Fred Smith Is A Natural Clown
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Fred Smith QC is simply that a natural clown. He just has to make himself relevant and talks any foolishness in search of a headline. His latest foray was that yes he supports the bills to amend the constitution. No the bills do not facilitate same sex marriage because same sex marriage is already possible. He claims that he and Maurice Glinton QC did a case in front of the Court of Appeal which supports the view that sex is already a protected category in that you cannot discriminate on the basis of sex. That was a novel proposition and no one had ever heard about that before. He got the obligatory headline the next day. The Attorney General Allyson Gibson issued a statement the next day saying that what he was talking was foolishness. He said: “This was decided by the Supreme Court and The Court of Appeal in The Bahamas in 1996 in a case argued by myself and Maurice Glinton QC before Dame Joan Sawyer in Harbor Lobster and Fish Co and Jeffrey Butler vs. Attorney General, when the courts held that discrimination on the grounds of “sex” and “gender “ were unconstitutional.
“Therefore, any couple (men or women) denied the right to be married can mount a constitutional challenge on the basis of this protection and have the courts ratify their union.
“The Privy Council in London, have, since 2013 have already recognized same-sex unions.
“So this referendum has nothing whatsoever to do with same-sex marriage and everything to do with ending discrimination against Bahamian women, and in some cases men, solely on the basis of their gender. There is nothing hidden or even controversial in what the government is trying to do; the intention is simply to amend another section of the Constitution so as to bring it in line with the protections outlined in Article 15.”
Attorney Wayne Munroe later wrote that he would take a case for homosexual couples to challenge the existing law. We don’t dismiss what Fred Smith says given his record of winning against the Government in the Courts but our point is that he says anything for a headline, making him suspect on anything he says. He made is statement on 29th April.