AUDLEY SHAW, Opposition spokesman on finance, has denounced the government for tabling anti-money laundering legislation that threatens to invade the privacy of the nation's citizens.
"With this sweeping proposed amendment, the government is trying to substitute its own powers of investigation and prosecution by turning everyone into informers," Mr. Shaw told The Gleaner yesterday.
The Money Laundering Amendment Bill, along with the Financial Investigations Division Bill, was tabled in the House of Represent-atives the Minister of Finance and Planning, Dr. Omar Davies last week. Dr. Davies subsequently named House members, including Mr. Shaw, to a joint select committee which will examine the bills.
That committee will begin sitting on December 1, and it has been requested that written submissions from interested organisations be sent to the clerk of the House at Gordon House by November 24. The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Jamaica has reportedly already taken an interest.
The bills were tabled the same day Solicitor General Michael Hylton disclosed that anti-money laundering legislation was being considered, in which lawyers, accountants, real estate agents, and major car dealers will join financial institutions in reporting suspicious transactions to the relevant authority.
But yesterday Mr. Shaw pointed to Section 3 (c) of the Money Laundering Amendment Bill, which includes in its definition of a 'financial institution', a provision for "a person whose regular occupation or business is the provision of trust services."
With a wide range of businesses providing what can be described as 'trust services', Mr. Shaw suggested that there is a need for guidelines to ensure greater control over the number of institutions called on to file reports on suspicious transactions.
It has also been suggested that the legislation could break the sanctity of the lawyer-client relationship.
Last week, the Jamaican Bar Association said the proposed legislation is a 'serious threat' to lawyer-client confidentiality, while the Realtors Association of Jamaica said the enacting of such a law would place unnecessary 'burden' on real estate agents.
