Working in Saint Kitts and Nevis
This replaces the general rule for you
No work permit for a citizen of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
The whole of the work-permit regime is switched off for a citizen of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Section 19(1) of the Immigration Act, as substituted by Act 1 of 2012, excludes a citizen of a Protocol Member State from the prohibition on taking employment without a permit, and section 19(2) excludes the employer from the matching offence. The requirement that an application be made while the prospective employee is outside the Federation falls away with it, because there is no application. Combined with the indefinite stay under section 4(3), the practical position is that a citizen of a Protocol Member State may arrive, look for work and take it, which is something no other nationality can do here.
Work is permit-first and employer-led, and the Act puts a condition on it that most countries put in guidance: the application must be made while the prospective employee is outside the Federation. You cannot arrive as a visitor, find a job and regularise - except on renewal, or where the Minister directs otherwise by Order. The permit itself carries the status: holders are entitled to a work permit holder's residency, and their spouses and minor children can be granted temporary residence. The Minister may also require the employer to post security sufficient to repatriate the worker and the family, and until that security is furnished the permit has no effect at all.
At a glance
- Permit required before working
- Yes, for all but three classes
Section 19(1) exempts citizens, approved CARICOM citizens and citizens of a Protocol Member State. Everyone else, including permanent residents admitted on the retirement ground, needs a written permit from the Minister.
- Where you must be when the application is made
- Outside the Federation
Section 19(4). The exceptions are a renewal and "any other case as the Minister may, by Order, direct" - a delegation, so the real scope depends on Orders we have not read.
- Status that comes with the permit
- Work permit holder's residency
Section 6(5) states it as an entitlement, so the residency follows the permit rather than being applied for separately.
- Family
- Temporary residence for spouse and minor children
Section 6(4) limits the temporary-resident class to spouses and minor children of work permit holders. Adult children and parents are not covered.
- Employer security
- At the Minister's discretion, amount unstated
Section 21 lets the Minister require security sufficient to meet the cost of repatriating the worker and dependants. No amount is fixed in the Act.
- Employing without a permit
- An offence by the employer as well as the worker
Section 19(2) makes engaging or employing an unpermitted person an offence, and section 19(5) makes both contraventions offences.
Requirements
- An employer willing to apply - the Act frames the application as the employer's, and section 21 puts the repatriation security on the employer
- The prospective employee outside Saint Christopher and Nevis at the time the application is made, unless it is a renewal or the Minister has directed otherwise by Order
- An application in the prescribed form, with the prescribed fee
- Repatriation security in whatever form and amount the Minister thinks sufficient, where he requires it - the permit is of no force until it is furnished
- Compliance with every condition written on the permit: breaching one is an offence in itself
- No permit at all if you are a citizen, an approved CARICOM citizen under the Caribbean Community Skilled Nationals Act, or a citizen of an OECS Protocol Member State
In detail
Hire from abroad, by statute
Most countries express a preference for the local labour market in policy and then administer it loosely. Saint Kitts and Nevis puts it in the Act: section 19(4) requires that the application be made while the prospective employee is outside the Federation. The practical effect is that the familiar sequence of arriving as a visitor, finding work and converting is not available, and the person who does it has committed an offence under section 19(1) before the paperwork even starts. Two exceptions sit in the same sentence: renewals, and anything the Minister directs by Order. The second is the planning instrument - if a case can be brought inside a Ministerial Order, the rule does not bite - and it is also why this record cannot say the rule is absolute. We did not find the Orders.
The permit carries the status, and the status carries the family
In most of the comparison a work visa is a residence permit with a work right attached. Here it runs the other way: the permit is the primary thing and section 6(5) makes the residency an entitlement that follows it. Section 6(4) then creates temporary residence for the spouse and minor children of a permit holder, and for nobody else - there is no temporary-resident class for an adult child, for a parent, or for the family of anyone other than a work permit holder. The whole family's status therefore stands or falls with the permit, and section 19(6) lets the Minister revoke the permit at any time.
Three ways not to need one
Section 19(1) names three exempt classes and each has a different legal source. A citizen is exempt because of the Constitution. An "approved CARICOM citizen" is exempt because of the Caribbean Community Skilled Nationals Act, Cap. 25.04, which admits graduates, media workers, sportspersons, artistes, musicians, nurses and teachers from twelve named CARICOM states on a certificate of recognition. A citizen of a Protocol Member State is exempt because of the Revised Treaty of Basseterre and Act 1 of 2012. The first is narrow and skills-based; the second is open to every citizen of six other Eastern Caribbean states regardless of qualification. That difference is the single most important fact about working in this Federation and it is set out in the regional-treaty record.
Country-level policy
Saint Kitts and Nevis stopped charging individuals income tax on 1 May 1980 and has taxed wages ever since under a different statute. The Housing and Social Development Levy is imposed on the wages of every person employed in the Federation, at nothing up to the first band, then three and a half, ten and twelve per cent, with the employer paying a flat three per cent of all wages on top. It is deducted at source by the employer and paid monthly to the Comptroller of Inland Revenue, and the Social Security Board collects it on his behalf. Nothing in it turns on nationality or residence: it follows employment.
