Commonwealth legislators meet at EuroPride conference to advance common agenda for equality

A group of legislators attending the LGBTIQ Human Rights Conference at EuroPride 2023 have met with other dignitaries and stakeholders to discuss how they can work together to progress inclusive laws in the Commonwealth.

At a roundtable discussion (14 September 2023) co-organised by the Global Equality Caucus, the British High Commission Malta, and the Maltese Parliamentary Secretariat for Reforms and Equality, the session highlighted some of the key obstacles to legal equality that exist in Member States and how existing Commonwealth institutions can be leveraged to overcome them.

Present at the meeting were representatives from Australia, Botswana, Canada, Kenya, Malta, New Zealand, Seychelles, Uganda and the United Kingdom, as well as civil society experts and officials from the co-organising parties.

British High Commissioner to Malta Katherine Ward LVO OBE co-chaired the roundtable with Maltese Parliamentary Secretary for Equality Rebecca Buttigieg.

Legislators shared some of the persisting equality issues in their countries, including barriers to healthcare access, a lack of civil society funding, inadequate sex & relationships education, and the rise of the anti-gender movement. Attendees also condemned the recent passage of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act, which allows for the death penalty as a maximum sentence for homosexuality, and pledged to support efforts to overturn it.

With many of the highlighted equality issues shared across the Commonwealth – including the ongoing criminalisation of same-sex intimacy in 32 Member States – legislators called for more resources to support their efforts to challenge penalising laws. Strategies identified included training parliamentarians on drafting inclusive legislation, improving links between parliamentarians and civil society experts, and amplifying the work of parliamentary human rights committees by sharing technical expertise and international best practice.

Maltese MP Randolph de Battista addresses the roundtable.

Attendees also addressed the burgeoning global campaign to roll back the rights of sexual and gender minorities, expressing concern that this campaign is well-organised and well-funded. Pointing to existing research that traces this campaign to fundamentalist groups in the United States, Europe and Russia, legislators called for better organisation and alignment amongst pro-equality campaigners to challenge this movement.

Determined to drive this priority forward, attendees agreed a series of practical next steps, including follow-up representations to governments and international networks.

The Global Equality Caucus will continue to deepen transnational connections between its members to support communication and knowledge exchange, and will seek to work with Commonwealth partners to facilitate further strategy meetings over the next year.

We would like to thank the British High Commission Malta and the Government of Malta for their ongoing commitment to this work.