Bermuda Premier Dunkley: 'We Won't Let You Hide Things' (Audio)

falling fifty four cents a barrel to forty sixteen. Gold up three eighty the ounce to twelve seventy five, a gain of three tenths of one percent. The SMP five hundred index down eighteen to two thousand forty five, a drop of nine tenths of one percent. Nastack down twenty four a drop of five tenths of one percent down, Industrials down one eighty five points, a drop of one percent. I'm Charlie Palaton. That's a Bloomberg Business Flash. Days, Good Days.

This is taking stock on Bloomberg. I'm Pim Fox my co host Kathleen Hayes. We are broadcasting live from Elbow Beach, Bermuda, an ocean front enclave of classic style and contemporary luxury. Bermuda is a British overseas territory. And here to tell us more about Bermuda is the Premier and the Minister of National Security, the Honorable Michael Dunkley. Thank you very much for being here, sir. It is great to be here. And does it get any more beautiful than this? No, no,

it doesn't. I could. I can say definitively I have. All I had to do was get off the plane yesterday at the airport, come and sit on that beach, and all the thoughts I had, what, all the things I had to do just sort of melting away. It tends to get like that. And I'll tell all your listening audience that you are here in beautiful Bermuda. But there's no rum swizzles or dark and stormies out just yet. It's a little bit earlier to day. Tell us a

little bit about Bermuda. It's legal status, the way the politics and the business community work in the island. Tell us what goes on. We have been blessed with a very strong system of democracy for hundreds of years, and along with that we build a very strong foundation uh in our community and also in the business world. Our legal system is one that we made sure that at all times we've continued to make sure that we have a sound system to be used with appeal to the

Privy Council in London. And I say those comments to to get to this position where we live in a small world nowadays because of the technology and how it moves very quickly and people seem to be the access to capital in all parts of the world do what they have to do. But with that comes real increase in scrutiny to all jurisdictions in regards to how they run their country. What type of tax system you have,

what type of transparency and compliance you have. And we're proud in Bermuda that while we might be one of the most remote places in the world, seven miles from the East coast, we've built a system that we believe is just equitable, openly transparent compliance and we cooperate with all our partners throughout the world to make sure we

stay in that position. And I think if you've seen over the past couple of weeks, months and years, while there's been for example, the release of the Panama Papers

with significant discussion about it. Bermuda's reputation has held a line because when we've built industry, as we've built international business through the years, seventy eight years ago, before what people even thought about it, we created our Registry of Beneficial Interest, and we we set right up front if you're not going to come to if you're gonna come to the island, you're gonna do business an appropriate way.

We're not gonna let you hide things. Would you explain to our listeners who don't know much about Remuda, accept that beautiful beaches and great golf courses, etcetera, what that regis wonderful people and what I'm we have talked more about that. The culture, the people, it's fascinating to me. Less than a hundred thousand people, so cohesive, it's just amazing.

But tell us about the Beneficial Registry, Well, uh, it was started in the I would say probably shortly around there when we started have a real business infrastructure developed, and uh, the the leaders of that of that time decided that they wanted to make sure that if you were going to set up companies in Bermuda, there had to be access to know who was a part of

those companies and what type of business they've done. Um. And it's unbelievable the vision that they had to do something like that, because today in two thousand and sixteen, other jurisdictions are still looking through basic scenarios of what they will do. There's been a lot of oppression from the UK and from European Union countries to have other countries developed some things like this, and we said, look, we have a model here that works, uh, and we've

continued to tweak it as we've gone forward. So for example, UM, my colleague, the Deputy Perium and the Minister of Financing myself, we're in the UK and November UH and with the heightened oversight to try to deal with corruption and the farious activity, and we met with the National Crime Agency there and he said, look, you know, we've never turned down a request for information or for people to see

the books. Obviously, you know you have to protect the privacy of some things, but we need to know what's going on. And so we told the National Crime Agency that you know, if you have a request that's legitimate enveloped, within twenty four hours, you will get the information you need. And I think that's given us a strong foundation to

build our business because that's what business wants. They want reliability, they want certainty, and they want to be able to withstand public scrutiny, which is picking up more and more nowadays. And I think it's it's only appropriate that it does. I wonder if you could just speak to the issue of what goes on domestically, because many people may not realize that, Uh, you have to deal with the same

issue that every country deals with. Spending on education, UH, spending on housing, health care, sixty to sixty five thousand people g d P, I think of around six billion.

