Oct 12 - Chief Minister’s Gibraltar Day In London Evening Reception Speech
This is the full text of a speech delivered earlier this evening at the Guildhall in the City of London by the Chief Minister Fabian Picardo.
Sheriffs,
Ministers of Her Majesty’s Government of the United Kingdom,
Ministers of Her Majesty’s Government of Gibraltar,
Past and present Governors of Gibraltar,
Commissioners of Police of the Metropolitan Police and of the Royal Gibraltar Police,
Leader of the Opposition,
My Lords,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is my pleasure to welcome you once again this year to the fantastic setting of this magnificent Guildhall.
Let me start by thanking the Band of the Corps of the Royal Engineers for the music so far this evening.
And the Commanding Officer of the Royal Gibraltar Regiment and the Commander British Forces in Gibraltar for the presence of the Band and Corps of Drums of the Regiment.
We will enjoy their music outside in a few minutes.
Ladies and gentlemen, it has been an eventful year since we last met here and there is a lot of good news to report.
I am delighted to be able to once again report to you this year that Gibraltar is booming.
We are booming as a great place to do business.
Booming as the home of international online gaming.
And booming as one of the most reputable financial services jurisdictions in the world.
Indeed, in just the past year since many of you were last with us we have seen huge progress in Gibraltar.
Two projects particularly important to highlight this year.
The first is the opening of the University of Gibraltar.
At last we are a University City.
An ambition of so many generations of Gibraltarian politicians.
Now a stunning reality.
I know we are joined today by our University Chancellor and previous Governor of Gibraltar, Lord Luce.
And by our Vice Chancellor, our very own Daniella Tilbury.
Welcome to you both.
And of course, in May of this year our new National Bank was established.
The Gibraltar International Bank is wholly owned by Her Majesty’s Government of Gibraltar.
You will be delighted to know that within 6 months of opening, the Bank has exceeded the expectations in its business plan for the whole year already by well over 100%.
And our oldest Bank, the Gibraltar Savings Bank, has in the past year further increased its deposits to break the barrier of One Billion pounds sterling.
And the reserves of the Savings Bank have therefore grown too, from just £1000 to over £20m in the past four years.
A new University.
A new bank exceeding expectations.
And our oldest bank with new record highs in deposits, profits and reserves.
Those really are good news stories about the last year in Gibraltar.
As is the news that our GDP has grown by 10.3% last year.
Our statistics office predicts similar double digit growth again this year.
Indeed, our current GDP per capita stands at almost £51,000, ranking us in third place on the IMF database of per capita GDP rankings.
But this progress is not achieved by me, in splendid isolation.
Or by just relying on the maturity of low lying fruit.
It is achieved only with hard work and effort.
The hard work and effort of my ministerial team.
The hard work and effort of the great professionals who I have the benefit of working with in the Civil Service and wider public sector in Gibraltar.
And the hard work and effort of the great professionals who run our private sector.
It is the combined efforts of all of us in the Gibraltar economy that delivers these incredible results.
Of course one of our most unique selling points is the high standard of the regulatory environment in Gibraltar.
As I told you when I first addressed you four years ago, I was determined that we would get ahead of the many EU directives which we had not yet transposed and which were past due their transposition deadlines.
We achieved that two years ago.
And we are not going to fall behind again.
In fact, I announced last week that we will be the first of all the EU jurisdictions to implement a Central Register of Beneficial Ownership.
Because the Prime Minister, David Cameron, grasped the nettle of leadership in the G8 and central registers will now become a reality in all of Europe.
And we will be the first.
Because we agree with David Cameron’s vision that to be successful today, financial services centres must be at the forefront of compliance with international standards of transparency.
And we are.
That is why Gibraltar now has Exchange of Information relationships with 79 other nations.
Those include the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and even, although they don't often like to refer to it, the Kingdom of Spain.
That is why the OECD Phase Two peer review ranks Gibraltar alongside the United Kingdom and Germany in terms of compliance.
Yes, you heard right.
The OECD ranks Gibraltar’s financial services sector in compliance terms in the same group as this City of London and Frankfurt.
Perhaps that is why you will not have been surprised to hear that the EU Commission has today announced that Gibraltar has been removed from two more “blacklists” of EU Nations, down from 9 to 7.
Because even those who have been persuaded by the misleading propaganda of our opponents, change their tune when they see the reality of our actions.
And our online gaming industry also continues to grow, despite external challenges.
This year we celebrate twenty years since my predecessor, the great Joe Bossano had the forsight to agree to the grant of the first such licence in 1995.
Now, Gibraltar has become the pivotal point on the globe for remote gaming.
The numbers of people employed in the industry has increased by almost a thousand in just these past four years.
And in the financial services industry, the numbers of people employed has increased by over six hundred in the same period.
