‘Gay Britain is on the verge of a historic breakthrough,’ journalist Colin Richardson wrote in the Dec. 27 Guardian. ‘Equality before the law is at last within our grasp.’
In recent months, gays have won equal rights in adoption and tenancy law, the Crown Prosecution Service announced a crackdown on homophobic crimes, and the lord chancellor appointed Adrian Fulford as the first openly gay high court judge.
In 2003, several gay sex ‘crimes’ will be wiped from the law books, work will begin on a national civil-partnership registry, and a bill to ban discrimination based on sexual orientation will take form.
‘All that will be left,’ says Richardson, ‘will be section 28, the measure that prohibits local authorities from ‘promoting homosexuality.”