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| History of Australia |
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 Australiaportal |
This article details the history of the LGBT rights movement in Australia, from the colonial era to the present day.
| This article is part of a series on the |
| History of Australia |
|---|
| |
| Australiaportal |
This article details the history of the LGBT rights movement in Australia, from the colonial era to the present day.
Whilst identifying as LGBT is not uncommon amongst Indigenous Australians today [1] there is no record of it being a phenomenon in pre-colonial Australian societies. Anthropologists Bill Stanner, Norman Tindale, A. P. Elkin and Ralph Piddington found evidence of polygamy [2] and other non-binary behaviours, but not of homosexuality as such. While there is no evidence of these cultures on mainland Australia, this may not confirm that homosexual and other queer behaviours and identities were absent from mainland Aboriginal Australian culture. [3]
An exception is in the Tiwi Islands. While there is not a lot of evidence that there were formal structures and formal roles within mainland Aboriginal communities in the Tiwi Islands, language that names sexual and gender diversity exists, and there is evidence that there were roles that were quite set out. [4]
Early laws in Australia were based on then-current laws in Britain, which were inherited upon colonisation in 1788. Lesbianism was never illegal in Britain nor its colonies, including Australia. Sodomy laws, however, were part of Australian law, from 1788 through to 1994 under Human Rights (Sexual Conduct) Act 1994. The punishment for "buggery" (sodomy) was reduced from execution to life in prison in 1899. [5]
Throughout the transportation period there was a severe imbalance between the sexes, convict and free, and large numbers of convicts were kept in relative or complete isolation from the other sex. Homosexual behaviour was prevalent among Europeans in colonial Australia; Historian Robert Aldrich suggests that sodomy became more common in the 1820s and 1830s. [6] Some historians have suggested that anti-sodomy rhetoric was utilised effectively against the practice of transportation, contributing to its eventual conclusion in the 1840s, although the emergence of gold mining also led to an increase in free migration and settlement. [6]
In 1796 Francis Wilkinson became the first man to be charged with buggery (but acquitted). Class differences appear to have been involved in tolerance and indulgence of gay sex amongst convicts, with little attention paid by working-class convicts, but condemnation from middle-class or upwardly mobile transportees. [7]
In 1822 an official inquiry into the sexual scandal that resulted from the movement of thirty female prisoners to the male prison farm at Emu Plains reported the rumour that the women had been placed there to prevent "unnatural crimes" on the part of the men.
In a secret dispatch of 1843 the Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land stated that women in the Hobart female factory have "their Fancy-women, or lovers, to who they are attached with as much ardour as they would be to the opposite sex, and practice onanism to the greatest extent". [8]
Select committees of the British Parliament inquiring into racism in 1832 and 1837 heard much evidence of the prevalence of scandalism. Major James Mudie testified that the prisoners called each other "sods" and that at Hyde Park Barracks in Sydney boy prisoners went by names such as Kitty and Nancy. [9]
In 1932, an Australian tabloid, The Arrow , described the growth of the "pervert population" of Brisbane, largely men aged 18 to 25, whose activities presented "a scandal of evil almost unprecedented". It called for police action to suppress and end their gatherings. It reported clandestine weddings between gay men there: "In the last two weeks there have been two 'weddings'—ghastly, horrifying spectacles of painted men and primping lads united in a sacrilegious blasphemy that they call the 'bonds of matrimony'." [10]
In 1951, the New South Wales Crimes Act was amended to ensure that "buggery" remained a criminal act "with or without the consent of the person", removing legal loophole of consent. The government of J.J. Cahill increased arrests of male homosexuals and reopened a prison at Cooma exclusively for gay prisoners in 1957. [11]
While Britain's influence on Australian political culture was still strong in the fifties there was no local appetite for a political response to the Wolfenden Committee, which recommended the decriminalisation of male homosexuality in Britain in 1957. Ten years later there was little comment from any Australian public figure (state or federal) when Britain finally decriminalised homosexuality in England and Wales. Some historians have attributed this to the association of homosexuality with the 'convict stain'. [7]
However, it was in the wake of decriminalisation in Britain that the first Australian gay and lesbian rights groups were organised. The ACT Homosexual Law Reform Society, a Canberra-based organisation formed in mid 1969; and an Australian arm of the Daughters of Bilitis, formed in Melbourne in January 1970, are considered Australia's first gay rights organisations. Although, it was a Sydney organisation, the Campaign Against Moral Persecution (CAMP), founded in 1970, that was to gain the most public attention. [5]
CAMP set out to publicly campaign for political and social change, rather than focusing on law reform. This was apparent when activists John Ware and Christobell Poll announced its formation in an article on the front page of the magazine section of The Australian newspaper on 19 September 1970. CAMP was officially launched on 6 February 1971, at the first public gathering of gay women and men in Australia, which took place in a church hall in Balmain. [12] Within 12 months local CAMP groups had formed in each capital city, creating an informal gay rights network around Australia.
