Wight: Thank you, Madam President .
I would like to send condolences to the family
of Phil Talbot. Phil was a banquet manager at the
Fairmont Princess and he died suddenly last week
and I just want to send my condolences to his wife
Lori and family who I have known for many, many
years.
Thank you, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Senator Wight.
Would any other Senator care to speak?
Hearing none, then it is over to you Minister
Peets for the adjournment.

Yes, actually, just
before the adjournment, Madam President, many may
know or may not know, I am not really sure, but Vi ncent Minors of 10 Boundary Crescent celebrates his
84th birthday today. I certainly wish him the very best.
I am not sure Madam President, if Senate was
aware that the infamous, famous [Leon] “Spider” Blakeney passed. I certainly send condolences to the
Blakeney family of which I am related to. My grandmother on my father’s side was Spider’s older sister.
Many people remember Spider from his cricketing days, both with Flatts and then, of course, with his
beloved Bailey’s Bay. We certainly send our cond olences.


Bermuda Senate Thank you, very much, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Minister Peets.
The adjournment date?

ADJOURNMENT

Yes, I am really
happy, Madam President, to invite Senate to adjo urn
until 11 May 2022.

The President: Thank you.
Would any Senator care to speak on the m otion to adjourn?
Senator Lindsay Simmons, you have the floor.

ROAD TRAFFIC FATALITIES

Sen. Lindsay Simmons: Thank you, Madam Pres ident.
I am not going to speak l ong today, but I just
want to talk about our road traffic fatalities. Madam
President, I am cautioning Bermuda to take their time
on the road. We just witnessed our second and third
fatalities. My heart goes out to the families.
I just want everybody to k now that, you know,
last night for instance, I walked down to the bottom of
my job and I saw a young man who was intoxicated
and two people were trying to get him to go into a taxi
and he could barely stand up, and [he] really wanted
to ride his bike home. You know, one mistake like that
is costing people their lives that we do not need to
lose.
We have families out here that are devasted
over these deaths and I think that we just need to stop
and think about what can happen and take our time
on the road. Texting and WhatsApp’ing and talking on
your phone are also causing serious accidents. So, I
am cautioning Bermuda to please take their time on
the road because one death on our road is one too
many.
Thank you, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Senator Lindsay Si mmons.
Would any other Senator care to speak?

Sen. Owen Darrell: Yes, Madam President .

The President: Senator Owen Darrell, you have the
floor.

WORKMEN’S CLUBS BENEFITTING
FROM PLP GOVERNMENT GRANTS

Sen. Owen Darrell: Madam President, I would like to
speak about something in particular, an initiative that
the Government has been doing for Community Clubs
around the Island. I did mention last week that I was planning to attend a grand opening, or a grand reopening, of a Community Club in my neighbourhood,
and this Saturday the Harrington Workmen’s Club r eopened after nearly three years of being closed down.
When they initially closed down, I recall Harrington
Workmen’s Club having a dollar figure of close to
$300,000 to make the necess ary changes that they
were looking to make.
Madam President, it probably was in the best
interest of all that (most know it as) Devil’s Hole Club closed down three years ago. It got to a point where most of the areas of the Club, whether it be upstairs,
out the back, were not functioning as they should. The
bathroom fixtures were past their useful life. Unfort unately, as some Community Clubs have become in this country, it just became a place for individuals to
go and get cheap drinks. I was delighted to hear about two years ago
that the Bermuda Government developed to make
funds available for capital developments for Comm unity Clubs and one of the first clubs that actually applied for a grant, with no assistance of mine, was ac-tually Harrington Workmen’s Club. As any individual
would do, if you know that you have a price tag of
$300,000 to fix something, your ask is going to be, Can I have $300,000? I thought that the way the Go vernment managed this was actually really, really interesting and progressive.
I remember Harrington Workmen’s Club were
told, Thanks. Your plans look very comprehensive.
But we will give you $50,000. And as my five- year-old
sometimes acts out when he does not get everything
he wants, when he wants it, I am pleased to say that
the executive and the committee that were tasked with
renovating Harrington Workmen’s Club never acted
out. They worked with their MP who sits in another
place, MP Anthony Richardson, and they went about figuring out, H ow can we make this $50,000 work to
achiev e the objectives of renovating our Club?
Immediately, they were given the $50,000. I
recall . . . you could drive by Devil’s Hole Club and
see the work that was being done. You could see that
there were trucks outside taking away old materials.
You coul d see the volunteers showing up. You could
not see what was going on inside, but without a doubt you knew that works were happening.
So, at some time we put another offer, or the
Government put another offer out, for capital development grants. And other clubs came in and they asked for many different things and Harrington Wor kmen’s Club said, We have exhausted the money you
gave us. Can we have a bit more? [Government] said,
Well, let us see what you have done. And they sent
pictures. They sent invoices. They sent names of their contractors. Most were from the community of the
Harris’s Bay area, and it was really impressive to
show that despite us not getting everything that we
asked for, we are appreciative. If you give us a little bit
more, we can go a l ittle bit further —as they did.
438 30 March 2022 Official Hansard Report

