The call for a national vote to settle the contentious issue of same-sex marriage has a familiar ring to John Kane, Bermuda’s honorary Irish consul.

Last year, the Republic of Ireland made history after becoming the first country in the world to approve same-sex marriage through the popular vote.

While many were surprised at the move by an overwhelmingly Catholic and traditionally conservative nation, Mr Kane points out that Ireland has undergone great social change.

“With the big younger population there, you could understand it,” Mr Kane said, adding that he had been more surprised by Ireland’s decision to ban smoking in 2004.

Support in Bermuda for a referendum on same-sex unions remained divided along ideological lines during this week’s demonstrations.

Preserve Marriage, the group opposing same-sex marriage, supports a vote, while the Rainbow Alliance disagrees with putting the question to “the shifting passions of the majority”.

Ireland only decriminalised homosexuality in 1993, but in May 2015, 62 per cent of the two million who voted did so in favour of same-sex marriage.

Mr Kane said many young people returned home specifically to vote, and that “getting back at the Catholic Church” may have helped sway votes.

“They already had civil partnerships that were protected by law but not protected by the constitution,” Mr Kane added, pointing out why referendums are common in Ireland compared with Bermuda.

Any amendment to the Irish constitution must go to the popular vote. Bermudians, by contrast, hold referendums sparingly.

Mr Kane acknowledged Bermuda’s own powerful religious influence but said: “It’s really the term ‘marriage’ that’s exercising most people’s minds here, particularly older people. It’s a massive sea change for them.”

Settling Bermuda’s marriage policy by referendum would set “a dangerous precedent” for the island, according to Tawana Tannock, chairwoman of the Human Rights Commission. The HRC maintains that marriage equality should be “the only policy” to deal with the issue: “Human rights should not be granted or removed because of the popular vote,” Ms Tannock said.

“Human rights by their very nature are inherent, inalienable and as such should be protected by the rule of law, and must not be voted away by consensus that runs contrary to the protection of equality for all members of our community. The function of a human right is to protect the minority from oppression by the majority.”

Allowing all citizens the right to marry was “not an attack on religion”, she said, but an outcome of the belief that no one was “any less entitled to the rights afforded to all under the law”.

Ms Tannock said that the language used by Preserve Marriage illustrated that the group believed “rights should be restricted via public policy”. “We have fallen through the looking glass when progress is failure and extending rights is denigrated.”

Preserve Marriage has also called for the Government to add “supremacy clauses” to existing marriage legislation, thus preventing the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman from being deemed discriminatory.

That term was explained by Peter Sanderson, the lawyer who represented the Bermuda Bred Co, a group of Bermudians involved in “binational relationships” who won a landmark recent case for same-sex partners.

“The Human Rights Act trumps any other laws that are in conflict with it in areas such as employment, accommodation, and provision of goods and services,” he said.

“Crucially, this includes government services. An exception is when another law states that it has effect despite the Human Rights Act.”

However, Ian Kawaley, the Chief Justice, had indicated in the Bermuda Bred case that the court still had discretion in this area.

“So the court might decline to intervene to remedy discrimination — if there were highly compelling reasons,” Mr Sanderson said.

A Bermudian supporter of same-sex marriage, asking not to be named to protect his privacy, said he was in a four-year relationship with an overseas partner who’d had to leave Bermuda after being forced to annually renew his work permit. His partner left before the Bermuda Bred case went before the Supreme Court.

“All that case means is he will be able to come back and work, but it does not give us any rights,” he said.

Opposed to settling the matter by referendum, the man said it boiled down to “the many deciding on the few”.

“The reality is that this change is not going to impact most people,” he said. “No one can give me a logical reason why this should not be legal. The other question I ask is, how does this actually affect you? Unless you’re homosexual, it won’t. Nobody can give me an answer.”

Bermuda’s rare use of referendums

Bermudians have settled major issues by referendum just twice in recent memory.

In 1990, the island’s electorate voted on the death penalty, with 75 per cent in favour of keeping it. Five years later, Bermudians returned to the ballot boxes on the question of independence from Britain.

In that case, 73 per cent of voters were against severing ties with the UK. In December 2013, a referendum on casino gaming, an election promise of the new One Bermuda Alliance Government, was controversially dropped.

Now, with Bermudians split on whether or not to recognise same-sex marriages, many opponents are calling for a referendum if the Government proves unwilling to intervene.

Referendums once required their own laws to be passed before putting an issue to the people’s vote.

In 2012, the Progressive Labour Party Government passed the Referendum Bill, which dispensed with that requirement.

A “yes” vote occurs if 50 per cent or more of voters take part, and if more than 50 per cent of them vote in favour. The same would apply for a “no” vote.

The referendum would be deemed unanswered if less that 50 per cent of voters took part. The power to call for a referendum rests ultimately with the Bermuda Government, although some jurisdictions the citizenry are able to bring forward a national vote.