CAMP's first demonstration took place in October 1971 outside the Liberal Party of Australia headquarters in Sydney when a right-wing Christian fundamentalist stood against Tom Hughes for pre-selection. Tom Hughes was the federal Liberal Attorney-General and had spoken out in favour of limited homosexual law reform, so CAMP mounted a demonstration. In January 1971, the Melbourne-based gay rights organisation Society Five was formed, inspired by CAMP, and was to become the largest gay organisation in Australia during the 1970s. [13]
The emergence of this movement in the early 1970s was aided by the growing visibility of the gay and lesbian community in the Australian media. Reform of Australia's tough censorship rules by then Minister for Customs and Excise, Don Chipp, meant that by the early 1970s gay and lesbian content was no longer automatically censored. In February 1970 the first gay themed Australian film The Set was released. While in October 1970 ABC TV's This Day Tonight broadcast an interview with a lesbian couple featuring the first same-sex kiss seen on Australian television. Further exposure occurred when another ABC TV's Chequerboard program broadcast an interview with a gay couple in February 1972 and Australian TV soap opera Number 96 introduced the first sympathetic gay character, Don Finlayson, to local audiences.[ citation needed ]
This visibility and increasing publicity around the emergence of gay and lesbian groups in major Australian cities soon encouraged more groups to form. Additional gay and lesbian rights organisations included The Gay Teachers Group, [14] and The Homosexual Law Reform Coalition, all gay rights organisations which started in the late 1970s. [15] In May 1973 Australia's first LGBTI focused social service Phone-a-Friend was established in Sydney, which in 1978 saw the launch of Australia's first gay focused news publications The Sydney Star Observer.
However, homosexual law reform first occurred in South Australia, not New South Wales or Victoria. In 1972, in response to public outrage at the murder of University of Adelaide academic Dr George Duncan, the Dunstan Labor government introduced a consenting adults in private type reform bill. This led to a later more comprehensive reform bill introduced by Murray Hill, father of former defence minister Robert Hill. In 1975, South Australia became the first Australian state to legalise sexual conduct between consenting adult males. This action prompted other Australian jurisdictions to debate law reform for the first time, with the Australian Capital Territory following the South Australian lead in 1976.[ citation needed ]
In 1973 the Pink Bans were carried out by the Builders Laborers Federation to protest discrimination against gay people by universities in Sydney. [16]
In October 1973 the Australian Parliament passed a motion in favour of the decriminialization of homosexual acts between consenting adults in private. While at the same time, the Australian Medical Association removed homosexuality from its list of illnesses and disorders, two months before the American Psychiatric Association did the same. [17] Following in the wake of South Australia and the ACT the other Australian states and territories reformed their laws between 1976 and 1991. The exception was Tasmania, which retained its laws until the federal government forced their repeal in 1997.[ citation needed ]
It was in this context that an estimated 500 people marched to and rallied in Martin Place in Sydney on 24 June 1978. [16] Organisers said the march and rally were part of "international homosexual solidarity day" to demonstrate against sexual repression in Australia and other countries. [18] Police attacked a late night street party or Mardi Gras that night and arrested 53 revelers. This response, coupled with the publication of the names of the activists arrested in the local press over the next few days, attracted considerable public sympathy and led to this event becoming an annual community event, the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, which celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2008. It also inspired similar events in other cities like Melbourne and Perth.[ citation needed ]
Law reform and the emergence of visible gay and lesbian communities did not however lead to the end of police harassment of individuals, which would continue into the 1990s. The last gay man was arrested on 14 December 1984 in Hobart, Tasmania, when he was found engaging in sexual conduct with another man on the side of the road in a car. He was sentenced to eight months jail. [19]
In 1991, after consistent pressure from Gay and Lesbian Immigration Task Force (GLITF), the Migration Amendment Act (No. 2) 1991 (Cth) was passed, amending the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) to allow Australian Citizens and Permanent Residents to sponsor their same-sex partners to Australia through a new Interdependency Visa. [20]
