Speaker of the House of Assembly Julian Willock has said that he has new information regarding his Register of Interest applications which clears his name from previously announced breaches.
Willock brought the documents to a media briefing on Wednesday June 30th after he said he made several requests through his attorney to the Commissioner of Inquiry Sir Gary Hickinbottom to present the new information to the Commission of Inquiry.
He said after being deferred on many occasions, he felt it necessary to hold the press conference to present this new information to the public, to clear his name.
“I want the record to show… I did the professional thing by writing to the Commissioner via Silk Legal on the 24th June 2021 with my new evidence. In my letter I humbly but politely request to return to present orally the new information. Their response was they will get back to me,” Willock stated.
He added, “A few days later I reminded my attorney again that I needed to see the one-man commissioner to return to present my new evidence. It was said again they will get back to me. To date, over a week later I have not received word on presenting to them my new evidence, hence for this press conference to share this information with the public.”
Crucial documents were left out of bundle
Willock said that critical documents were left out of his Commission of Inquiry bundle which would have shown that he was in full compliance of his mandatory requirement.
He said, “The record must show that on May 21st 2019 I received a letter from the registrar of interests in which she attached the form to be filled seeing that the letter received from me on March 12th 2019, my declaration, did not follow according to her format. Now this information was quite interestingly left out of my bundle.”
“What appeared in my bundle – as you would see in the other paragraph the form was actually filled out on January 22nd 2020 in Appendix C – that was what was in my bundle. So my first letter on my anniversary the day I was sworn in to the Register of Interests Act was miraculously left out of my bundle. The letter from the registrar of interests telling me that while she received my letter, I needed to fill out a form, again, miraculously left out of my bundle. But what appeared in my bundle was me filling out the form a couple months late,” the Speaker further explained
Willock also presented documents for each of the following years, which he said showed that he exhibited good faith intention on each of his March 12th anniversary dates to ensure that the Registrar of Interest had something from him on file.