Wednesday 9th July 1986 A week ago senior National party politician and North Shore MP George Gair voted against Parliament deciding immediately on the Homosexual Law reform bill, thus tipping the scales in favour of deferring the vote until tonight. Gair supported the intent of the Bill except for its setting of the age of consent at 16, the same as for heterosexuals. He preferred a higher age. Gay rights campaigners and other supporters of the bill unanimously opposed a higher age of consent because it would leave young sexually active men abandoned and vulnerable to legal censure. It would also reinforce the impression in the public mind and on the statutes that homosexuality was less acceptable than heterosexuality. Acknowledging that tonight's vote will be close, outspoken reform foe and National MP Graeme Lee confidently expects Gair to vote against the final reading of the bill because of the age of consent still being set at 16. So do the rest of his conservative colleagues. For a week the MPs have been lobbied quietly but most effort has been directed to ensuring that every pro-reform MP possible is present tonight for the final vote. It is hoped the bill has the numbers - but no one is sure. Parliament's public gallery is packed with around 200 men and women, mostly supporters of the bill, just a few opponents. Wellingtonians are in the majority but amongst the out of towners a few Aucklanders are there too. One of the gay Auckland-based lawyers who has meticulously drafted the legislation, Alan Ivory, and the man who has led the generating of over a quarter of a million dollars in today's money to fund the 18 months of campaigning, Bruce Kilmister. Wellingtonian Bill Logan, who has relentlessly debated publicly and in the media with the bill's opponents, who has become for many New Zealanders the face of homosexuality, is there too with his partner Jerome. All around the country gay men and lesbians and trannies listen to Parliament on the radio, singly or in groups. Amongst them is a young Richard Tankersley in Christchurch. Tankersley, a student in his early 20s has been a self-described 'foot soldier' in the campaign, licking stamps, helping with fundraisers and marching in the city's downtown, taking abuse from onlookers. Tonight his flatmate has gone out and Tankersley is quietly alone... waiting. In suburban Auckland Tony Hughes and a companion sit in a small Honda. He has been at the heart of the campaign for years, even before it became public knowledge. He's a strategist and researcher par excellence. For some reason the radio in Hughes' flat won't pick up the Parliament broadcast so they listen to it on the car radio. Warren Lindberg, an ex-teacher who has for years been openly gay even though it was a criminal offense to engage in same sex intercourse, and who is now the Executive Director of the recently formed NZ AIDS Foundation, is also pressed to his radio. The queer nation holds its breath. The third and final reading of the Homosexual Law Reform Bill begins. If it passes, it will get the law and the police and courts out of gay men's bedrooms and signal the start of a better life for future generations of glbt people. George Gair, whose vote last Wednesday night in favour of deferring the vote on law reform gave the bill the breathing space of the past week, now tells the house that, despite the age of consent still being proposed to be 16 he cannot vote against it because this change is long overdue. He has considered abstaining but decided that would be just passing responsibility to others. His government colleagues are aghast and unleash a voice a storm of criticism of his stance. Harshest in condemnation of Gair is John Banks who has been vehemently and vocally against the bill since its introduction. Banks accuses Gair, his own party's deputy leader, of “shallow humbug and wet rhetoric,” and calls Gair's speech “an historical dissertation of negligible substance.” Banks thanks all those who have worked against the bill, including the hundreds of thousands who have signed the anti-law reform petition. If the bill passes, “this day will be remembered as a sad and sickening day for New Zealand,” he predicts. “Someone has got to stand up and say this country is in trouble. Enough is enough. I am prepared to take a stand,” he said. “A very black cloud hangs over this Parliament tonight.” National's Tauranga MP Winston Peters thunders that Maori youth will be the people most damaged if the bill passes. It's another night of anti-gay abuse. But those in the know have a feeling the numbers might just be on the bill's side. At one point MP Trevor Mallard looks up to the public gallery and silently mouths this belief. Shortly before 10pm the Speaker draws the debate to a close and calls for a vote. Once again, even though this is a conscience vote, the voting is political and predictable, with the National party and Social Credit/Democrat MPs largely against and the Labour opposition mostly in favour. However, if Gair was the surprise defection to the 'ayes' camp a week ago, tonight's surprise is a last minute defection by National's Tarawera MP. Ian McLean did not speak tonight and has voted against the bill at every one of its previous stages. But he has belatedly changed his mind after realising that decriminalisation would help stem the epidemic of HIV/AIDS sweeping through the gay population. The Labour government MPs, plus National's long-time bill supporter Katherine O'Regan, and George Gair and Ian McLean bring the ayes total to 49. The National-dominated opposition, bolstered by eight labour defections including the majority of Maori MPs and, sadly, several closeted gay MPs, can only muster 44 nays. The ayes have it! The debating chamber echoes with applause, cheers and foot stomping from the public gallery. Ruth Dyson, Fran Wilde and Trevor Mallard. (Photo: David Hindley) Several couples, including Logan and his partner hug and kiss wildly, the first known recorded same-sex kisses in the New Zealand Parliament. “I had put every sinew into this thing for eighteen months,” says Logan twenty five years later to the day. “I wasn't absolutely sure it would pass until that moment. The sense of relief was overpowering! I can still feel it now, it was so wonderful!” Some in the public gallery find it too difficult to restrain themselves, though the same could also be said of the MPs. When one anti-reform observer