In 1994, the Commonwealth passed the Human Rights (Sexual Conduct) Act 1994 – Section 4, [21] legalising sexual activity between consenting adults (in private) throughout Australia. It was not until 1997 however when the law in Tasmania prohibiting gay male sexual conduct was repealed. [22] The ban on gay male sexual conduct was overturned in the courts in 1996 following Toonen v. Australia that gay male sexual conduct became formally legal in all Australian states and territories when the federal government passed the Human Rights (Sexual Conduct) Act 1994. [23]
Since the beginning of his term as prime minister of Australia in 1996, John Howard made his position clear on the gay rights issue. [24] [25] In January 1997, Howard refused to offer a message of support to Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras[ citation needed ] and said on the TV program A Current Affair that he would be "disappointed" if one of his children were to tell him they were gay or lesbian.[ citation needed ] In August 2001 when asked in a Triple J interview where he placed himself on a scale of acceptance of homosexuality, one end being total acceptance and the other total rejection, Howard replied, "Oh I'd place myself somewhere in the middle. I certainly don't think you should give the same status to homosexual liaisons as you give to marriage, I don't."[ citation needed ]
In July 1996 the Howard government reduced the number of interdependency visas, making migration for same-sex couples more difficult. [26]
Reported in 2003, the government was pushed into permitting passports with an 'X' sex marker by Alex MacFarlane. This was stated by the West Australian to be on the basis of a challenge by MacFarlane, using an "indeterminate" birth certificate issued by the State of Victoria. [27] [28] [29] Australian government policy between 2003 and 2011 was to issue passports with an 'X' marker only to people who could "present a birth certificate that notes their sex as indeterminate". [30] [31] [32] [33]
The UN Human Rights Commission declared Australia's federal government in violation of equality and privacy rights under the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights in September 2003 after it had denied a man a de facto spouse veteran's pension based on his 38-year same-sex relationship. The request from the UN that Australia take steps to treat same sex couples equally was ignored. When directly questioned, Attorney General Philip Ruddock said that the government is not bound by the ruling.[ citation needed ]
In March 2004, Howard condemned Australia's first laws which would allow gay couples to adopt children in the ACT as part of a new ACT Bill of Rights. Howard said, "I think the idea of the ACT having a bill of rights is ridiculous. I'm against gay adoption, just as I'm against gay marriage." [25] The Commonwealth, however, did not overturn the legislation.
On 27 May 2004, approximately two months after Tony Blair's Labour Government in Britain proposed its Civil Partnership Act 2004 , federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock introduced the Marriage Legislation Amendment Bill to prevent any possible court rulings allowing same-sex marriages or civil unions. [34] In August 2004, same-sex marriage was officially prohibited when the Marriage Act 1961 and the Family Law Act were amended in order to define marriage as a "union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others, voluntarily entered into for life". Amendments were also made to prevent the recognition in Australia of marriages conducted in other countries between a man and another man or a woman and another woman.[ citation needed ]
The passage of the legislation was made possible because the Australian Labor Party supported the Howard government's proposed ban on same-sex marriages at the time. [35]
In March 2006, after the ACT government announced plans to create civil unions within the territory, the federal government vowed to block it. [36] Following the public outcry over Howard's move to kill the ACT bill, in April the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) began a six-month inquiry to hear from Australians about the federal government's treatment of gays. [37] The Howard government banned its departments from making submissions to the inquiry into financial discrimination experienced by same-sex couples. [38]
In May 2006, Attorney General Philip Ruddock blocked a gay Australian man from marrying in Europe. Ruddock refused to grant a gay man living in the Netherlands a 'Certificate of No Impediment to Marriage' document required by some European countries before marriage, to prove foreigners are in fact single. Under Ruddock's instructions, no such documents were to be released to gay and lesbians individuals intending to marry overseas. [39] Following a request for the certificate the following statement was received:
Following the advice of the Australian Attorney-General's Department we herewith certify that Australian law does not allow the issue of a Certificate of No Impediment to Marriage to persons wishing to enter into a same-sex marriage.
