Computerization and Revision of Laws Act 1989

"active database" has the meaning assigned to it by section 4(2) and (3);

"applied laws" means United Kingdom statutes, orders in coun cil, royal proclamations and other instruments having leg islative ef fect in Bermuda and includes any law applied to Bermuda by such statutes, orders in council, royal procla mations or other in struments;

"database" has the meaning assigned to it by sec tion 4(1);

"effective date" means the date specified by the Attorney-General under sec tion 14 for the coming into operation of the version of the revised edition first issued under section 5 and any periodic update is sued under section 9;

"enactment" means a statutory provision other than a statutory pro vision deriving from an applied law;

"graphics" means the electronic manipulation of data in the form of pictures;

"historical database" has the meaning assigned to it by section 4(2) and (3);

"Minister" means the Minister of Finance;

"revised edition" means the printed version of the laws of Bermuda prepared from time to time from the database un der the author ity of this Act.

[section 2 amended by 1993 : 35 deemed effective 2 January 1990]

Revised Laws 1971

3 No annual supplement shall be prepared or published under the Revised Laws and Annual Revision Act 1971, in respect of the year 1986, or any subsequent year.

Stages in preparation of database

4 (1) The Attorney-General shall prepare and maintain a col lection of electronically stored data ("the database") for the purposes of this Act.

(2) The database shall consist of an active part ("the active database") and a historical part ("the historical database").

(3) The active database is for storing material which is re quired or permitted by this Act to be held in the database as being mate rial which is current; the historical database is for storing other material.

(4) Subject to section 10, the Attorney-General shall cause to be included in the database—

(a) all enactments and applied laws appearing in the 1971 edition; and

(b) all enactments and applied laws enacted be tween 1 Jan uary 1986 and 31 July 1989.

(5) The Attorney-General may cause to be included in the ac tive database such—

(a) United Kingdom statutes, orders in council, royal proclamations or other instruments;

(b) treaties and conventions; and

as he considers desirable to include.

(6) The Attorney-General may, if he sees fit, cause to be ex cluded from the database plans, drawings and designs requiring graph ics.

(7) In each Act (in paragraph (b) called the "principal Act") in cluded in the database—

(a) the word "Bermuda" followed by the year in which the Act was passed together with its number among the Acts of that year shall ap pear at its beginning; and

(b) when another Act or some provision thereof is incorpo rated in the principal Act, the year and number of that other Act shall be set out at the end of the principal Act, together with any ex planatory notes which the Attorney-General may deem necessary.

(8) Where the date on which a provision of an Act came into operation differs from the date of assent the date of such coming into op eration shall be set out in a note to the section providing for the Act to be brought into operation.

(9) Each Act, other than an amending Act or an Act incor porated in another Act, shall form a separate item and the items shall be numbered and arranged under such titles as the Attorney-General thinks fit.

(10) Nothing in subsection (5) shall derogate from subsection (4) or section 6.

Preparation and format of revised edition

5 The Attorney-General shall cause the revised edition to be pre pared from the active database and thereafter published in loose leaf form.

Continual updating of active database

6 (1) Subject to section 10, the Attorney-General shall cause to be included in the active database all enactments and applied laws en acted after 31 July 1989.

(2) Where an enactment or applied law included in the ac tive database under subsection (1) amends or repeals an enactment or ap plied law already in the active database the Attorney-General shall cause the active database to be altered so as to reflect that amendment or re peal.

(3) Without derogating from section 10(1)(e), where subsec tion (2) applies the Attorney-General may cause the enactment or applied law included in the active database under subsection (1) to be trans ferred to the historical database.

(4) That which is to be done under this section is in this Act referred to as the continual updating of the active database.

Access to active database

7 The Minister may make available for sale to the public—

(a) a version of the active database; and

(b) a subscription service providing its subscribers with on-line access to updated material in the active database so that such service shall at all times be up to date.