shouts out that Parliament had voted to “condone wickedness” the speaker, Dr Gerry Wall, orders him removed. “Remove the poofs as well!” shouts ex-Prime Minister Sir Robert Muldoon, never a graceful loser. Fran Wilde is elated but clearly tired. Of all the bill's public proponents she had taken the hardest beating, enduring month after month of insults, abuse, personal attacks on herself and her family. She and her young children had been called every obscenity under the sun and even had shoebox of human shit sent through the post. She thanks those MPs from marginal seats who took the electoral risk of voting in favour of the bill. Labour MP Geoff Braybrooke, one of the leaders of the anti-law reform movement, predicts that the law will be overturned by Parliament following the next General Election, in two years' time. He predicts that the electoral backlash at the following election will see those who voted for the bill swept from the house. Sadly, for Braybrooke, despite his lasting in Parliament until 2002 he will see neither prediction come true. In fact he will witness, in the mid-1990s, the jettisoned anti-discrimination Part 1 of the Homosexual Law Reform package re-emerge as the core of anti-discrimination legislation, which will fronted by his caucus colleague, National's Katherine O'Reagan. What he made of the nation seeing a National Prime Minister happily ensconced in the VIP viewing stand for the Hero Parade, has never been revealed. Arch bigot – and proud of it – Invercargill MP Norm Jones rants that despite the Bill's passing its opponents will never drop out of the fight until it is rescinded. Another petition, he says, is already organised. And he will claim that Auckland millionaire and anti-campaigner Keith Hay has offered $1million to fund the repeal petition. It never surfaces and organised opposition to equality for homosexuals retreats into the dark corners of religious bigotry and political oblivion. But Jones does get a few things right. “We'll now have gay bath houses, churches, shops and dancehalls, and all sorts of other things, he predicts. In fact most of those things were already in place, in the bigger cities at least, and the rest will follow incredibly quickly and form the basis for a coherent and motivated glbt community the likes of which New Zealand has never seen before. Jones will die the following year aged just 64; what he would have made of the increasing visibility and acceptance of gays and lesbians including openly gay, lesbian and transsexual MPs and media personalities - and the nationally televised Hero Parades which were such a fixture of New Zealand life through the 1990s - isn't hard to guess. But the night belongs to Wilde and her supporters and glbt folk everywhere. Though she is Junior Government Whip, the Senior Whip tonight gives Wilde permission to leave the house for an hour to celebrate with her colleagues and supporters in the exhausting sixteen month long campaign. In Parliament's foyer, surrounded by well-wishers she acknowledges that the campaign has been exhausting. “I am very tired and just pleased that it is all over and that we won,” she says, acknowledging that the brutal eighteen months had taken its toll on her and her family. Out! Magazine, the main gay media in New Zealand in the 1980s, reflects the moment. While some of the throng from the public gallery head out to celebrate on the town, Wilde and a small group of supporters party in her Parliamentary office. A few wine bottles are scrounged up and the relief is immense. Labour colleagues such as Minister of Police Anne Hercus and Jonathan Hunt call by and offer congratulations. Later, when Parliament adjourns for the night, Wilde, accompanied by close colleague Trevor Mallard and a small group of gay men including Bruce Kilmister and Alan Ivoryhead for the only gay social venue open on a Wednesday night in the Capital, the Victoria Club on Oriental Parade. The small club is packed. Some had been there most of the evening listening to Parliament on the radio, others had come on from the gallery. All erupt into cheers when Wilde arrives. Everyone wants to shake her hand or kiss or hug her. Trevor Mallard, a bloke-ish young politician who none the less has ardently supported the bill visibly blanches as Bill Logan rushes forward and grips him in an appreciative bear hug. Behind Logan a score more excited and effusive homos wait, pressed close for their turn to similarly express their gratitude. “I just had to hug him,” says Logan, “he'd been so supportive.” In Auckland Warren Lindberg and hundreds of others converge on the central city and its two gay nightclubs. There are gays and lesbians everywhere in the streets. The clubs are packed, everyone is hugging and kissing and loving and cheering. Total strangers embrace like long lost lovers. Gay men hug lesbians. Lesbians hug trannys. Everyone is shouting drinks and shouting toasts and it's a night they will remember for the rest of their lives. The following weekend the mood is still fizzing with celebration. Fran Wilde comes up to the queen city and is mobbed by those she has worked so tirelessly to help. At Staircase nightclub she slowly works her way through the roundabout route which is the only way to get from the entrance to the stage. She is hugged and squeezed and patted and loved to bruising point every inch of the route. This tired, dazed young straight mother and budding politician embodies all the dreams and hopes of thousands of persecuted homos and the huge number of them who have stepped up and worked so hard to make everyone's dreams come true. Suddenly the land somewhere over the rainbow feels like it might just be New Zealand. While most bills take several weeks, even months, to be checked over for legal niceties before being signed into law, and there can be an even longer period before a law comes into effect to allow all those affected by it to adjust to the new legal framework, the Homosexual Law Reform legislation moves at warp speed. Two days after passing in the House it reaches the Governor General's office and Sir Paul Reeves, who is soon to become the first Honorary Patron of the New Zealand AIDS Foundation, an organisation started by and for gay men, immediately signs it. Just four weeks later, on August 8th, 1986 The Homosexual Law Reform bill, enshrined in the statutes, will become the law of our land. Our land. Jay Bennie - 9th July 2011