During a meeting with Saint Lucians in New York on September 29, Prime Minister Philip J. Pierre spoke of his plans to bring a Diaspora Bill before parliament.
The bill would provide incentives for individuals who want to invest in the island.
These incentives will not be available to non-nationals.
Pierre mentioned that the diaspora bill would allow Saint Lucians who have lived abroad for ten years to bring items onto the island duty-free.
During his address, the Prime Minister also spoke about delays in the finalisation of regulations that will allow the grandchildren of Saint Lucians living abroad to attain automatic citizenship.
Pierre stated: “We’ve made the first step in the 2nd generation citizenship … the administrative work to do that is taking some time.”
“We have rules and regulations to follow. We are part of international bodies, part of the UN, part of the world bank, [and] part of the IMF. We have to follow rules and regulations…” The Prime Minister remarked, asserting sanctions require obedience to international rules and the administration needing to follow these measures results in delays.
At the meeting, Pierre took the opportunity to urge individuals making physical donations to Saint Lucia to send these items through the Saint Lucia Social Development Fund (SSDF).
“We appreciate what you do for Saint Lucia… because when you send your remittances, when you send your barrels, you send [them] for Saint Lucia and Saint Lucia benefits,” Pierre said, advising, “If you intend to send stuff to the country for schools or for the hospitals, do not send it under individual names, send it to the SSDF and they will do the distribution, because when you send it to individual names or organisations, it takes too much because Saint Lucia has laws and regulations.”
The Prime Minister informed that at the moment, while items sent under individuals’ names are currently not VAT exempt, “… when you send it to the SSDF they are a body that are VAT exempt.