Bermuda Senate Then about two months ago, I remember Harrington Workmen’s Club asked for a little bit more just
so they can finish. Now, as I said, Harrington Wor kmen’s Club is in my neighbourhood, so I can see the ongoing progress. I can see the emails that were com-ing to my neighbours asking for people to come down
and help paint. Anybody that has any carpentry skills,
please come down and assist.
So, I was more than proud, Madam President,
that with the assistance of the capital development
grant Harrington Workmen’s Club proudly reopened their doors on Saturday to the community. And to be
there and to see the upgrades that they put inside of
that building, to see the pride on the executive me mbers’ faces, to see the pride on some of the (we called
them loosely in Bermuda’s community) old byes of the
Cleveland County Cricket Club come by and just
beam with pride with what has become now of their
Club. That is what the Progressive Labour Party as
well as community spirit is all about, Madam Pres ident.
Madam President, remember, I said at the
beginning of this presentation that the price tag that
they put on that was about $300,000. I can tell you
that the Government , through the capital development
fund, by the time you add up the three payments they
got, assisted Harrington Workmen’s Club with $125,000. What that means is that $175,000 of work
came from the volunteers of that community.
And that is what community spirit is all about.
It was good to see them recognise those individuals when they reopened on Saturday with a video and it
was also good to see, as you walked through Harrington Workmen’s Club on Saturday, that they had taken
very special planning to make sure that there were
different areas of the Club that would benefit the
community. You no longer have to have young people, and we talked about that a lot earlier, having to be
subjected to individuals at a bar. There is a separate
entrance, totally away from the bar, if you wanted to
have classes upstairs or, I do not know, tec hnical
training for cricket. There is a social area out the back
which is also separate from the bar. There is an area out the front where they have audio/visual equipment
and you had older gentlemen enjoying the West I ndies victory on Saturday.
I just w ant to congratulate, again, Harrington
Workmen’s Club, but I know that this is a motion to adjourn, but there were other clubs that have also
benefitted from this. If I just quickly go down the list,
from east to west or west to east, Bailey’s Bay Cricket
Club, Somerset Bridge Recreation Club, Southampton Rangers Sports Club, Pembroke Hamilton Club,
Western Stars Sports Club, St. George’s Cricket Club,
Mid-Atlantic Boat Club, East End Mini Yacht Club,
West End Sailboat Club, Flatts Victoria [Cricket Club],
Paget Lions Club, Somerset Cricket Club, St. David’s
[County] Cricket Club, the Devonshire Recreation
Club, Harrington Workmen’s Club, Warwick Wor k-men’s Club, the Leopards Club, Willow Cuts [Cricket
Club] and Hamilton Parish Workmen’s Club.
These communit y grants, that the Gover nment assisted these Community Clubs with was a t otal of $1,032,122, and this, Madam President, is an
example of what the Progressive Labour Party likes to
call Putting Bermudians first .
I know we get bogged down with some of the
legislation that comes before us, but I . . . and I will
say it again. I could not be prouder to know that the
club that I grew up playing cricket for as a teenager and the club that I have actually had many branch
meetings in and gone to kite- making demons trations,
you know, the Community Fun Day that is put on by
the DHF Family (that is the Devil’s Hole Family), now
has access to the club year -round, inside from the
elements.
I could not be happier to see friends that I actually went to school with now taking on management
roles in this Community Club.
Madam President, while we may often open
the Royal Gazette and we may see lengthy editorials
about topics that people would like to debate and talk
about and get excited about, I would hope that som etime in the near future the editors of that newspaper
[would] take some time out to go down to Devil’s Hole,
or any of these other clubs that I have mentioned, and
highlight the work that has been done and the com-munity spirit that encompasses this Island.
Thank you, Madam President .