Publication of revised edition

8 (1) The Minister shall make available for sale to the public—

(a) complete sets of the revised edition (but only while stocks of it and any reprint thereof sanc tioned by the Minister shall remain);

(b) issues of new and replacement pages;

(2) The Minister may make available for sale to the public on request photocopies or computer generated print-outs of separate items of the revised edition or any page of such an item.

Periodic updating of revised edition

9 (1) The Attorney-General shall cause to be published as of ten as he shall see fit an issue of new and replacement pages of the re vised edition which pages shall on the most up to date basis consistent with publication of the new and replacement pages reflect the current state of the active database in relation to those pages.

(2) In this Act, that which is done under subsection (1) is referred to as the periodic updating of the revised edition, and the product is referred to as a periodic update; and "updated" in subsection (4) has a corresponding meaning.

(3) Every notice published under subsection (2) of section 14 in relation to a periodic update, and every new or replacement page contained in a periodic update published under subsection (1) of this section, shall specify the revision date of that update.

(4) In this section the expression "revision date", in relation to a periodic update, means the date to which the law has been updated by that update.

(5) Subsection (3) does not apply in relation to any periodic update with a revision date earlier than 1st August 1992.

[section 9 amended by 1993 : 35 effective 13 July 1993]

Power of Attorney-General to omit

10 (1) The Attorney-General may omit from the active database—

(a) enactments, or parts of enactments, which have been repealed or which have expired or have be come spent or have had their effect;

(b) repealing provisions contained in enactments and tables and lists of repealed enactments, whether contained in schedules or otherwise;

(d) provisions prescribing the date when or manner in which an enactment or part of an enactment is to come into operation, where such omission can, in the opinion of the Attorney-General, con veniently be made;

(e) amending enactments or parts thereof, where the amendments effected thereby have been em bodied by the Attorney-General in the enactment to which they re late; and

(f) words of enactment.

(2) Any enactment or part thereof omitted from the active database in exercise of the powers conferred by subsection (1) which as a result of the exercise of such powers does not appear in the revised edi tion may be proved by the production of any copy thereof by which the same could have been proved before the effective date.

(3) Any enactment or part thereof referred to in subsection (2) may be included in the historical database.

(4) It shall not be necessary for the Attorney-General to in clude in the database—

(a) private Acts;

(b) appropriation Acts;

(d) Acts conferring pensions or gratuities on indi vidual per sons;

(e) any Acts which are of a temporary nature or un der revi sion;

(f) any Acts the carrying into effect of whose provi sions is doubtful;

(g) any statutory instrument made under any Acts referred to in paragraph (e) or (f); or

(h) any statutory instrument which does not appear to the Attorney-General to be of sufficient im portance to be in cluded.

Power of Attorney-General to revise

11 Subject to section 13 the Attorney-General may in the active database and in the revised edition first issued under section 5 or any periodic update issued under section 9—

(a) consolidate into one enactment any two or more enact ments in pari materia making the alter ations thereby rendered necessary and affixing thereto such date as may seem most convenient;

(b) alter the form or arrangement of any enactment by transferring words, by combining it in whole or in part with another enactment or other en actments or by di viding it into two or more parts or transferring the whole or any part thereof to a schedule;

(d) transfer any provision contained in an enact ment from that enactment to any other enact ment to which it more properly belongs;

(e) add a short title to any Act which may require it or to alter the short title of any Act;

(f) arrange the enactments, whether consolidated or not, in any group or sequence that may be convenient irrespec tive of the date of enactment;

(g) supply or alter marginal notes and alter their position;

(h) correct cross-references;

(i) shorten and simplify the phraseology of any en actment;

(j) correct grammatical and typographical errors in the ex isting copies of enactments and for that purpose make verbal additions, omissions or alterations not affecting the meaning of any en actment;

(k) make such formal alterations as to names, lo calities, of fices and otherwise as may be neces sary to bring any enactment into conformity with the circumstances in Bermuda;

(l) make such adaptations of or amendments in any enact ments as may appear to be necessary or proper as a consequence of any change in—

(i) the constitution of Bermuda or any country in the Commonwealth; or

(ii) the membership of the Commonwealth; or

(iii) the circumstances of Bermuda or the Govern ment or the public service;

(m) supply, alter or omit headings;

(n) do all things relating to form and method which appear to be necessary for the perfecting of the active database or the revised edition.

