Free To Be Who You Are
On Your Side Since Day One
The freedom to live your life as the person that you are, secure in the knowledge that your fundamental rights will be protected is not a lot to ask.
But in our country there are still too many people for whom that is an aspiration. Our LGBTQ+ community face prejudice, discrimination and hostility simply because of who they are.
Liberal Democrats have been at the forefront of many of the great strides the UK has made towards LGBTQ+ equality. It was Ed Davey in 2003 who proposed the clause which finally repealed “Section 28”, the Conservatives’ law which prohibited the "promotion of homosexuality" by local authorities.
Lynne Featherstone – the first ever Liberal Democrat Equalities Minister – was the driving force behind the legislation that made Same Sex marriage happen.
And it was the former Liberal Democrat MP John Leech who spearheaded the campaign to pardon Alan Turing and Lib Dem peer Lord Sharkey, tabled the amendment to the Policing and Crime Act 2017 which posthumously pardoned thousands of gay men who had been criminalised for their sexuality.
Our party had been pushing to lift the ban on men who have sex with men's ability to donate blood for over 15 years by the time it finally happened in 2021.
That is the proud tradition of which we are the keepers.
Like so many of the fights before, the fight for trans rights is not over. In Britain today, torn apart by the forces of division, it has never been more important for us to stand with our allies and affirm: Trans Rights are Human Rights, and the law must act like it.
Trans Rights Are Human Rights
We, the undersigned, call for the Equality Act 2010 to be reformed to include trans-inclusive definitions of ‘man’ and ‘woman’, to properly enshrine the rights of trans people, and to protect intersex, agender and non-binary people in law.