Gitanjali Gutierrez, the Information Commissioner in Bermuda has ruled that the Board of Immigration did not use the required rigour and efficiency to find records when it was asked to disclose the minutes of its meetings under a public access to information (“PATI”) request.
Ms Gutierrez annulled a decision by the Board of Immigration to deny access to its meeting minutes sought under the Public Access to Information Act 2010 because the records did not exist. In a written decision Ms Gutierrez stated she was not satisfied the board has taken all reasonable steps to trace the records before it rejected the PATI request from The Royal Gazette and ordered the board to issue a new decision by June 26.
The PATI request was submitted in November 2016 and concerned the renewal of a work permit for the Reverend Nicholas Tweed, a pastor at St Paul AME Church and a prominent critic of the former One Bermuda Alliance government. His work permit renewal application was considered by the Board of Immigration and rejected by then home affairs minister Patricia Gordon-Pamplin.
Both parties gave differing accounts of how the application was dealt with, and the PATI request was made in a bid to shed light on this process in particular and the manner in which religious work-permit applications are handled in general.
The Royal Gazette asked for the minutes of the board’s meetings from July 8 to November 17, 2016, as well as any memos, protocols or guidelines related to work permit applications and renewals from churches which it used to decide applications and appeals. Danette Ming, the Chief Immigration Officer, denied the request claiming no minutes of meetings were kept per se, but decisions were rendered directly on the applications.
Ms Gutierrez found that the board did not fulfil its duty under legislation to assist the Applicant with the request and to respond completely and accurately.
Ms Gutierrez said her office’s investigation found that the Department of Immigration logged the receipt of work-permit applications and the outcome of the board’s reviews in its computer system and the board should have made a reasonable effort to have, or offer to have, cooperated with The Royal Gazette at the initial request stage.
Records relevant to the request were identified and Ms Gutierrez recommended that the board take an approach that increases the transparency of its operations, activities and the manner in which it records its decisions on work permit applications in order to increase accountability.
