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Homosexuality

Lord Wolfenden in 1968.
Lord Wolfenden, whose 1957 report recommended that 'homosexual acts between consenting adults' should be legalised.
©TopFoto

Despite the Wolfenden Report of 1957, male homosexuality was not decriminalised in Britain until 1967. Until that time, a homosexual act was considered by law to be a criminal offence.

Related documents

Wolfenden Report

Sexual Offences Act 1967

Search using Racial discrimination Wolfenden

Further reading

  • Glennerster, H., British Social Policy 1945 to the Present (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007)
  • Hall, L.A., Sex, Gender and Social Change in Britain Since 1880 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000)
  • Higgins, P., Heterosexual Dictatorship: Male Homosexuality in Post-War Britain (London: Fourth Estate, 1996)
  • Houlbrook, M., Queer London: Perils and Pleasures in the Sexual Metropolis 1918-1957 (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2005)
  • Houlbrook, M. and Cocks, H.G., Advances in the Modern History of Sexuality (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005)
  • Weeks, J., Sex, Politics and Society: The Regulation of Sexuality Since 1800. (London: Longman, 1989)

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