The Island's employers do not have to abide by the controversial new spouses law, Labour Minister the Hon. Irving Pearman said.

Although Government has said the law passed last summer placed non-Bermudian spouses of Bermudians on an equal footing with Bermudians in the job market, Mr. Pearman told The Royal Gazette on Thursday that it does no such thing.

"It doesn't oblige employers to take a non-Bermudian if they do not want to,'' he said. But, "if they do, it frees them from the bureaucracy.'' Mr. Pearman was responding to a recent Gazette editorial that said he had created a "double standard'' by allowing the Public Service Commission not to conform with the law -- an amendment to the Immigration and Protection Act.

PSC chairperson Mrs. Jeannette Cannonier labelled the law "ridiculous'' in a recent speech, saying that placing foreign spouses of Bermudians on an equal footing in the job market had removed one of the last planks of real protection for Bermudians.

The PSC, which has the final decision on most Government jobs, has not yet amended its regulations to comply with the new law.

In a letter to the Editor of The Royal Gazette , Mr. Pearman said: "As to the contradiction you see with the policies of the PSC, I don't believe there is one.'' If an employer wanted to set a "higher standard'' than the new law provided in protecting Bermudians, he said, they could "refuse to hire non-Bermudians at all, for example. He (would) certainly not be conflict with any Immigration law or policy. How could he be? "Any employer who goes an extra mile to do the same can hardly be breaking the law. To give another example: The law prevents you from licensing more than one car, but it doesn't prevent you from deciding not to own one at all.'' Mr. Pearman noted that before the amendment, the situation was that non-Bermudian spouses of Bermudians who had been in Bermuda seven years, and who had been married for ten years, could apply for Bermudians status and get it "more or less automatically.'' "Non-Bermudian spouses of Bermudians who had been here for longer than five years and who had been married for longer than five years were able to apply for Spouses Employment Rights Certificates which allowed them to compete equally with Bermudians on the employment market and work permits were granted automatically,'' he said. "Therefore, only non-Bermudian spouses of Bermudians who had been here for fewer than five years were put in the position of needing work permits on a competitive basis.'' Mr. Pearman said there were currently between 900 and 1,000 people who fit into that category.

"Most of them who wanted to work did work, with the permission of the Department of Immigration. Many of them were skilled, and it plainly made more sense for Bermuda to make use of those skills rather than import another worker.

"Some of them were without skills, however, and the effect of our laws and policies was, in practice, to deny them work for the first five years of their marriage. And those who were unskilled were almost always those who could least afford to spend five years without bringing a second income to the family. I was aware, therefore, that these people were being caused real hardship.'' Mr. Pearman still did not see a "double standard'' if those who had been caused hardship by the old law continued to be denied employment because the organisations they had applied to had decided not to recognise the new law, such as the civil service.

Nevertheless, he said, "The Constitution says that the wives of Bermudians `belong' to Bermuda. This means that they should enjoy the freedom of movement that Bermudians enjoy.

"I have heard the opinion expressed many times that should a case be submitted to a court it would be found that to force wives of Bermudians to get work permits runs against the grain of the Constitution.'' Mr. Pearman would not be drawn on whether the PSC was then going against the Constitution by not amending its regulations to comply with the new law.