Prime Minister Theresa May has been urged to apologise and compensate men convicted under anti-gay laws.
Human rights campaigner, Peter Tatchell, Director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation, is leading the calls for May to apologise.
The calls come as the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act of 1967 approaches. The act decriminalised homosexual acts in private between two men.
Tatchell said, “These men deserve an apology and compensation for the terrible persecution they suffered.”
“Many were jailed and nearly all endured devastating knock-on consequences.”
“They often lost their jobs and became near unemployable and semi-destitute because of the stigma associated with having a conviction for homosexual offence.”
“Some experienced the break-up of their marriages and lost custody and access to their children.”
“Families and friends disowned them and they were abused and sometimes assaulted in the street.”
“Many descended into a downward spiral of depression, alcoholism, mental illness and suicide and attempted suicide.”
“The psychological and emotional scars were devastating and long lasting.”
“That’s why they need and deserve a Prime Ministerial apology – and state compensation.”
In January, it was reported that thousands of gay and bisexual men convicted of now abolished sexual offences had been posthumously pardoned under the new ‘Turing’s Law’.
The new Policing and Crime Bill received Royal Assent, enshrining, in law, pardons for those convicted of consensual same-sex relationships before homosexuality was decriminalised.
The new law, nicknamed Turing’s Law after Alan Turing, will also see statutory pardons granted to those still alive today. However, this will only apply in cases where offenders have successfully applied through the Home Office’s disregard process to have historic convictions removed.
Turing, a World War II code breaker, posthumously received a royal pardon in 2013, over being convicted of ‘gross indecency’ in 1952. As punishment, Turing, who famously worked at Bletchley Park, was chemically castrated.
Despite the posthumous pardons, campaigners estimate that between 10,000 and 20,000 men who were convicted are still alive today.