— Australian Embassy, Netherlands on behalf of the Attorney-General's Office [39]
In June 2006, the ACT's civil union legislation was passed by the ACT Legislative Assembly however the law was subsequently disallowed by the Governor General on instruction from the Howard government. A second attempt to legislate for civil unions for same-sex couples in 2007 was again disallowed.[ citation needed ]
In 2007, following the successful same-sex adoption of a boy in Western Australia by two gay men the Howard government made plans to introduce a federal bill, The Family Law (Same Sex Adoption) Bill, which sought to prevent same-sex couples from adopting. The idea was taken off the legislative agenda after the 2007 election, which Coalition government lost. [40]
Despite the reluctance of the federal government, individual states and territories were continuing to make inroads towards same-sex marriage. Since 2001, Victoria has amended 60 Acts to advance same-sex marriage. In 2002, Western Australia removed all remaining legislative discrimination toward sexual orientation (including adoption) by adding the new definition of "de facto partner", and Queensland created a new, non-discriminatory definition of "de facto partner" within 61 pieces of legislation. In 2003, Tasmania became the first state to create a relationship registry for same sex couples, giving same-sex couples nearly equal rights to married couples, excluding adoption. In 2004, the Northern Territory removed legislative discrimination against same-sex couples in most areas of territory law, and the ACT began allowing same-sex couples to adopt. In 2005, the city of Sydney, in New South Wales, created a Relationship Declaration Program offering limited legal recognition for same-sex couples. In 2006, South Australia, the last state to recognise same-sex couples, amended 97 Acts, dispensing with the term "de facto" and categorising couples as "domestic partners". The city of Melbourne, in Victoria, provided a "Relationship Declaration Register" for all relationships and carers starting in 2007, which was followed in December with Victoria introducing a statewide registry and amending 69 pieces of legislation to include couples who are in registered relationships.[ citation needed ]
By the late 2000s and early 2010s, support for LGBT rights in Australia generally grew, and a number of significant legal achievements were made. Nationwide equalisation with respect to the age of consent laws was achieved when Queensland amended the law in 2016. The decade was also marked by the implementation of expungement schemes in many states and territories, which allowed men who had been charged with anti-homosexuality laws to apply to have their convictions removed from the record. As of November 2018, all of the eight states and territories have passed expungement laws.
States and territories, with the exception of South Australia, also abolished the use of the gay panic defence in common law and the first nationwide anti-discrimination law was passed by the Federal Parliament in the form of the Sex Discrimination Amendment (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Intersex Status) Act 2013, the provisions of which extended to intersex people. Significantly, adoption laws were amended in six states and territories (New South Wales 2010; Tasmania 2013; Victoria 2015; Queensland 2016; South Australia 2017; Northern Territory 2018) to allow same-sex couples the right to adopt children. South Australia's amendment of assisted reproduction laws in 2016 ensured same-sex couples had equal access to these methods in all jurisdictions. [41] By 2018, all states and territories, with the exception of Western Australia and the Northern Territory, had implemented a relationships registration scheme, which allowed couples to demonstrate proof of the existence of a de facto relationship for the purpose of federal law. Some of these laws included the option for a couple to have a formal, state-sanctioned ceremony. Queensland made history in this regard by legislating for civil unions twice in the decade, once in 2011 and again in 2016 after the intervening Newman LNP Government had repealed the legislation in 2012. [42]
Transgender people in the Australian Capital Territory, the Northern Territory, South Australia, Tasmania and Western Australia also benefited from landmark reforms which allowed them to change their gender marker on their birth certificate, irrespective of whether or not they had undergone sexual reassignment surgery, though this was rejected by the Victorian Parliament in 2016. [43] Arguably the most significant reform in the transgender space was a November 2017 ruling from the Family Court of Australia which allowed transgender children to access cross-sex hormone treatment (known as "stage 2 treatment") without court approval needing to be sought, in cases where there is no dispute between a child, their parents, and their treating doctors, hormone treatment can be prescribed without court permission. [44] [45]
In the relationships recognition space, federal law would be critical. The Federal Parliament's reforms of de facto recognition in 2008/09, spearheaded by the Rudd government, would amend 85 pieces of Commonwealth legislation to allow same-sex couples equal access to a range of areas including taxation, superannuation, health, social security, aged care and child support, immigration, citizenship and veterans' affairs. [46] [47] In time however, glaring examples of deficiencies between de facto relationships and marriages would be identified, enhancing the momentum for same-sex marriage. [48] [49] Same-sex marriage legislation would fail 22 times in the Federal Parliament between 2004 and 2017, [50] most notably in September 2012 when legislation was rejected by large majorities in both houses of Parliament, despite the Gillard Labor government agreeing to a conscience vote on the issue. [51] [52] In 2017, the Turnbull Liberal/National government, having been denied the opportunity to hold a plebiscite, succeeded in conducting a voluntary postal survey on same-sex marriage, which resulted in a 61.6% "Yes" vote in favour of legalisation. [53] Consequently, the Federal Parliament passed a law amending the Marriage Act 1961 to allow same-sex couples to marry in December 2017. [54] [55]
In 1982, the first LGBTQI football team, the Adelaide Armpits, played their first season in Adelaide, and continued to play in South Australian competitions for 30 years. [56]
Brian Andrew Greig OAM is a former Australian politician. Grieg was an Australian Democrats member of the Australian Senate from 1999 to 2005, representing the state of Western Australia.
