Fran Wilde, who as a young and inexperienced MP fronted the Homosexual Law Reform Bill through bitter national and parliamentary debate, received a standing ovation last night for her dedication to the cause of decriminalising consenting sexual relations between men. (Pic: Michael P Moore) Wilde was speaking at a function at Parliament acknowledging the thirtieth anniversary of the Bill being passed, in July 1986. Wilde spoke of how she was asked before she entered Parliament if she would sponsor such a bill. She said "yes" with not too much thought and the commitment was to subsequently consume her public and at times private life for almost two years. She acknowledged the hard work done by organisers and volunteers and supportive Parliamentary colleagues and by straight people in the general community who understood the injustice of the law as it stood. She recounted how the organising abilities of the bill's supporters improved as the Bill passed through it's parliamentary readings, and the venomous opposition from those quoted the Bible against gays and equated homosexuals with child molesters. Less well-known strategies of the Bill's promoters included ensuring virulently anti-HLR MPs were invited to public functions "at the far ends of the country" and who could not return from those functions in time to vote in parliament. She also recounted the anti-gay movement's own goal when they organised a uniformed and flag-bedecked Nazi-style 'Nuremberg Rally' style of event on the steps of Parliament. "It scared New Zealanders because they had seen this kind of thing before, either in reality or on the old World War Two newsreels of the Hitler rallies." Wilde also paid tribute to the many gay people "who came pout during the passage of the bill... those men were criminals who had been persecuted in New Zealand for a long, long time. But they showed other New Zealanders that there were gay men all around them, in workplaces or sports teams, as sons, brothers and in some cases husbands... they were extraordinary brave acts by gay men who came out at that time."
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Sunday, 6th March 2016 - 6:14pm