Group pleased with Government response to Human Rights Act

Centre for Justice sincerely commends the Government for being so responsive to concerns expressed about the Human Right Amendment Act. The Minister for Justice has responded swiftly, and openly, which is laudable.

It is really positive to note that the proposed amendment legislation will be debated in the House of Assembly on Friday, without delay. We are hopeful that this will result in equal rights for members of the Bermuda community regardless of their sexual orientation.

Similarly, we are pleased to see the legislation go forward without the provision which we believe would enable harassment with impunity.

We are not sure what Government proposes to do next, regarding the Section 6C, which has now been removed from the Amendment Act. Our hope is that it will be reviewed and included at a later date, without subsection (3), which we believe is unconstitutional in that it would expressly hinder our right to free movement and it would lend itself to discriminatory behaviour and profiling.

We will be exploring various ways to prohibit harassment, but in a manner which respects the Constitutional rights of all residents. We look forward to sharing our work with the public and government in due course.