Members
Parliament
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Dr. Douglas De Couto, JP, MP

Dr. Douglas De Couto, JP, MP

1768
Speeches
616,883
Words Spoken
69
Sittings Active
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
91 words
Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I would like for us to . . . I would personally like to extend the best wishes to the people of the Azores as they have endured Hurricane Gabrielle last night and this morning. We here in Bermuda know what it is to go through a storm. And of course, many of …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
48 words
Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hereby give notice that at the next day of meeting, I propose to move the following motion: That this Honourable House [do] take note of the opportunities, challenges, and risks to Bermuda arising from Bermuda's Corporate Income Tax. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
84 words
Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. We support this Bill because the Bill per se is about enabling the later Regulations, and we understand that the Government may wish to make new Reg-ulations from time to time that this Bill would support. While we do have further remarks regarding the administration's fees, we will keep those until we discuss …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
19 words
Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. So, to be clear the One Bermuda Alliance supports the goals — [Inaudible interjection]
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
45 words
—supports the goals of ensuring that all Bermudians can enjoy a properly supported retirement. And we know that one of the ways to get there is for people to put away enough money and allow it to grow with low -cost investments. [Inaudible interjections ]
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
1,234 words
One of the issues facing Bermudians today is that this regime that was put in place in 1998 and in effect in 2000 as the Minister outlined, has not really been around long enough for many older Bermudians to properly build the balances that we need. And w e saw some of the statistics that he provided. And if I …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
11 words
I know in the past . . . [Inaudible interjections ]
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
80 words
I know in the past, when we have discussed the pensions, for example, while the One Bermuda Alliance supported hardship withdrawals for things like COVID -19, we didn't necessarily support other withdrawals because we know the importance of compounding and building these investments up. And some people on the Government benches said, oh, we were being paternalistic. Well, you must …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
68 words
But to good impact. For example, is it paternalistic that we have to have third- party insurance when we drive on the roads? No, it is a good public benefit. So, I would urge this Government to look further at this issue and look at things like how to promote transparency in law, how to promote competition and how to …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
5 words
Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
36 words
The Premier is, I am sure, unintentionally misleading the House. We did not support with conditions. We support it and we ask for things we would like to see in the future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
5 words
Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
73 words
Any member of the public is entitled to visit the parliamentary website where my interests are well declared. Also, I have no specific interest in this that many other members of the public do not also have as highlighted in the Standing Orders on those parts. So, I would appreciate if the Premier [does] not insinuate poor intent on my …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
220 words
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, Mr. Premier, for the presentation. And I would also like to say thank you to the staff at the Ministry who provided us a very detailed briefing, and we are grateful for that information, which helped us develop our understanding of the situation. Quite a lot was covered by the Premier, and I am …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
349 words
And if you rely on social insurance, that is not what this is about. Social insurance, as we have heard in the past, also has significant issues that need to be addressed by this Government. We hope that they will address those things like they have addressed the public sector pensions. Two key differences, and the Premier has actually talked …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
152 words
Now, Mr. Speaker, the Premier also talked about how complicated this is, because we know we have the various types of employees, they all have different benefits, and he mentioned about the work that they will be doing to make sure people can get the information. So, I urge the Government to invest heavily to make sure every individual, because …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
344 words
The Premier mentioned the lump sum conversion factor and the actuarial review, and I think it is important to note that the review means it could probably go up as well as down, with the health of the pension in mind. And finally, Mr. Speaker, he talked about looking ahead. Again, that is not in this Bill, but it was …
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
5 words
Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
20 words
The Premier again, misleading. [The Opposition] is fully supportive of the legislation [that is] finally arriving. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
26 Sep 2025 House of Assembly
Official Hansard Report - House of Assembly
121 words
Yes, thank you, Madam [Chairman] . My remarks are with respect to this a mendment Bill , clause 4, which amends section 13 of the principal Act, adding in the [subsection] ( 1B) to the section 12, which the Premier alluded to. My interpretation of that is that ensures that going forward, member s of the Bermuda Regiment, when they …