A UK Politician Talked for So Long That Parliament Couldn't Vote on the 'Turing Bill'

The Tory Justice Minister effectively blocked a vote on a proposed bill that would have automatically pardoned thousands of living men criminalized under now-defunct anti-homosexuality laws. In a process that's known as "filibustering," minister Sam Gyimah basically addressed the House of Commons until there wasn't time left for a vote on Friday afternoon, meaning the Private Member's Bill proposed by SNP MP John Nicolson couldn't move forward in Parliament.

As it stands, the deceased men who were considered guilty of offences before gay sex was decriminalized in 1967, and the age of same-gender consent lowered to 16 in 2001, will still be pardoned. That was the crux of the news reported on Thursday, and hailed as a the cornerstone of "momentous day" by Lib Dem Lord Sharkey.

The government seemed to agree. "It is hugely important that we pardon people convicted of historical sexual offences who would be innocent of any crime today," Gyimah said, when announcing the Tory party's plan to use an amendment to an existing bill, rather than the new bill laid out by the SNP. "Through pardons and the existing disregard process we will meet our manifesto commitment to put right these wrongs."

To critics of Gyimah's filibuster, that translates as the Tory party opting to take the lead on a change to the law rather than having the SNP take credit for a more widespread pardon. Nicolson's bill hoped for a blanket pardon for all convictions that are no longer illegal – namely, consensual sex between male adults above the age of 16.

"The meaning of that is patently obvious," Nicolson said, as reported by the Guardian. "If the crime for which you were convicted is still a crime, by definition you are not pardoned. So let nobody be confused about that. The aim of this simple measure is, I hope, obvious. The pardon confers no immediate advantage except this: it will, I hope, bring closure to those men who have had those monstrous, unfair criminal convictions for decades."

That's not quite how Gyimah saw the issue. He, and thus the Ministry of Justice, have said that there's a risk that people would be automatically pardoned for crimes that fall into a grey area: ones that are still illegal today, but wouldn't have been properly catalogued when they fell under the vague "gross indecency" remit of past anti-gay restrictions and laws. About 15,000 living men would thus have to apply for a pardon from the Home Office, as Nicolson noted, under the current system supported by Gyimah, rather than have the crimes automatically struck from their record.

"A blanket pardon, without the detailed investigations carried out by the Home Office under the disregard process, could see people guilty of an offence which is still a crime today claiming to be pardoned," Gyimah said in a statement. "This would cause an extraordinary and unnecessary amount of distress to victims and for this reason the government cannot support the Private Member's Bill. Our way forward will be both faster and fairer."

Nicolson's bill is due to be debated again on the 14th of December.

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