UK court upholds Cayman Islands law legalising same-sex partnerships | Cayman Islands

A courtroom in London has upheld a Cayman Islands legislation legalising same-sex civil partnerships, in a transfer that campaigners say may flip the tide for different British abroad territories battling for LGBTQ+ rights.On Monday, the privy council, the ultimate courtroom of attraction for the British abroad territory, rejected an attraction that had argued the Caribbean island’s governor had no proper to enact the invoice, after lawmakers had rejected related laws.Leonardo Raznovich, performing president for the LGBTQ+ human rights organisation, Colors Caribbean, described the result of the long-running authorized battle a “victory for all”.The change within the legislation got here in 2020 following a landmark courtroom case introduced by a lesbian couple – Caymanian lawyer Chantelle Day and her associate Vickie Bodden Bush, a nurse – after they have been refused permission to marry.Day mentioned the choice was a “massive aid”.“It’s an absolute aid that us and different {couples} within the Caymans now have the knowledge that the authorized framework that all of us relied on for recognition of {our relationships} received’t be pulled from beneath us and that the structure works the best way it’s meant to,” she mentioned.Chantelle Day and Vickie Bodden-Bush have fun with their authorized crew in 2019. {Photograph}: Twitter/XWhen the couple made their unique case, the Cayman Islands’ courts finally dominated that the proper to marry prolonged solely to opposite-sex {couples}, however that same-sex {couples} have been entitled to authorized safety “which is functionally equal to marriage”.A invoice was delivered to parliament to place that safety into legislation, however lawmakers rejected it in July 2020 by 9 votes to eight.Two months later, the then-governor, Martyn Roper, enacted the Civil Partnership Legislation, permitting same-sex civil partnerships, saying the motion needed to be taken to uphold human rights.Kattina Anglin, a lawyer based mostly within the Cayman Islands, argued that Roper didn’t have the ability to introduce the legislation below the Cayman Islands’ structure. However her case was rejected by the islands’ courts and her remaining attraction was dismissed by the privy council.Raznovich mentioned the choice may have implications for ongoing litigation in different British abroad territories, similar to Turks and Caicos, and the British Virgin Islands.However he was much less assured in regards to the influence on circumstances involving unbiased Caribbean international locations similar to Trinidad and Tobago, which nonetheless have colonial period legal guidelines that criminalise consensual anal intercourse and the place same-sex marriages and civil partnerships are prohibited.In 2018, a excessive courtroom judgment repealed Trinidad and Tobago’s so-called “buggery legislation”, however in April the nation’s supreme courtroom upheld a authorities attraction towards the ruling and recriminalised the act, forcing campaigners to take their case to the privy council.Controversial “financial savings clauses”, which usually have been created when international locations gained their independence, and have been designed to protect colonial legal guidelines until they’re modified by parliament, complicates the state of affairs in Trinidad and Tobago and different Caribbean international locations.Anglin advised the Guardian she would supply a response to the choice on Thursday when she has had the time to totally assessment the judgment and meet along with her authorized crew.Reuters contributed reporting