business@tribunemedia.net
Tuesday, December 9, 2025
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Double-digit New Year hikes over minimum legal charges • Bar unveils increases across multiple services • Property, estate planning, Immigration to rise • Mixed attorney reactions to recommendations
By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net BAHAMIAN citizens and companies must brace for double-digit percentage hikes in the minimum fees charged for virtually all commercial and civil legal services with effect from New Year’s Day 2026 - a move sparking mixed opinions and divided reactions among attorneys themselves.
Multiple senior attorneys, speaking on condition of anonymity, yesterday told Tribune Business that the Bahamas Bar Association’s December 3, 2025, memorandum setting out new minimum recommended rates for services such as real estate conveyances, wills, trusts, Immigration work permits and company incorporations has sparked questions over how the new charges were derived, whether there was due
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consultation and if the new levies schedule itself is even legal. The Bar Association, in unveiling the new rates, said they were designed to account for the impact of inflation since the last adjustment took place in November 2006 - almost two decades ago. It added that the latest revisions, which are set to take effect in just over three weeks’ time, also include new minimum per hour and per day rates specifically for King’s Counsels or KCs. Disclosing that the new rates are based on research by an accounting firm, the Bar Association wrote: “The following [22] tables are prepared having regard to the memorandums from Oracle Business Partners, accountants, dated February 15, 2024, by which a review of the rates for counsel and attorney, set out in the November 2, 2006,
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memo take into account inflation up to 2022.” Explaining that data on Bahamian inflation for 2023 and 2024 had not been available when the review was conducted, the Association added in the memo obtained by Tribune Business: “In addition, having regard to local allowances, custom and practice, hourly rates for King's Counsel have been introduced. Kindly take notice that the effective commencement date is the first day of January 2026.” The fee schedule detailed in the Bar Association’s memorandum sets a floor, or minimum fee scale, that Bahamian attorneys should charge but does not prevent them from levying higher rates. The concern, at least from a public perspective, is that lower and middle income Bahamians could be priced out of accessing
CHARGES - See Page B5
Minister: ‘No phantom’ amid Opposition’s $20m loan fight ‘Happy medium’: Maximum cheque value limits unveiled By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
• Central Bank proposes $10k cap on cheque payments • And $1,000 upper restriction on over-the-counter cashing • Regulator, banks opt against ‘big bang’ cheque phase-out By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net PROPOSALS to impose maximum limits on the transaction value and over-the-counter cashing of cheques, which would take effect by year-end 2026 at latest, were yesterday described as part of a “happy medium” approach to eliminating this payment mechanism in The Bahamas. The Central Bank, unveiling the launch of a swift public consultation that will close by end-January 2026, said itself and its Bahamian commercial bank licensees are proposing a $1,000 maximum limit on the value of a cheque that can be cashed over-the-counter at a financial institution. And they are also suggesting that the maximum value of a transaction that can be paid for by a cheque be limited to $10,000. Both reforms, if they proceed, will take effect “no later” than December 31, 2026. This would mark a major cultural shift, especially for construction
A CABINET minister yesterday asserted “there is nothing phantom about anything involved” with the Government’s Renaissance at Carmichael housing project amid ongoing challenges by the Opposition’s leader over whether a $20m loan has “hit the ground at that land”. Keith Bell, minister of housing and urban renewal, vehemently rejected assertions by Michael Pintard, the Free National Movement (FNM) leader, that the special purpose vehicle (SPV) formed to oversee the development,
KEITH BELL
MICHAEL PINTARD
Carmichael Village Project Development Company, is a “phantom” entity that does not exist from a corporate perspective, Responding to Mr Pintard’s previous challenge for the Government to disclose why $20.2m in Bahamian taxpayer funds
have been advanced to the SPV, the minister told the House of Assembly that it was formed in 2022 as a government-owned entity that was “legally incorporated, properly constituted and publicly disclosed”. “Its financial arrangements were reported
THE Bahamas Fly Fishing Industry Association’s (BFFIA) president yesterday asserted that a conservation fund established by law was never truly implemented as he slammed the Government’s “lip service” in protecting and preserving the sector for Bahamians.
CONSTRUCTION - See Page B5
Vendors put out of business on market demolition delay GOWON BOWE workers and other professions accustomed to being paid by cheque and cashing it at a bank to obtain cash proceeds. Pay cheques worth more than $1,000 would, instead, have to be deposited under the new proposals. Gowon Bowe, Fidelity Bank (Bahamas) chief executive, who co-chairs the steering committee overseeing the cheques initiative alongside John Rolle, the Central Bank governor, told Tribune Business that the consultation marks the first step in a more measured approach that, in its initial phase, seeks to
PAYMENT - See Page B4
By ANNELIA NIXON Tribune Business Reporter anixon@tribunemedia.net AT least two vendors at the Blue Hill Road Farmers Market have been forced out of work due to the 18-month delay in demolishing the site with a new date still to be announced. Stephen Wilson, vice-president of a group of vendors who operate under the Farmer’s Market Association name, told Tribune Business yesterday the group backs the Government’s plan to demolish the market site and reconstruct it. However, they voiced concerns to the Ministry of Agriculture in a “cordial” meeting yesterday that this Christmas holiday is not the
proper time to begin the demolition process. Tribune Business understands demolition was set to begin yesterday, but Mr Wilson explained that, following the meeting, he is unsure how the Government will proceed. He has insisted that demolition and construction begin in the New Year after vendors benefit from the uptick in business they normally see during the Christmas season. “So the market is really up on the move, but it has come to a point now that it really needs to be revamped, and the derelict structures that are there, a lot of them need to come down,” Mr Wilson said. “But what our concern was, and what we were expressing to the ministry
STRUCTURE - See Page B6
Fly fishing chief renewing call for conservation fund By ANNELIA NIXON Tribune Business Reporter anixon@tribunemedia.net
through the Government’s established systems, questioned in this House and answered in this House. Every contract, every expenditure and every stage of construction is traceable. Nothing was hidden, because nothing needed to be hidden. What some now describe as secrecy is, in fact, the result of disclosures made by this administration,” Mr Bell argued. Noting that the project’s roots lie with a 60-acre Crown grant that was executed by the last Ingraham administration in 2009, some 16 years ago, he added that there had been many promises but
Prescott Smith told Tribune Business that the Fisheries Resources (Jurisdiction and Conservation) (Flats Fishing) regulations 2017 created a conservation fund that was to be funded by flats fishing licence fees and used for the management and protection of the flats and other fisheries resources. “The conservation fund that was passed was never actually implemented,” he said. “And it needs to be implemented so that
resources go directly back into the industry to strengthen and further build capacity in the industry for education, and for conservation and education. That’s very critical. “It was never established even though it was passed by law. It says 50 percent of the funds from the fishing licence fee should go into a conservation fund… It was never implemented. And it needs to be implemented.” Mr Smith also reiterated his call for the
Government to declare the industry reserved exclusively for Bahamian participation. “Another thing is the Government cannot be shy about declaring this industry to be developed for and by Bahamians,” he added. “And the reason I'm very adamant about this is from a conservation standpoint, because you cannot expect Bahamians to protect something if you're not prepared
CATCH - See Page B4
BAILLOU HILL FARMERS MARKET