“Lest the opponents of the new bill think that a new freedom, a new privileged class has been created,” he declared. When Lord Arran co-sponsored the bill that ended the total criminalisation of same-sex relations between men – after his gay brother had killed himself – his preamble was bleak. I t is little over half a century since homosexuality was partially decriminalised in England and Wales, and it’s a period defined by both progress and trauma.
