The Opposition Leader, Mrs. Cora Richardson-Hodge, has declared that the right to have the Attorney General and the Deputy Governor to vote in the House of Assembly is unconstitutional and should be removed from the Constitution of Anguilla. She made this pronouncement while hosting the Opposition’s radio program “Just the Facts” over Radio Anguilla on Monday 30th October, 2023.
As a former Minister of Constitutional Affairs, Mrs. Richardson-Hodge has appealed to the Government of Anguilla to make a constitutional amendment as it regards the removal of the voting rights of these two ex-officio members of the House.
While serving as the Constitutional Affairs Minister in 2019, Mrs. Richardson-Hodge had led amendments to the Anguilla constitution in the area of Nationality. This required the substitution of the term “Anguillian” for a person who belongs to Anguilla and revising the category of people who qualify as Anguillians in the establishment of the Island-wide Single Electoral District.
At that time, the removal of the voting rights of the AG and DG was contemplated, but as Mrs. Richardson-Hodge said, there were technical issues that did not readily allow for the removal of the voting rights then.
As she spoke on “Just the Facts”, she was adamant that it is time that this issue be addressed through constitutional reform:
“Our constitution provides for legislative and executive powers that are reserved for the Governor,” she said. “However, we have seen that there needs to be constitutional reform to remove the powers of the Attorney General and the Deputy Governor from voting in the House of Assembly because they are, in essence, appointees by the British Government.”
She explained: “If there are persons in the House who are appointed by the British Government voting [as non-elected officers] on important Bills that come to the House, whether it be tax Bills or otherwise, then the question is ‘do we really have a democracy?’ This is the question, because you have the British who has appointees in the House of Assembly voting and influencing the outcome of the vote.”
She said that this Government has not taken any steps towards constitutional reform since the GST has been passed. “In light of this, we can only surmise or suspect that the reason why they haven’t is because they may still need the powers of Attorney General and the Deputy Governor to vote on a particular issue. This will undermine the will of the people,” she said.
