Government posthumously pardon thousands of gay and bisexual men in England and Wales convicted of decades-old sexual offences.
The so-called Alan Turing law means about 49,000 men will be cleared of crimes of which today, they would be innocent and were found guilty of committing now-abolished offences while in consensual relationships.
The pardons, first announced last year have now been officially rubber-stamped after receiving Royal Assent in the Policing and Crime Bill.
Justice minister Sam Gyimah, said: “We can never undo the hurt caused, but we have apologised and taken action to right these wrongs.”
Mathematician Mr Turing received a royal pardon in 2013, nearly 60 years after his suicide in 1954 following a conviction for gross indecency, after which he was chemically castrated.
The pardon followed a public campaign which came to a climax in 2009 with former Prime Minister Gordon Brown apologising for Mr Turing’s treatment.
Turing’s relatives later mounted a high-profile campaign to secure pardons for other men similarly convicted under the same historic indecency laws.
Liberal Democrat peer John Sharkey, whose original Private Member’s Bill was instrumental in securing a pardon for Alan Turing, reached an agreement with the Government in November 2016, to grant a posthumous pardon to thousands of gay and bisexual men convicted under long-abolished sexual offence laws.
This followed a long-fought campaign by the Liberal Democrats who first raised the issue in Parliament in the early days of the Coalition Government.
Lord Sharkey, the author of the original amendment to the Policing and Crime Bill, said: “This is a momentous day for thousands of families up and down the UK who have been campaigning on this issue for decades.
“It is a wonderful thing that we have been able to build on the pardon granted to Alan Turing during Coalition and extend it to thousands of men unjustly convicted for sexual offences that would not be crimes today.”
Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron MP, added: “The Liberal Democrats continue to be the strongest voice on equality in Parliament.
“Although it comes too late for those convicted, the friends and relatives of the thousands of people who suffered under this unfair and discriminatory law will now have a weight lifted off their shoulders.”
George Montague the 93-year-old, Brighton based campaigner, affectionately known as The Oldest Gay in the Village said from his holiday home in Thailand that his fight for an apology from the government continues.
George has been campaigning for an apology rather than a pardon saying that a pardon suggests that he had done something wrong.
George was forced to resign in 1974 from his position as a Senior Commissioner in the Boy Scout Association where he ran camps for severely physically disabled boys from six southern counties in the UK, following a conviction for gross indecency.
George delivered a petition to 10 Downing Street on Wednesday, November 2, 2016 with more than 10,000 signatures supporting his call for an apology.