Applied laws, treaties and conventions

12 When any applied law or anything referred to in section 4(5) is included in the database it may be reproduced with such amendments as have been made thereto, and where any applied law has been applied
or extended to Bermuda with modifications the provisions of that applied law may be reproduced with those modifications, but every departure from the body of the original text shall be clearly shown by notes, refer ences, underlining, square brackets, contrasting type or other similar means.

No power to make amendments of substance

13 (1) Nothing in this Act shall be taken to imply any power in the Attorney-General to make any alterations or amendment in the mat ter or substance of any enactment.

(2) No enactment or applied law omitted, under the author ity of this Act or otherwise, from the revised edition shall be deemed to be without force and validity by reason only of the fact that it is so omit ted.

(3) Without prejudice to sections 15 and 20, the powers con ferred upon the Attorney-General by paragraphs (i) and (j) of section 11 shall not be exercisable on or after 1st January 1991.

Bringing first revised edition and periodic updates into operation

14 (1) The version of the revised edition first issued under section 5 and any periodic update issued under sec tion 9 are texts to which this section applies.

(2) The Attorney-General may by notice published in the Gazette order that a text to which this section applies shall come into operation on such date as the notice specifies.

(3) Subject to this Act, a text in relation to which a notice has been published under subsection (2) shall from the date specified in the notice be deemed in all courts and for all purposes whatsoever to be, without any question whatsoever, the sole and proper law of Bermuda in respect of the enactments included in that text.

(4) A notice under subsection (2) is subject to the negative resolution procedure.

[section 14 repealed and substituted by 1991:100 effective 16 December 1991]

Directions for rectification of errors

15 For the purpose of rectifying any clerical or printing error ap pearing in the revised edition or in any periodic update or for the pur pose of rectifying, in a manner not inconsistent with his powers under this Act, any other error so appearing, the Attorney-General may from time to time, by notice published in the Gazette, give directions as to the rectification of any such error.

Tables and indexes

16 The Attorney-General shall, as soon as practicable after the pub lication of the version of the revised edition first issued under section 5 cause to be published in a subsequent issue of new pages of the revised edition—

(a) a list of the titles of all unrepealed Acts;

(b) such additional material as he may consider ap propriate to facilitate reference to the revised edition.

References to enactments affected by operation of this Act

17 Where in any enactment, or in any instrument or document of whatever kind, any reference is made to any provision of any enactment affected by or under the operation of this Act, the reference shall, where necessary and practicable, be construed as a reference to the corre sponding provision in the revised edition.

Schedule of amendments

18 (1) Each Act the short title of which is set out as a heading to Part I or II of Schedule 2 is amended in the manner specified in that Part.

(2) Each enactment affected by Part III of Schedule 2 is amended in the manner specified in that Part.

Expenditure

19 The expenses of and incidental to the preparation and produc tion of the database and the revised edition and the continual or periodic updating of them shall be paid out of funds provided by the Legislature.

Correction of errors

20 (1) The Attorney-General shall cause any errors in the database to be corrected as promptly as possible.

(2) Subject to subsection (3), where such errors have been car ried into the revised edition the Attorney-General shall cause to be pub lished a replacement of the pages affected by the errors.

(3) Where subsection (2) applies but such errors do not in the opinion of the Attorney-General justify the publishing of a replace ment of a page or pages he may in lieu thereof publish a correction no tice in the Gazette.

(4) Where subsection (3) applies the Gazette notice takes effect immediately upon publication.

