Pardons scheme extended to all convictions for consensual gay sex under now-abolished laws
An amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will broaden the criteria to include any repealed or abolished civilian or military offence that was imposed on someone purely due to consensual same-sex sexual activity.
Tuesday 4 January 2022 10:19, UK
A pardons scheme aimed at "righting the wrongs of the past" will be extended to any conviction imposed purely due to consensual homosexual activity under now-abolished laws, the home secretary is set to announce.
Priti Patel said more people will have convictions for same-sex sexual activity wiped from their records.
Ms Patel is seeking to expand the government's Disregards and Pardons scheme from a narrow set of laws.
Just nine former offences are currently included on a list the Home Office said "largely focused on the repealed offences of buggery and gross indecency between men".
Anyone convicted of a crime under the now-repealed laws can apply to have it wiped from their criminal record. They would then not be required to disclose it.
An amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will broaden the criteria to include any repealed or abolished civilian or military offence that was imposed on someone purely due to consensual same-sex sexual activity.
All those whose cautions and convictions are disregarded under the scheme will also receive an automatic pardon.
Anyone who has died before the changes came into place, or up to 12 months afterwards, will be posthumously pardoned.
Ms Patel said: "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."
The home secretary thanked peers Lord Cashman and Lord Lexden for raising the issue.
Earlier this year, Lord Lexden said it was "an affront to gay people" that the scheme had not been extended.
Lord Cashman said in November "the disregard and pardon schemes in England and Wales are significantly flawed because they encompass only a small fraction of the laws that, over the decades and centuries, have immiserated the lives of gay and bisexual people".
He went on to highlight how "the offence of solicitation by men, which was used to entrap gay and bisexual men, sometimes for doing nothing more than chatting up another adult man" would not have been included in the original scheme.
The Home Office said conditions would still need to be met in order for a disregard and pardon to be granted, including that anyone else involved must have been aged 16 and over and the sexual activity must not constitute an offence today.