The President: Thank you, Senator Darrell.
Would any other Senator care to speak on the
motion to adjourn?

I promise I can
share these comments in two minutes or less. I know
we have worked extremely hard in this legislative session and all of us are looking forward to a bit of a r ecess.
I may not have mentioned in these Chambers
that I had the opportunity as the Minister of Sport to
attend the annual Sports Awards. And if I am being redundant, I do apologise, but yesterday . . . som ething occurred yesterday that just sort of encouraged
me all the more.
I know these past two years have been especially hard on sport and, in particular, on our athletes. But every day, Madam President, as I begin to think
about this particular Ministry and this particular post, it
is these same athletes that I draw my inspiration from.

B ermuda Senate They have some characteristics . . . and it does not
matter how old they are. The amount of the characteristics may vary from age group to age group, but I see it in both our young athletes, our middle- aged athlet es
and our senior athletes, and that is individuals who demonstrate discipline, determination and dedication.
Many of these athletes are very, very disc iplined with the choices they make, the things that they do, how they train, how they eat. They are dedicated. They have to balance work or they have to balance school, or sometimes both, and even in the midst of difficulties, perhaps injury or the inability to train in facilities that will certainly bring about their best performance, they find a way through determination to
continue to push forward. I think we can draw lessons from them and employ some of these things in our sphere of influence.
I know many of the professionals here in this
room have made a difference to some young person
coming behind them, whether you be an educator, or
perhaps in the healthcare profession, or in some other profession. Likewise, our coaches and others have poured a lot into our athletes and certainly deserve recognition.
I was especially pleased yesterday to be a
part of the event that launched the upcoming (hopefully) film Transforming the Beautiful Game: The Clyde
Best Story, and watching Clyde listen to all of the
speeches and, of course, giving a speech himself and hearing what he had to say and how heartfelt that
was. But more importantly, Madam President, there
were about a dozen kids under the age of 12 sitting
there on the turf field at the Clyde Best Centre [of E xcellence] who got a chance to sort of sit in the shadow of Clyde Best and realise, you know, despite all the
adversity, I have no idea what it would have been like,
personally, to live in the 1960s in the UK trying to
break into top flight football in the way that he did. But all of those things that he had to endure had to include discipline, dedication and determination.
Now, of course, we have at the end of his c areer an opportunity to really celebrate him, and he is such a wonderful man. Very gentle, very kind and to this day all he is thinking about is giving back and tr ying to help other footballers, in this particular case, realise their football dreams.
So, I am very, very encouraged about the
state of our athletes as it relates to where they are mentally and, of course, we are just hoping the very, very best going forward for them —and hopefully us,
as Senators. I know we are not athletes, so we do not do push ups and sit ups and run laps in here. But we certainly also could benefit from lessons around disc ipline, dedication and determination as it relates to the job that we do here every day in these Chambers.
Thank you very much, Madam President . I
certainly wish everyone a wonderful Easter break. The President: Thank you. Minister Peets, thank you
very much.
I just wanted to say that as we are approac hing this holy season, this Easter period, I want to wish all Senators, your families and the listening public a most enjoyable Easter —Good Friday and Easter. It is
a very special period and I am hoping that people will
be able to, with the lessening of some of the issues,
restrictions be able to spend time with family and
friends and really enjoy the season that is before us.
I want to thank each and every one of you for
the work that you put in for this day that was unlike any other day we have had for some time. But thank
you for everything that you have done today in terms
of reading the briefs and expressing your views on the Bills that have been presented.
So, I will say that the Senate stands adjourned, and I want you all to enjoy the holiday before you, however you spend it.
We are adjourned until the 11
th of May. Thank
you all.
[At 4:55 pm, the Senate stood adjourned until
10:00 am, Wednesday, 11 May 2022.]
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