SCHEDULE 1 [section 10(4)(c)]

Acts included in the 1971 edition omitted from database

Title 7	Item 1	War Department Land Act 1904
Title 7	Item 2	Admiralty Land Act 1915
Title 7	Item 5	Warlike Experiments Act 1878
Title 9	Item 38	Pensions (Increase) Act 1970
Title 14	Item 2	Treasury Advances Act 1931
Title 19	Item 5A	Road Closure (Secretary Road) Act 1984
Title 19	Item 12	Foot of the Lane Exchange of Lands Act 1939
Title 20	Item 1A	Stonington (Special Planning Provision) Act 1978
Title 20	Item 1B	Fort Langton (Special Planning Provi sion) Act 1983
Title 20	Item 1C	Tynes Bay (Special Planning Provision) Act 1984
Title 20	Item 1D	Ireland Island North (Special Planning Provision) Act 1985

SCHEDULE 2 [section 18]
PART I
The Interpretation Act 1951

(1) In section 5 for the definition of "United Kingdom" substi tute—

" "United Kingdom" means—

(a) the United Kingdom of Great Britain and North ern Ire land; or

(b) when used with reference to citizenship or na tionality, Great Britain, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man;".

(2) For section 6 substitute—

"6 (1) In any Act or statutory instrument "Commonwealth" means collectively —

(a) the United Kingdom;

(b) the Channel Islands;

(d) Antigua and Barbuda; Australia; The Bahamas; Bangladesh; Barbados; Be lize; Botswana; Brunei; Canada; Repub lic of Cyprus; Dominica; The Gambia; Ghana; Grenada; Guyana; India; Ja maica; Kenya; Kiribati; Lesotho; Malawi; Malaysia; Maldives; Malta; Mauritius; Nauru; New Zealand; Nigeria; Pakistan; Papua New Guinea; Saint Christopher and Nevis; Saint Lucia; Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; Seychelles; Sierra Leone; Singapore; Solomon Islands; Sri Lanka; Swaziland; Tanzania; Tonga; Trinidad and Tobago; Tuvalu; Uganda; Vanuatu; Western Samoa; Zambia; Zim babwe;

(e) Anguilla; Bermuda; British Antarctic Territory; British Indian Ocean Territory; Cayman Islands; Falkland Islands and Dependencies; Gibraltar; Hong Kong; Montserrat; Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno Islands; St Helena and De pendencies; The Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (that is to say the areas mentioned in section 2(1) of the Cyprus Act 1960); Turks and Caicos Is lands; Virgin Islands.

(2) In any Act or statutory instrument "Commonwealth country" means a country specified in subsection (1).".

(3) In section 7(1)—

(a) for the definition of "alien" substitute—

" "alien" means a person who is neither a Common wealth citizen nor a British protected person nor a citizen of the Re public of Ireland;";

(b) for the definition of "British subject" substitute—

" "British citizen" means a person who has the sta tus of a British citizen under the British Nation ality Act 1981;

"British Dependent Territories citizen" means a per son who has the status of a British Dependent Territories citizen under the British Nationality Act 1981;

"British Overseas citizen" means a person who has the status of a British Overseas citizen under the British Nationality Act 1981;

"British protected person" means a person who has the status of a British protected person under the British Nationality Act 1981;

"British subject" means a person who has the sta tus of a British subject under the British Na tionality Act 1981;

"Commonwealth citizen" means a person who has the status of a Commonwealth citizen under the British Nationality Act 1981;".

(4) After section 19 insert new sections—

"Citation of United Kingdom statutes

19A United Kingdom legislation may be cited by a short title or citation, if any, or by reference to the regnal or calendar year in which it was passed or by the number assigned to any statu tory instrument or statutory rule and order.

Construction of reference to United Kingdom legislation

19B A reference in any enactment to particular United King dom legislation or to any provision, part or division thereof shall be construed as a reference to the same as the same may be from time to time amended and as a reference to the particular United Kingdom legislation or to any provision, part or division thereof substituted therefor.".

PART II
The Evidence Act 1905

In section 2 delete the words India, Pakistan, Ceylon and South ern Rhodesia.

PART III

In any enactment where the context so requires for "British sub ject" substitute "Commonwealth citizen".

[Amended by
1991 : 100
1993 : 35]

Bermuda Consolidated Legislation

Computerization and Revision of Laws Act 1989