Is that just a little okay further south and that, But it's it's growing, right, and and as it grows, you have to fulfill the promises that that the people want to want kept tell us about the mix of businesses and what you're trying to do here, because I understand that, for example, many of the tourists that come now come on the cruise ship, and that that's great, but how do you grow all that. I have to say that it's it's hard for me to concentrate when

I'm sitting at this wonderful thing. We did that on per in Elbow Beach and then looking at at the at so many different colors of the water and UM, but I think I can collect my thoughts enough to answer that question for you. UH. And it is Friday afternoon, so you've got our own wine sometime. UM at this point in time are our foundation is international business. We're heavy reliant on that. We've found um some good growth

and strength over the years. Recent changes to the industry have seeing mergers and acquisitions and their rates have been dampened a bit. You're talking about the reinsurance, the reinsurance,

the reinsurance industry. But we did for me to still the third largest reinsurance destination insurance destination in the world, and we're proud of that with our size, and we continue to work very closely with the industry to make sure uh that this is the place that they want to be and this is the place that they want to do their business from and grow. And we have a strong relationship with them. And also the regulation, the regulator in Bermuda, the b m A, who do a

fantastic job tourism. I guess is we're from a first put its footprint back in the fifties I think we were probably one of the four runners of the modern era of tourism, uh with furnace, with the built the old Castle Harbor Hotel, and the cruise ships will come in and drop people off, and the golf courses who have built it at uh what's now Tuckers Point and what still is mid Ocean UM. And so we were the four runner of the vibrant cruise industry. And over

time UH that has changed. Uh. We now, I believe, are on a nice resurgence with tourism. We've got a number of exciting properties that are redeveloping and and um putting them up in a better position. Obviously, Elba Beach I think is one of the jewels in our crown. Here in Bermuda, there's redevelopment in the east end with Desperallas Group and with Mortgage Point, which is gonna build

a rich reserve. Michael Douglas probably just three miles down the coast here is going to be developing his property, so that there's a lot going on. Cruise ship visitors are an important part of that industry UM and Bermuda is probably one of the top cruise destinations at this point in time. Because we have developed the facilities for them to come into the Royal Naval Dockyard, so we can have two mega ships there at a time and

we typically have four through the whole week. And the Royal Naval Docker is a really good place to visit and then we put ferries to go out to support that. So the government obviously has a big role to play. And I know that you have a beach vision. You know, we spoke earlier in the show to Ed Burns, who's the managing director here at the Double Beach in Bermuda, and Ed has been affiliated. Now what a very dynamic experienced hotel development professional. Who's who's come in? Did Bermuna

fall behind for a while? Does Bermuda have catching up? Are you having to like like let the world know again what's going on here? No doubt we we did fall beyond um And I think it's probably twofold one is you know, we might have taken our eye off the ball and had other opportunities that were in front

of us. And I also think, you know, in all reality is that the world has really focused more on tourism and destinations at ten fifty and twenty years ago, never happened um and so while we were we were still in the game and tourism uh, and we were concentrating to some other real growth opportunities. It's it's like a champion if if if you're the world champions um of basketball or football, whatever, it's always hard to stay

in that position because people want to attain that. And even though we you know, we live in paradise and we've got so much going for us in the tourism industry, as I'm sure Mr Burns knows as as a great professional, is that every year you have to reevaluate your product. And that's what we're trying to do in Bermuda. Now we've we've looked at our product. We're trying to give the experience so we can appeal to the traveler of today that we want to get in Bermuda that has

a disposable income. We're appealing to the markets where we have good access to good air airlift from and I think now we're starting to see that progress. I've talked about the development and if you take a look at our first core tourism numbers, we're up about fourteen but set with good growth. Well, congratulations on that We're so happy you joined us today. This is the premiere of Bermuda. You've been listening to the honorable Michael Dunkley as we

continue our live broadcast from Elbow Beach, Bermuda. Kathleen Hayes taking stock, Bloomberg Radio m