These men deserve compensation for their suffering but so far the government is refusing them recompense. Some lost their homes, jobs, marriages and children. Not only did they carry the stigma of a criminal conviction but many were jailed and beaten. “Many of these men had their lives ruined. Around 15,000 of these men are still alive. The human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell said: “An estimated 100,000 men were convicted under anti-gay laws from 1885 to 2003, when homosexuality was finally fully decriminalised in England and Wales.
They called on the government to widen the scope of the scheme to include more offences and to better publicise it. However, the scheme has been criticised for only including a limited number of offences.įigures released to the Guardian under freedom of information show the Home Office has so far only disregarded 189 convictions out of 663 submitted to the scheme, a success rate of 29%.Ĭampaigners said the figures revealed an astonishingly low number of overall applications, as well as a “very depressing” success rate. Even spent convictions for most sex offences show up in the checks system, known as the disclosure and barring service (DBS).Ī 2012 scheme, described by the government as an opportunity to “right a historic wrong”, enabled men with such convictions in England and Wales to apply to the Home Office to have their records permanently deleted. The convictions have left many men feeling stigmatised and unable to get jobs that require a criminal record check, including work with children or vulnerable people.