15th July 2026
The last step in the passage of the legislation providing for Disregards expected in the Dáil tonight.
The Seanad amendments to the Criminal Law, Civil Law and Defence (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2026 will be debated and voted on in the Dáil this evening (Wednesday 15th July), completing the Bill’s passage through the Oireachtas.
The Bill includes a Disregard Scheme to provide redress for gay men harmed by Ireland’s since-repealed anti-gay laws. The only remaining step will be for the President to consider and sign the Bill into law.
“The long-awaited legislation to provide redress to the men whose lives were scarred by unjust persecution under Ireland’s anti-gay laws will finally be completed tonight,” said Kieran Rose of the LGBT Restorative Justice Campaign.
“For those men and their families who endured the humiliation and shame of criminalisation under laws that targeted ordinary loving relationships between men, the completion of the Bill’s passage through the Oireachtas begins to right a profound injustice”, said Rose.
The Disregard Scheme, administered by an Independent Person, will allow men arrested, questioned, prosecuted or convicted for consensual same-sex activity under the former anti-gay laws to apply for a Disregard, removing the stain of criminality from their records. The Scheme will also cover juveniles, including some sent to industrial schools, and recognises discriminatory policing practices that entrapped gay men.
According to a recent Oireachtas Library research report, at least 1,690 men were prosecuted under the anti-gay laws between 1950 and 1993, with 941 convictions.
“The real challenge will be ensuring the Scheme reaches as many of those men as possible, many of whom emigrated, and that it provides trauma-informed support to them, or to their relatives where they have died, so they can clear their records and achieve some measure of redress for the wrongs done to them by the State”, said Brian Sheehan of the LGBT Restorative Justice Campaign.
“This legislation is a landmark moment for human rights and LGBTI+ rights in Ireland. It marks an important step in acknowledging the injustices of the past, whose consequences are still felt today. Criminalisation shaped attitudes to LGBTQ+ people, fuelling stigma, discrimination, silence and shame, and the work of repairing that legacy is not yet complete,” continued Sheehan.
“It took decades of campaigning to secure the repeal of the Victorian-era anti-gay laws inherited by the Irish State at Independence. A landmark 1988 judgment won by Senator David Norris in the European Court of Human Rights paved the way for the decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1993. On the 25th anniversary of that reform, the State apologised to those persecuted under the laws and acknowledged the harm they caused to the wider LGBTI+ community. After a further seven years of campaigning, tonight’s completion of the legislation will finally provide some redress to those whose lives were profoundly damaged by laws that criminalised ordinary relationships” said Karl Hayden from the LGBT Restorative Justice Campaign.
“We thank the Minister for Justice, all members of the Oireachtas who engaged with the legislation, and everyone who supported the long journey in this campaign. While the legislation does not include every recommendation of the Working Group, we hope the Scheme will be sufficiently robust and flexible to ensure that most people unjustly convicted can obtain meaningful redress”, concluded Hayden.
ENDS
Editors Notes:
The Dáil debate on the amendments from the Seanad is scheduled to start at 18:28 on Wednesday 15th July. While there are no major amendments to the Disregard section of the Bill, there are significant amendments to other sections.
More information on the LGBT+ Restorative Justice Campaign and the journey to achieving Disregard legislation is available at www.lgbtdisregard.ie
LGBT Disregard 