Roadtown, Tortola - Premier Hon Ralph O’Neal, OBE has welcomed statements from finance centres adopting the principles of exchange of information and transparency of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

In recent weeks Hong Kong, Singapore, Switzerland, Austria, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Andorra and Monaco have all agreed to commit to OECD standards of exchange of information and transparency.  

 Government welcomes these recent statements which essentially agree to abide by the same OECD principles that the BVI adopted since 2002.  According to the Premier, we now have to await these declarations being put into practice. 

Commenting on the BVI’s position with regard to OECD standards of exchange of information and the recent statements by other finance centres, the Premier reiterated that “the BVI committed to the OECD principles of exchange of information and transparency in 2002 and was one of the first jurisdictions to sign the TIEAs.”

The Territory has become a leading jurisdiction in terms of signing Tax Information Exchange Agreements (TIEAs). The BVI has three TIEAs with the United States of America, the United Kingdom and Australia, providing for the full exchange of information on request in both criminal and civil tax matters.

Noting the existence of the three agreements with the U.S., UK and Australia, Hon. O’Neal also noted that the Territory is “very close to concluding similar agreements with a number of other jurisdictions. The BVI has been acknowledged as fully compliant with OECD standards by the organisation’s Director of the Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, Mr. Jeffrey Owens.”

World leaders are currently looking at a global standard of 12 TIEAs as a benchmark of compliance with effective exchange of information and transparency.  According to the Premier, “the Territory is on track to meet that benchmark and the Government is willing to publicly commit to reaching that goal in the very near future.  We are involved in bi-lateral discussions with OECD countries so we are dependent on the timing of our negotiating partners but our good intentions are clear and have been acknowledged by those with whom we are negotiating.”

He further stated that ”for TIEAs to be effective there needs to be a level playing field.  We in the BVI have been calling for such for a decade now and are heartened at last to see some movement on the international stage.  We now expect the world leaders who gather for the G20 London Summit to recognise finance centres, such as the BVI, that have always been co-operative and constructive members of the international community of nations as a matter of public policy.”

Maintaining the BVI’s solid reputation as a financial centre remains an area of critical concern for the Government because of the significant contribution the industry makes to the local economy.