Homosexual pardon delayed as officials say it could benefit paedophiles

Campaigners who had hoped that the royal pardon for the Enigma codebreaker Alan Turing would be extended across the nation have been dismayed by a warning from Whitehall officials that a blanket pardon could benefit gay men who had sex with a minor. [...]

Simon Hughes, the justice minister, will on Saturday pledge that the Liberal Democrats would demand in any future coalition negotiations that a pardon is offered to the estimated 49,000 men convicted of gross indecency before homosexuality was decriminalised in 1967. Hughes will say that the men, of whom 15,000 are believed to be alive, are "morally innocent" of any crime.

The former Lib Dem deputy leader, who will indicate that the Tories have yet to agree to the pardon, will speak up after concerns were raised in Whitehall that paedophiles could benefit from the proposed pardon. Officials have said that there may be no record of whether a minor was involved in a pre-1967 prosecution because homosexuality was illegal regardless of age. Homosexuality was initially decriminalised in 1967 for consenting adults aged 21 and over. The age of consent was eventually equalised in Great Britain in 2001.

source: Article 'Homosexual pardon delayed as officials say it could benefit paedophiles' by Nicholas Watt; www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/27/homosexual-pardon-delayed-whitehall-fears-paedophiles-simon-hughes-alan-turing; The Guardian; 27 February 2015