Clifford prepares to hand CBC reins to deputy
(CNS): The director of Customs and Border Control, Charles Clifford, is preparing for a long but what it appears will be a smooth transition to the next head of the critical agency. More than eight months before Clifford retires, his deputy and veteran official Bruce Smith has been confirmed as director-designate.
Smith will take over on 1 August next year, when he will become responsible for overseeing all aspects of CBC’s operations, including border security, revenue collection and trade facilitation. Smith was appointed as CBC senior deputy director in 2019, and oversees intelligence, investigations, and border control in the Sister Islands.
Before his current appointment, he had already served 21 years at the old customs department and eleven years at the immigration department.
In a press release about the succession plan, officials said that Smith is a highly respected leader with a proven track record of success. He is known for his strategic thinking, operational excellence and ability to build and motivate high-performing teams, the release stated.
Wesley Howell, the chief officer of the Ministry of Border Control and Labour, said he was thrilled to welcome Smith as the director-designate. “He is a highly experienced and accomplished leader with a deep understanding of the organisation and its mission,” Howell said. “We are confident that he will lead CBC to even greater success in the years to come.”
Smith will work alongside Clifford until he retires. Officials said that the planned handover period was an important part of the leadership transition and would ensure that he is strategically prepared to assume the directorship of CBC and effectively continue its transition to an intelligence-led risk management organisation.
The handover period will also give Smith and the CBC Senior Management Team time to review their 2022-2026 Five-Year Strategic Plan and make adjustments, where necessary, to counter new and emerging threats at our border. He will also use the transition period to build relationships with key stakeholders.
“We are committed to a smooth and successful handover of the leadership of CBC,” Clifford said. “I am confident that Mr Smith is the right person to lead CBC into the future, and I look forward to working with him and our entire amazing CBC team to ensure a seamless transition.”
Smith, a graduate of Triple C School, has completed various leadership and management training courses over the span of his extensive law enforcement career. He has received numerous service, supervisory and leadership awards, including Civil Servant of the Year. He has served as a valuable resource on various boards, tribunals and committees. For a period of five years, he served as the head of the Joint Police and Customs Marine Unit (now the Cayman Islands Coast Guard).
Saying in the release that he was honoured by the appointment, he added, “I am passionate about public service, and I look forward to working with the talented team at CBC to protect our borders, collect revenue and facilitate trade. I am confident that together we can build a more secure and prosperous Cayman Islands,” Smith added.
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I personally don’t know Mr. Smith but wish him all the best with that department.
a. Train ALL Customs officer thoroughly, some of them make up laws on the fly and depending on which one you get they have a different answers to the same question.
b. They are civil servants, which mean they serve the public but some of them have a power trip, particularly at the airport and tend to treat some people as less than a human being.
c. Customer Service should be “world-class” according to the Deputy Governor but a lot of them don’t care about customer service, rarely smile or are pleasant.
Just because their job is to protect the borders and identify potential criminality doesn’t exclude them from being courteous and decent to others.
Hopefully he does something, ANYTHING, to advance the department. Prioritize accepting payments online and reallocate or retire those 2 miserable cashiers you have there.
Heading up the absentee Coast Guard qualifies for promotion? Who is Wesley Howell’s thrilled client?
Smith is a person of good character and proven leadership ability, quite a rarity in the Civil Service hierarchy nowadays. He was also Chief Immigration Officer for several years prior to the merger with Customs to create the CBC, hence he has a broad experience base to draw upon.
The stage should now be set for WORC to now administer a new Guest Workers Permit Act that deals purely with work-permits and to separate(decouple) such matters from the topic of Immigration which should only be dealing with actual immigration, and thereby removing work-permits and time served in the private and public sectors from residency. A new Caymanian Protection Act should deal with both residency, Caymanian Status and Trade & Business licensing. The Trade &Business Act needs to be put on hold as it is operating unlike it was originally intended by the framers of the 1972 law.
