Ministers from the United Kingdom and the Caribbean have pledged co-operation on COVID-19 and a raft of other areas.
The joint communique from the March 18 virtual meeting recognised the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic as an urgent and overriding priority, and that the UK’s support in the fight against the COVID-19 was welcomed by the Caribbean.
The communique noted that agriculture and food and nutrition security in the context of post-COVID-19 economic recovery, building resilience and achieving sustainable development was given priority by Caribbean countries. The Forum committed to exploring co-operation and investment possibilities, in this area, in the context of the United Kingdom-Caribbean partnership. There was agreement for timely international support for exceptional measures to ensure debt sustainability and address new financing gaps as part of a short- to medium term recovery package.
The Forum, recognising that ‘no one is safe until everyone is safe,’ acknowledged the call from CARICOM Heads of Government for an urgent Global Summit to address inequitable access to, and distribution of vaccines to be convened in coordination with the World Health Organisation’s Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator. The United Kingdom committed to work with Caribbean governments to build back better, and more inclusively, to strengthen long-term resilience. The Forum of ministers recognised that the pandemic demonstrated the necessity and urgency of working together, both regionally and internationally, in vaccine rollout and distribution, and the procurement of medical supplies and equipment. The ministers collectively also expressed their commitment to advocacy and action aimed at promoting and ensuring equitable access to and distribution of vaccines, including through the COVAX facility.
Windrush
CARICOM ministers welcomed the United Kingdom’s commitment to right the wrongs of the Windrush Scandal and for taking the decision for swift and decisive action to make amends. This includes providing compensation to victims through the Windrush Compensation Scheme, which is making higher payments, more quickly, and implementing the recommendations of the Independent Windrush Lessons Learned Review.
Dozens of persons who had legally migrated from the Caribbean to the UK in the 1960s and 1970s were wrongly detained by the authorities, threatened with deportation, denied benefits and even refused re-entry into the UK.
The Ministerial Forum paid tribute to the over half a million West Indians who have made an immeasurable contribution to the socio-economic fabric of the United Kingdom by helping the United Kingdom’s public services and economy to thrive. This, the Communique said, includes the significant contribution of West Indians of the Windrush Generation who migrated to the United Kingdom between 1948 and 1973, helping to rebuild a post-war UK as a modern and multicultural society, and developing key sectors such as the National Health Service (NHS) and the transport system across the country.
Further, the ministerial forum recognized the potential and growing strength of the CARICOM/UK relationship as demonstrated by the United Kingdom’s opening of four new diplomatic missions in The Bahamas, Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, and St Vincent and the Grenadines. The expanded number of diplomatic missions comes in the wake of the UK’s exit from the European Union and moves to reposition itself in this region.
The ministers reaffirmed their commitment to the longstanding diplomatic partnership between Caribbean countries and the United Kingdom, welcoming the United Kingdom’s deployment of additional diplomatic staffing across the Caribbean, as a further opportunity to enhance United Kingdom and Caribbean cooperation on key issues.
Trade and economic development
The CARIFORUM-United Kingdom Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) was recognised as a trade agreement with the potential for promoting sustainable development and being important for all parties’ recovery efforts following the economic shock of the global COVID-19 pandemic. The UK’s support to Caribbean development institutions, in particular the United Kingdom’s recent commitment of up to £21m to the Special Development Fund of the Caribbean Development Bank was welcomed at the Forum, including the UK’s pledge to work in partnership with Caribbean countries to maximise the impact of this support and other spending in the region. It was noted too, that the pandemic placed additional pressures on small island states’ finances and diverted critical resources away from areas such as long-term resilience building.
Whilst it was acknowledged that several Caribbean countries have medium to high per capita Gross National Income (GNI), giving the impression of wealth, they suffer disproportionately from diseconomies of scale, external economic shocks and catastrophic climatic events, which significantly and gravely impact their economies and societies. Determining accessibility to finance, Official Development Assistance (ODA) graduation and “differentiation”, based on their GNI per capita, presents a disadvantage as the measure used is known to work poorly for small states. This can mean the end of support before those states have resilience, as opposed to alternative approaches that reduce these risks, including the use of a multi-dimensional vulnerability index. The Forum noted with concern that the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the debt situation, created significant GDP contraction and widening fiscal deficits among Caribbean countries.
CARICOM ministers raised additional concerns over the threat posed to their financial stability by de-risking by international banks, which has resulted in the withdrawal, restricted access to, and higher costs of correspondent banking services to the Caribbean banking sector, alongside the negative impact on trade, investment, remittances and the regions’ ability to integrate into and benefit from the global financial, trade and economic systems. The ministers, however welcomed the United Kingdom’s £43.8m Strengthening Health Facilities Programme, which is supporting the upgrading of 60 health facilities across the region to higher standards of climate and disaster resilience and developments with respect to disaster risk financing tools, shock responsive social protection and recovery planning.
Democracy
The United Kingdom-Caribbean Ministerial Forum reaffirmed their commitment to democracy, freedom of expression and independent, responsible and sustainable media freedom, which are essential to the self-determination of all peoples.
The Ministerial Forum welcomed the December 18, 2020 decision of the International Court of Justice that it has jurisdiction to entertain Guyana’s claim concerning the validity of the 1899 Arbitral Award, which settled the land boundary between then British Guiana and Venezuela.
The Forum also expressed their concern about the issuance of Venezuela’s Decree No 4.415 on January 7, 2021 claiming exclusive sovereign rights for Venezuela in the waters and seabed adjacent to Guyana’s coast, west of the Essequibo River. They called on Venezuela to follow a peaceful path of adherence to the tenets of international law. The Ministerial Forum also reaffirmed their longstanding and unambiguous support for the preservation and maintenance of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Belize and Guyana.