Of course, with such growth in those sectors, you won't be surprised to hear the good news that unemployment in Gibraltar was at a record low of 164 at the end of August.
No surprise then that we have announced the start of the exploratory piling works on the Eastside reclamation for the development to be known as Blue Water Resort.
It will provide over 500 new luxury homes and 1,700 affordable homes as well as a Super Yacht Marina, a new hotel and other terrific world-class amenities in a development with a value well in excess of £1 BN.
And on the western side of Gibraltar, work has already commenced on the centrally located MidTown Development and on the iconic World Trade Centre.
And, just this morning, I was able to announce that London based developers, London and Regional Properties, have been selected as Preferred Bidders for the development of the centrally situated Rooke site.
That site is 17,000 square metres of prime development land in the centre of our city.
A once in a generation opportunity not to be mishandled.
A once in a generation mixed use project of huge potential benefit to Gibraltar.
And a once in a generation opportunity to partner with a company that has an investment portfolio of over £9bn around the world.
A long term investor with offices from Park Lane to Panama City and I hope soon also in Gibraltar.
Ladies and gentlemen, the development of the Eastside Blue Water Resort, the development of the World Trade Centre and Midtown,
alongside the bid by London and Regional to develop a premium site like Rooke, demonstrates in objective terms a huge vote of confidence in the strength of the Gibraltar economy.
A huge vote of confidence in the direction in which Gibraltar is travelling.
And one of the things which we have introduced to encourage travel to Gibraltar and has been the hugely successful Gibraltar Literary Festival.
A feast of literature.
A feast of learning.
A festival for young and old alike.
This year we shall be hosting the festival from the 12th to the 15th of November.
I am very happy to be able to inform you, ladies and gentlemen, that Her Royal Highness the Princess Royal has accepted the invitation to become the Patron of the Gibraltar Literary Festival for 2016 and we can all very much look forward to her visit to Gibraltar next year!
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am also very happy to say that Gibraltar is investing in Britain.
We are working with the Trustees of Calpe House to refurbish the new property acquired by the Trust in Norfolk Square.
This will provide a new home for Gibraltar Health Authority patients who need to travel to London for treatment.
And the number of our students studying in the United Kingdom now numbers approximately 400.
The value of maintaining tuition and maintenance grants for each represents a near £10m investment in UK institutions of higher education each year by Her Majesty’s Government of Gibraltar.
It is incredible to see how far we have come from the days, 75 years ago, when the whole of the civilian population of Gibraltar was evacuated from the Rock during the Second World War.
Many come here to London.
Most returned.
A large number never came back or returned later.
And many of those of you who stayed or returned are here with us tonight.
This year, in keeping with other events, I want to dedicate this evening to you, to the Evacuation Generation.
All we are able to do.
All the great achievements of today.
All are built on the sacrifices of those “useless mouths” as they were described in despatches at the time.
It is a reminder of the responsibility we now have today in shaping the future for our subsequent generations.
Finally, ladies and gentlemen, we are joined today by two great Ministerial friends of Gibraltar.
The Minister for the Armed Forces, Penny Mordaunt MP.
Thank you in particular for your concern in respect of the job security of the many locally employed civilians who work for the Ministry of Defence in Gibraltar.
I have no doubt we will be able to work well together to deliver a mutually acceptable outcome for the work force.
Thank you also for your personal interest in the maritime issues that are affecting Gibraltar.
We are seeing great risk created to the lives of British servicemen and British Gibraltarian law enforcement agents in British Gibraltar Territorial Waters by the unnecessary incursions of the state vessels of the Kingdom of Spain.
They achieve nothing.
They do not dent British sovereignty over our waters.
But they are not the behaviour of an NATO ally and EU partner.
We will continue to work together on those issues.
Thank you also to a great and longstanding friend of Gibraltar, Europe Minister David Lidington MP.
Today is the day on which the campaign for the United Kingdom to remain within the EU has been launched.
I think it is propitious that I should be on a stage with David Lidington today.
I know we are both equally committed to Prime Minister’s agenda of reform for the EU.
To deliver a better Europe for all its citizens.
To improve Europe.
But not to throw away the benefits of access to a European Single market of 520 million consumers.
I also want to thank David for his robust approach to any attempt in the EU to exclude Gibraltar from any measures.
And for his clear position in relation to the defence of our rights as a people.
For his continued strong commitment to Trilateral Dialogue.
And on self determination in particular, he and Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond have been crystal clear, in particular last week at the United Nations.
Penny.
David.
Dear friends all.
Together, Gibraltar and the United Kingdom have successfully seen off challenges in the past.
I am sure that together we will face off future challenges also.
And together we will long continue to celebrate our lasting bonds.
I would now ask you all to join me in a toast, dedicating tonight to the Evacuation Generation.
Ladies and Gentlemen: “The Evacuation Generation.”
Thank you.
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