We are the stage of our runaway development where some needed brakes are put in place to protect our future multigenerational Caymanians, and provide the needed incentives for them to catch up and rebalance the population in our interests. The sell out has to stop by politicians NOW. We the people are watching what you do, and not what you say, because Caymanians know Talk is Cheap.
From my personal experience with Mr Smith, above all else, Mr Smith in addition to his knowledge and experience brings a level of personal integrity to the post that should not be underestimated.
You can walk the halls of the public sector and highways and bi-ways of Cayman and you won’t find a soul insinuating Mr Smith being involved in questionable circles.
That is the type of person you want heading up your border protection. Someone (like his predecessors) who can’t be swayed or who won’t be looking out for the sons/nephews of the brotherhood by letting things slide.
Customs level of incompetence is unbelievable. Every officer has a different answer to every question. I really hope some one new running it will push it to a better level of care and understanding of the business worlds needs.
I remember calling immigration many years ago for information and Mr Smith getting back to me promptly and helpfully.
I didn’t know him personally but his manner struck me as unexpectedly humble—I think he was acting director at the time. I was just impressed by his unassuming tone and I wondered who he was. Nothing high-handed about him. That is not very common these days.
I think it was Rudyard Kipling who coined the phrase “walk with kings nor lose the common touch” that seems to so well describe Bruce Smith.
And for the benefit of detractors who clearly do not know this man, here is another little nugget from Kipling that I sensed when Mr Smith spoke:
“If all men count with you, but none too much….Yours is the earth and everything in it.”
I think we can expect that he will continue to live this creed that came across so clearly those decades ago.
Congrats Mr Smith. I am sure your appointment is well deserved. I wish you much success, Sir:”Yours is the earth and everything in it”—where it counts in the way Kipling intended.
Are you serious? They’re supposed to have different answers it’s called diversity. Come on now you should know betta!
I’m sure Mr Smith will be a very capable leader but I trust he will not allow certain of his minions to question so many passengers coming off the American Miami flight in the green lane and select half of them for a full bag search.
Remarkable how with certain positions the civil service has never heard of designate positions which carry the same salary as the post holder the person is taking over from but for others, no problem bobo. Meanwhile Franz works feverishly in his office planning the next run and tee shirt issue.
The best of a bad bunch to choose from!
“A graduate of Triple C”. That tells us everything we need to know.
7:12 pm: your shallow post tells us everything we need to know about you.
I sleep well at night knowing that I didn’t attend Triple C.
If you had one grain os sense you’d know that some of the most successful people in the Cayman Islands was graduated from triple c. so don’t be a hater because your parents couldn’t afford to send you there.
If your claim to notoriety is the high school you attended then you are a sad bunch. Is grade school truly where you peaked in life? Clowns.
Chuckles paid Doctors Express yet?
Yet another bad appointment. #worldclasscivilservice
Bruce is an outstanding young Caymanian trained by our DG when they worked together at immigration. You will recall that back then the immigration department was one of the best run departments in Government.
Bruce will do the same with CBC.
Which part of Bruce young?
You all is just a bunch of haters and probably not even Caymanians.
“young Caymanian trained by our DG” in other words destined for failure.
14 @5;41pm – When was Immigration Dept “one of the best run”? Certainly not since Mr. Bostock left and its leadership was “Caymanized” under OC and later Franz!
Since John Bostock left we have had a number of foxes in the henhouse i.e.customs officers prosecuted for involvement in the import of drugs and other crimes.
Nice guy. Not appropriate for the office.
Why, you think an expat is deserving? Remember caymanians made cayman. The same cayman you come to live and enjoy.
Nothing to do with his nationality.
What is it to do with? Why disparage the man without even bothering to give reasons why?
WORC?
oh be quiet with the same ole boring rhetoric, yawn!
College level education not preferable?
Not really.
Only when the lack there of can be used strategically against unwanted candidates.
4.37pm, he was deserving but that’s not to say Caymanians are not. I’m sure Mr Smith with all his experience will certainly be deserving and will prove to be an excellent leader of CBC.