Chief Minister Dr. the Honourable D. Orlando Smith intends to pilot three pieces of Trust legislation through the Legislative Council that should have the important additional advantage of enhancing the attractiveness of the BVI as a trust jurisdiction and thus increasing the diversity of the services offered by the financial services sector, so that the sector is less dependant on the continued popularity of IBC’s.

The three bills  The Virgin Islands Special Trusts Bill, The Trustee (Amendment) Bill ad The Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill  had their introduction and first reading on Thursday August 28^th, during the 4^th sitting of the 1^st session of the 15^th Legislative Council.

“It is our hope that the passage of these statutes will also provide this country with an excellent marketing opportunity, increase government revenue and as a result of all these factors, create further employment opportunities for BVIslanders,” he declared.

He said the bills have been formulated to meet the needs of the territory's international client base, in terms of creating flexibility and enabling the BVI to provide a diverse range of properly regulated services.

According to Chief Minister Smith, if enacted the three Bills should assist in portraying the territory in a positive light and should also help enhance the BVI’s reputation as a quality financial centre. “All in all, the three statutes will serve to demonstrate that the BVI is in the forefront of jurisdictions which are able to introduce innovative measures to meet the legitimate needs of its international clientele.”

The BVI leader pointed out that the most innovative of the three Bills is the Virgin Islands Special Trusts Bill, which is likely to receive a great deal of international attention.

The aim of this Bill is to enable shareholders of BVI companies to establish trusts that disengage the trustee from management responsibilities, leaving these responsibilities to the directors and enabling the company (and its business) to be retained as long as the directors think fit.

It is believed that the enactment of this legislation will be beneficial to the many individuals who would, but for the current constraints of English trust law, set up trusts to hold shares in their companies.  It is hoped therefore, that it will attract a significant amount of daily trust business to the territory and because the Act is confined to shares in BVI companies, it should also increase the number of IBC’s incorporated here for reputable purposes.
Trusts which are created under the proposed Virgin Islands Special Trusts Act, will be known as “VISTA” trusts, the intention being that this acronym will be very useful for marketing purposes, according to the Chief Minister, in promoting the Act and the territory’s financial services industry generally.
Meantime, the Trustee (Amendment) Bill includes a substantial number of improvements to BVI trust law. These include provisions relating to dealings between trustees and third parties, some desirable provisions relating to charities, a robust new regime for purpose trusts and some amendments relating to the BVI’s conflict of laws rules for trusts, which should provide the territory with the most refined and comprehensive set of rules in the world.

The Bill seeks to address several issues that were highlighted as leading to possible abuse by the KPMG Report. It also includes provisions that increase trust duty from $50 to $100.

And the objective of the Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill is to modernize BVI law in several areas. The most significant aspect of the Bill is a provision that abolishes the archaic requirement that deeds executed by individuals still need to be sealed.

It specifies instead that as an alternative to satisfying the sealing requirement, a document will still qualify as a deed if it is drawn up so that it is expressed to be a deed and is witnessed.