Britain's review of its Overseas Territories has seen the Foreign Affairs Committee take evidence from all comers.

This week many of the written submissions from Bermuda hit the British Parliament's website.

Here is a flavour of some of them.

Anger over conscription and the issues of gay rights and gender discrimination formed a big part of the concerns raised by Bermudians to British MPs, judging from website submissions so far.

Jonathan Suter voiced concern over the failure to include sexual orientation in the Human Rights Act which he said was needed because fundamental human rights should be afforded all individuals, regardless of their individual characteristics.

He wrote: "At the end of the day, the queer community are just normal people, like you and I, and everyone else.

"They just happen to be attracted to members of the same sex, both sexes or neither sex. How that has any negative impact on society is a mystery to me."

Brenda Lana Smith, who described herself as "an abused septuagenarian male-to-female 23-years' post-operative transsexual Bermudian," said the Bermuda Human Rights Act, 1981 needed to be changed to criminalise discrimination against gender variant persons, particularly on the grounds of their gender identity.

David R McCann said the Regiment was the 21st century form of slavery.

He added: "People who I know have gone through with it have described the abuse — officers yelling, shouting and cursing, even threatening, and carrying out acts of physical violence."

He said he returned from studies only to face repeated attempts to get drafted, despite medical problems.

"How can I put all my effort into getting my career properly of the ground if I have to give three years to the regiment?"

While Brian Swan wrote: "It is a horrible feeling to know that your freedoms may be taken from you when you reach a particular age and you will be forced to learn how to kill."

The Royal Gazette editor William Zuill highlighted the daily newspaper's A Right to Know: Giving People Power campaign which is calling for the introduction of freedom of information legislation in Bermuda — although he conceded it was for Parliament here and not in the British one to enact such laws.

But he added: "Because one of the terms of reference of the committee is Transparency and Accountability in the Overseas Territories, the committee may wish to examine the extent to which access to information is enshrined in legislation in Bermuda and in other OTs and how the United Kingdom Parliament might be able to assist and advise on bringing such legislation to the fore."

He said freedom of information legislation has now been enacted in more than 70 countries and associations of states, including the United Kingdom and the European Union.

"It should be clear that such legislation is crucial to openness and transparency in Western democracies, and it makes sense for such rights to be available to the citizens of British Overseas Territories.

While it may be logical to assume that access to information in small jurisdictions like Bermuda would be easier than it is in larger countries, said Mr. Zuill, the opposite is often true as those in positions of power will often guard information quite jealously.

"There are times when there are privacy issues at stake, but often in a small community this is used as a reason for not making information public, when in fact, no harm would be done or when the public interest outweighs rights to privacy."

Mr. Zuill said he acknowledged that a Green Paper on Public Access to Information (PATI) was published in Bermuda in 2005 and that the present Government has stated that it is continuing to work on a Public Access to Information Act.

"But it may be that the committee would recommend that the governments of Bermuda and other Overseas Territories give this kind of legislation a higher priority."

Mr. Zuill was supported by another submitter, Alan Gamble, who complained about Government secrecy.