Irving Pearman after a woman complained of "an extreme double standard'' in Bermuda's immigration laws.

When the Immigration and Protection Amendment Act 1994 was passed last June, Government said it removed a major inequity in the way Bermudian men and women were treated under the law.

Until then, Bermudian men who fathered children overseas could pass on their status to their children. But Bermudian women could not.

Mrs. Betsey Dix was born in the United States of a Bermudian mother. But even after last year's amendment, she was still not deemed to be Bermudian. The reason? Mrs. Dix was born in 1942, and the 1994 amendment only deals with children of Bermudians born since 1956 -- the year the Immigration and Protection Act was passed.

"It's an extreme double standard,'' Mrs. Dix told The Royal Gazette . The brother of Bermuda building expert Mr. Sanders Frith Brown, Mrs. Dix is the daughter of Bermudian Mrs. Lucy Hutchings Frith Brown, who died last year. Her father was American Mr. Warren Moen Brown, who died in 1968. The couple divorced in 1952.

Having moved to Bermuda as a young girl, Mrs. Dix stayed on the Island until she was about 17, when she went abroad to school. She returned to the Island for a stint in the 1960s, when she taught at Warwick Academy and Prospect Secondary School for Girls. She now lives in England.

Mrs. Dix noted that children of her mother's brother, the late Mr. Alexander Frith, were deemed to be Bermudian.

She said she has not applied for Bermudian status and has no plans to move to the Island.

"I lived my whole life elsewhere on the basis that I had no right to live in Bermuda,'' she said.

"There must be quite a few people about my age in the same situation. It's not that all of us want to come home and do something. It's the fact that we were treated unequally and appear to be categorically treated unequally.'' Mrs. JoCarol Robinson, chairperson of the Women's Advisory Council, said the issue would be on the agenda of the WAC's next meeting.

There appeared to be "a blatant flaw'' in the legislation, she said. "If that was not considered when it was being formulated, then clearly it's been exposed now.'' Yesterday, an Immigration official said Mr. Frith Brown had brought his sister's case to Government's attention and a report was being prepared for Mr. Pearman.

"Things get done a step at a time,'' he said. In last year's amendment, "we were extending the 1956 Act.'' Mrs. Dix's case was the first such one the official had heard of, and another amendment to the act would be required for her to be deemed Bermudian.

A report with a proposed amendment will be prepared for Mr. Pearman, and "the Minister will decide whether to take that forward or not'', he said.