caribbean_princess

Hi All,

I'm currently contemplating a move to the caribbean as I'm young and I currently don't have any commitments.

I'm hoping to get into the legal field out there as I have heard that there are better opportunities out there than here in the UK as I'm struggling to find legal work in the UK due to the recession.

I have legal qualifications and I'm aware that I would have to undertake a 6 month conversion course at Norman Manley Law School in Jamaica order to practice as a lawyer out there.

I would like to live on one of the following islands: Bahamas, Barbados, BVI, Bermuda, Cayman, St Lucia (or simply any island that is NOT Jamaica!!!)

I would like to know if there is anyone on here who has made this move and who can tell me what the current climate is in the legal profession in the caribbean.

Are jobs easily obtainable?

What is the likelihood of me walking into a job once I've completed the conversion course?

Any help or advice that anyone could give would be much appreciated!!

Thanks!!

Trixie_b

Do you have permission to live / work in any of these countries? Family connections? Family history? a large wad of cash to set up your own business?

Jerseygirl

Hi...welcome to BE.

I am moving your thread over to the Caribbean forum. Hopefully someone will be along soon to help you. Good luck.

caribbean_princess

Thanks for your reply Trixie_b.

My family heritage is Jamaican and I have family there however, I would prefer to work elsewhere in the caribbean.

I wish I had a huge wad of cash to start up LOL

The next enrolment for the conversion course is September 2014 so that would give me a year to save up money from here to take with me.

I was under the impression that if I was given a job offer that I would be able to apply for a work permit and with the conversion course giving me the ability to practice across the caribbean that it would make life a bit easier when applying for jobs out there?

Any ideas?

Or is there anyone else that has done this or something similar?

Pistolpete2

Trixie is asking you about family ties because you would ordinarily need to be a Caricom citizen in order to be able to work in the region. I can't imagine anybody giving you a work permit so that you can then compete with citizens from the region unless you have particular skills that others here do not have. That is the whole point of work permits, as it is in the UK, for example.

Others may have done what you ask but their family ties will normally* be close enough - they could in fact get a Caricom country passport - that that carries them through to being able to set-up in the Caribbean.

*There are all sorts of people who come by work permits in the region due to contacts made in one way or another which are dubious, but we won't go there on here. There are others who purport to have the requisite paperwork to allow them to practice law in some fashion but the media then take great delight when these people are discovered as being deficient and they are run off the island.

jean1947

Get a Jamaican passport.
I know a Jamaican who did his law degree at uni here, distance learning. It cost one million Ja dollars for the license there.

Pistolpete2

Since OP doesn't want to actually BE in Jamaica, this ultimately leaves the other Caricom member states as choices under CSME. However, I'm not sure if free movement of labour is actually in place, in this instance, in the three potential candidates which are:

Barbados, St Lucia and The Bahamas.

I very much doubt that a work permit would be granted in Cayman, Bermuda or BVI, other than, as previously stated, for an experienced legal professional because they are only Caricom associates and stand on their own immigration-wise.

In passing I would say that though the Caribbean in general is also suffering due to the global economic slow-down, so that the sort of business activity that would give rise to legal work is more limited, there is clear evidence of a need for legal personnel proficient in drafting legislation. Of course, whether governments here are actually prepared to pay for this expertise rather than just push the clearly stated numerous tasks in hand onto the back-burner is another matter.

Trixie_b

It's common to think that we can just move to another country because we fancy it...... However the reality is that it's more difficult than that, a large wad of cash often helps! and if you have family roots or heritage with a country, it may be that you already have permission to live and work there. (which is why I asked you what connections you had!)

So, while I admire your desire, you will need to review each of the countries and what they allow or not in terms of immigration.

I don't know about immigration in the countries you mention, but a google search easily turns up some good stuff:
http://www.totallybarbados.com/barba...s_Work_Permit/

Pistolpete2

It's this bit

"Under certain conditions, CARICOM nationals may live and work in Barbados without a work permit or visa. Contact the Chief Immigration Office for more details. "

that causes difficulty because Barbados is known for taking bajans first these days, over other Caricom nationals, even though this is considered contrary to the spirit and letter of CSME but really in a world of unemployment who can blame any country for considering their own first if their own have the same skills. Part of this (their own) preference would obviously relate to the multiplier effect that the IMF goes on about and unhappily mis-advises countries like the UK about. It is more important to hire an equally skilled home-grown who spends their money in the economy than one who ultimately remits an element of the same pay elsewhere.

Gordon Barlow

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...s-8632367.html

http://www.economist.com/news/americ...tax-havens-and

Princess. UK lawyers don't usually have too much of a problem getting Work Permits for Cayman, which is probably the highest-paying place in the region for lawyers. But you do have to get a job first, and that is usually done through an overseas agency; there must be plenty of those in Britain. You may have to do some kind of conversion course here (I don't know) - but certainly not in Jamaica.

Google "Cayman New Resident" for an online magazine that has a lot of information about living here. The above two links are from this weekend's UK newspapers, with some current opinions of relevance.

Pistolpete2

I like your pre-emptive strike on the bad publicity that Cayman is currently getting to negate it. Nice style!

Gordon Barlow

The bad publicity isn't actually likely to hurt us much. Offshore tax-havens have powerful support from the politicians and international companies that use our facilities.

Pistolpete2

Was talking more to the potential new recruit level where they might read this negative stuff and feel that the end of the (new) world is nigh.

I have to say though that I do wonder what role the FCO play in some jurisdictions in the area when there is quite clearly so much that is untoward going on - apart from downing a G&T in one, that is.

Gordon Barlow

Here is an extract from a post of mine last September, which is relevant to your wonderment.

It took until this year, 2012, for London to notice the mess. Only then did the FCO clerks twig the full effect of their collective Attention Deficit Disorder. Only now are they suddenly aware of the need for independent audits of government accounts, and for prudent monitoring of public expenditures. Even now, their latest proposals call for only the barest minimum of fiscal responsibility from the same people who got us into the mess.

The FCO’s intervention is a day late and a dollar short, as the saying goes. Unless and until long-term immigrants are allowed to participate fully in local governance, nothing will improve. We aren’t holding our breath; with each week of inaction that passes, more of us lose confidence in the FCO's ability to cope.

In 1997 the UK’s National Audit Office warned the FCO that inattention to the Overseas Territories had created a significant contingent liability. Since then, that contingent liability has increased massively. Nobody knows what it amounts to now. Britain’s own government finances are in such chaos that the Territories’ debts may be a drop in the bucket of Britain’s public debt. Nevertheless, one can measure the effect in terms of straws and camels’ backs.

The FCO is not literally “a day late and a dollar short”. It is at least fifteen years late and several billion dollars short. If we could be sure that its ADD were cured, we would feel a whole lot more comfortable.

Pistolpete2

Wasn't really talking about accounting, finance and bookkeeping as there are more serious concerns that inhabit the wider region as do they in Latin America, but not Cayman it seems, but I'll stop right there.