What applies to you
No work permit for a citizen of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
The whole of the work-permit regime is switched off for a citizen of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Section 19(1) of the Immigration Act, as substituted by Act 1 of 2012, excludes a citizen of a Protocol Member State from the prohibition on taking employment without a permit, and section 19(2) excludes the employer from the matching offence. The requirement that an application be made while the prospective employee is outside the Federation falls away with it, because there is no application. Combined with the indefinite stay under section 4(3), the practical position is that a citizen of a Protocol Member State may arrive, look for work and take it, which is something no other nationality can do here.
- Citizenship of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
- Nothing else under the Immigration Act: no permit, no employer sponsorship, no repatriation security
- Social Security registration and the Housing and Social Development Levy apply from the first payslip, as they do to anyone employed in the Federation
What the law says
«A person, other than a citizen, an approved CARICOM citizen or a citizen of a Protocol Member State, shall not, while in Saint Christopher and Nevis, engage in any occupation or accept employment without having first obtained a written permit granted by the Minister for that purpose.»Act 1 of 2012 is the amendment that implemented the OECS Economic Union protocol. Before it, the exemption covered citizens and approved CARICOM citizens only.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«A person shall not engage or employ another person who is not a citizen, resident, an approved CARICOM citizen or a citizen of a Protocol Member State unless there is a work permit in force in relation to that other person and for the purpose of that engagement or employment.»Note the asymmetry with subsection (1): the employer's prohibition spares "residents", the worker's prohibition does not mention them. Subsection (7) then removes retirement-ground residents from the word "resident" for the whole section.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«An applicant for a work permit shall make the application while the prospective employee is outside of the Federation, except that this provision shall not apply in respect of an application for renewal of a work permit or any other case as the Minister may, by Order, direct.»The subsection calls the employer "the applicant" and the worker "the prospective employee", which is why the permit is the employer's to obtain. The closing words are a delegation: the Minister can carve out cases by Order, and such an Order is published separately from the Act.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«security in such form as the Minister may determine and in such amount as the Minister thinks sufficient to meet the cost of the repatriation of the person to whom the permit relates and his or her dependants, if any, and the permit shall be of no force or effect until the security is furnished.»About this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«Persons holding work permits shall be entitled to be granted a work permit holder’s residency.»About this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«granted permission to become temporary residents in Saint Christopher and Nevis, that is to say, spouses and minor children of work permit holders.»The temporary-resident class exists only for this purpose. There is no temporary residence for anyone else in the Act.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«The Minister may, at any time—
---
16
(a) modify or cancel any condition specified in; or
(b) revoke,
a work permit.»Quoted across the page break in the publisher's own text, which carries a running page number in the middle of the subsection.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
Practical notes
The Act prescribes no fee amount, no duration and no renewal period for a work permit: section 20 says the form, manner and fee are "as may be prescribed", and the Immigration Regulations of 1947 printed as the Third Schedule do not prescribe them. Published fee schedules circulate widely in commercial guides. We did not find one on a government site and do not state one.
Guidance in English commonly states that a post must be advertised locally for three consecutive weeks before a work permit is granted. No such requirement appears in sections 19 to 21 of the Immigration Act or in the Immigration Regulations printed with it. It may be a Labour Department practice or may rest on an instrument we did not reach; either way it is not in the Act, and this record does not assert it.
The same guidance often cites "section 17 of the Immigration Act" for the work permit rule. Section 17 of Cap. 6.02 is about charging a member of a crew, a stowaway or an extra hand before a magistrate. The work permit sections are 19 to 21. The misattribution appears to be copied from source to source.
A permanent resident admitted on the retirement ground is not covered by the section 19(2) exemption for residents, because section 19(7) takes that class out of the word for the whole section.
- consolidatesImmigration Act, Cap. 6.02, Revised Edition showing the law as at 31 December 2020
Law Commission of Saint Christopher and Nevis · consolidated to 2020-12-31
About this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
- consolidatesCaribbean Community Skilled Nationals Act, Cap. 25.04, Revised Edition showing the law as at 31 December 2017
Law Commission of Saint Christopher and Nevis · consolidated to 2017-12-31
About this source
Prepares the revised editions of Kittitian law and hosts the annual collections of Acts and statutory rules and orders.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It must not be cited for the current state of the citizenship-by-investment rules: it prints the 2011 Regulations as a schedule to the Citizenship Act with no indication they were repealed in 2023. Nor for completeness - the 2020 edition is a supplement of fifty-six chapters rather than a corpus, so absence from it is not evidence that a law does not exist, and the social security and income tax Acts are simply not in it. Nor for anything after a revision's cut-off: the income tax Act it serves is as at 31 December 2002 and prints Omitted because of cut-off date in place of a section. Its annual instrument folders are not exhaustive either; one begins at number five.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source