LGBTQ+ UPDATE
A win for tolerance and equality
A landmark campaign to wipe convictions under discriminatory laws that have since been abolished, for consensual same-sex sexual activity has been successful
Home Secretary Priti Patel has announced that the Government’s Disregards and Pardons scheme will be extended to ensure that any person convicted or cautioned for consensual homosexual activity can have this removed from their records. An automatic pardon will
be extended to anyone whose cautions and convictions are disregarded under the scheme. Anyone who has died before the changes came into place – or up to 12 months afterwards – will be posthumously pardoned. This latest announcement is the culmination of years of campaigning by LGBT+ activists. In 2012, people in England and Wales have been able to have historical same-sex sexual activity cautions and convictions disregarded.
Then in 2017, the so-called Turing’s Law was passed, named after the gay wartime codebreaker Alan Turing, who was convicted of gross indecency in 1952
“Automatic pardons will be extended
government will broaden eligibility of the scheme to encompass any repealed or abolished civilian or military offence that was imposed on someone in relation to consensual same-sex sexual activity. National Vice Chair Ché Donald
to anyone convicted of any repealed or abolished civilian or military same-sex sexual activity offence”
and took his own life in 1954. Turing’s Law granted automatic posthumous pardons to people who were convicted of sexual acts that are no longer illegal. But campaigners argued that crimes covered by this scheme were too narrow. Through an amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, the
says: “This is welcome news and a fantastic result for this campaign and everyone involved in it.” The Home Secretary added: “It is only right that where offences have been abolished, convictions
for consensual activity between same- sex partners should be disregarded too. I hope that expanding the pardons and disregards scheme will go some way to righting the wrongs of the past and to reassuring members of the LGBT community that Britain is one of the safest places in the world to call home.”
15 | POLICE | FEBRUARY 2022
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