TNAG-0594-FCO40-740-Staffing-in-the-Dependent-Territories-in-the-1980s-1977 — Page 52

Your ref. Our ref. c.43/04

HKA 431/4

DESK INDEX

NO

3 0 AUG 1977

J.A.B. Stewart, Esq.,

GOVERNMENT HOUSE,

MONTSERRAT W.I.

Foreign and Commonwealth Office,

LONDON SW1A 2AH.

17th August,

Futer duur

Dear Stewart,

19 77.

Drus

Flease refer to your letter of 8 August 1977 about Judicial and Legal Staffing of the Dependent Territories in the 1980s.

2.

I have discussed this subject with ministers and with the law officers in the Attorney General's and Magistrate's Chambers. It has all been inconclusive, inevitably so when Montserrat is so small. Manpower planning on such a miniscule scale is far too vulnerable to the unforeseen to be fruitful.

3. We have a Montserratian as Attorney General. He is on contract and he is young enough to serve into the eighties; whether he will survive is another matter the post is an exposed one and the pressures, political and public, are wearying. He should have an assistant but the post is currently unfilled.

4. The post of Magistrate/Registrar is at present filled by a Guyanese on contract. This is an even more unsheltered post than that of Attorney General and the market town size of the society would make it a difficult job for a Mont- serratian to hold down. My personal view is that the bench in Montserrat would be best filled by an outsider.

By the same token the present dependence on the W.I. Associated States Supreme Court should continue.

5. Finally, I should add that there is not much in the pipeline either. A Montserratian has recently qualified and a post is being kept for him while he completes sone post-graduate studies. wo others are due to sit their finals in July 1979 and of these one is likely to become an academic. As I say

the numbers are far too small for

sensible planning.

My estimate is that we shall need at least one judicial, and possibly one legal, expatriate well into the eighties.

6.

Sincerely,

(G. WYN JONES)

Governor.