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Proposed changes to Bermuda's Human Rights Act (HRA) have been a long time coming, and are very welcome.

Since its inception, the HRA of 1981 lacked the teeth to do a job worthy of the name. The HRA replaced two previous bits of legislation and, with its enactment, actually set back the cause and protection of Human Rights in Bermuda for several decades.

Why do we need a Human Rights Act? Those of us over the age fifty will likely remember the days when racial segregation and discrimination were the norm. The theatre boycott of 1959 was a direct action by blacks to highlight and combat the prevalent policies of segregation. While the boycott was successful, attitudes within the community remained polarised.

In 1967, Parliament passed the Abolition of Discrimination in Legal Instruments Act as a step to outlaw discriminatory contracts. In 1969 and '70, the Race Relations Act and the Race Relations Council Act were passed. These two Acts were quite forceful and perhaps revolutionary in their assertive approach to thwarting racial discrimination.

The Race Relations Council was given powers to receive and investigate any complaint. The Council was a corporate body, which could sue and be sued; it had a mandate to be an advocate for an aggrieved person.

These Acts contained two provisions that should be noted:

-The Crown (the Government) was bound by the Acts.

-The Race Relations Council was required to make an annual report, which was to be tabled in Parliament.

The major problem with the Race Relations Acts was their narrow focus on racial discrimination when, as examples, discrimination along the lines of age, gender, marital status were just as prevalent.

The Human Rights Act of 1981 was supposed to expand the scope of rights protection to encompass all manner of discrimination. However, in the process of being expanded, the HRA was de-fanged, emasculated. The new Act covered more people but the coverage was minimal -- the Act was described as ineffective.

As examples:

-The Act was very specific about those categories of discrimination that were covered. Among those categories left off its list were unprotected, such as physical characteristics (height, weight, hair or eye colour), age (children, the aged), ability (the physically or mentally disabled), and sexual orientation.

-The Commission could not initiate complaints.

-If, after investigating a complaint, the Commission recommended a Board of Inquiry, that Board of Inquiry was denied access to the Commission's deliberations and documents; the Commission itself was prohibited from giving evidence or presenting the case it had developed.

-The Act specifically denied its protection to Government employees insofar as enforcement was concerned.

-The Commission was not required to produce a report of its activities.

In 1988, an amendment extended the Act's ineffective coverage to the physically disabled. Amendments in 1992 further extended coverage to marital status and children born out of wedlock. But the Act was still essentially toothless.

The public is now being asked to view and comment on twenty-seven recommendations for changes to the HRA that will extend the coverage to include groups previously excluded, clarify and streamline the functions of the Human Rights Commission, and put some much-needed teeth into the Act.

One of the recommendations adds sexual orientation as an unlawful ground of discrimination. While this provision has been termed "gay rights", as though it accords the right to be gay, its effect and purpose is anti-persecution. And that's the crux of it. As historical victims of persecution, second perhaps only to the Jews, black people and Christians should be leading the charge to stymie the persecution of any and every group. Human Rights cannot be selective. If any human is excluded, then calling them Human Rights is a farce.

I commend Minister Butler and his team for this initiative and especially the process of wide consultation. I wish him the courage to see all the recommendations through to completion.[[In-content Ad]]

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