New Zealand lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights are some of the most extensive in the world. The protection of LGBT rights is advanced, relative to other countries in Oceania, and among the most liberal in the world, with the country being the first in the region to legalise same-sex marriage.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights in Australia significantly advanced over the latter half of the 20th century and early 21st century, and are now ranked among the highest in the world. Opinion polls and the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey indicate widespread popular support for same-sex marriage within the nation. A 2013 Pew Research poll found that 79% of Australians agreed that homosexuality should be accepted by society, making it the fifth-most supportive country surveyed in the world. With its long history of LGBT activism and annual Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras festival, Sydney has been named one of the most gay-friendly cities in the world.
Same-sex marriage has been legal in Australia since 9 December 2017. Legislation to allow it, the Marriage Amendment Act 2017, passed the Australian Parliament on 7 December 2017 and received royal assent from Governor-General Peter Cosgrove the following day. The law came into effect on 9 December, immediately recognising overseas same-sex marriages. The first same-sex wedding under Australian law was held on 15 December 2017. The passage of the law followed a voluntary postal survey of all Australians, in which 61.6% of respondents supported legalisation of same-sex marriage.
Tasmania's Relationships Act 2003 provided for registration and recognition of a type of registered partnership in two distinct categories: Significant Relationships and Caring Relationships. The same Act also amended 73 pieces of legislation to provide registered partners with nearly all of the rights offered to married couples within the state. Furthermore, since July 2009, these relationships are recognised at federal level, providing couples with almost all of the federal rights and benefits of marriage. The legislation came into effect on 1 January 2004. In September 2010, the Parliament of Tasmania approved legislation to recognize same-sex unions performed outside Tasmania as significant relationships.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights in Scotland are generally in line with the rest of the United Kingdom, which have evolved extensively over time and are now regarded as some of the most progressive in Europe. In both 2015 and 2016, Scotland was recognised as the "best country in Europe for LGBTI legal equality".
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Bermuda, a British Overseas Territory, face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Homosexuality is legal in Bermuda, but the territory has long held a reputation for being homophobic and intolerant. Since 2013, the Human Rights Act has prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights in Queensland have advanced significantly from the late 20th century onwards, in line with progress on LGBT rights in Australia nationally. Private consensual sex between men has been legal in the state since 1991, with lesbian sexual acts never criminalised. The age of consent was equalised to 16 years for all sexual acts in 2016. Sexuality and gender identity are protected attributes under both state and federal anti-discrimination laws. Same-sex couples may marry under Australian law, enter into a civil partnership under state law or live together in an unregistered de facto relationship. Same-sex couples may become parents through adoption, foster care, altruistic surrogacy and, for lesbian couples, IVF. In 2020, Queensland became the first jurisdiction within Australia to pass a law banning conversion therapy, with a maximum penalty of 18 months imprisonment and fines. State anti-discrimination protections for sexuality and gender identity were introduced in 2002 and in 2017 the gay panic defence was abolished from the criminal law. Transgender and intersex Queenslanders are able to update their government records and birth certificate, with the formal repeal of both the "divorce requirements" in 2018 and then the "surgery requirements" in 2023.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in the Australian state of New South Wales have most of the same rights and responsibilities as non-LGBT people.
The Australian state of Victoria is regarded as one of the country's most progressive jurisdictions with respect to the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people.
Same-sex marriage is legal in the Australian Capital Territory, and in the rest of Australia, after the Federal Parliament legalised same-sex marriage in December 2017.
The rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in the Australian state of South Australia are advanced and well-established. South Australia has had a chequered history with respect to the rights of LGBT people. Initially, the state was a national pioneer of LGBT rights in Australia, being the first in the country to decriminalise homosexuality and to introduce a non-discriminatory age of consent for all sexual activity. Subsequently, the state fell behind other Australian jurisdictions in areas including relationship recognition and parenting, with the most recent law reforms regarding the recognition of same-sex relationships, LGBT adoption and strengthened anti-discrimination laws passed in 2016 and went into effect in 2017.
Australia is one of the most LGBT-friendly countries in the world. In a 2013 Pew Research poll, 79% of Australians agreed that homosexuality should be accepted by society, making it the fifth most supportive country in the survey behind Spain (88%), Germany (87%), and Canada and the Czech Republic. With a long history of LGBT rights activism and an annual three-week-long Mardi Gras festival, Sydney is considered one of the most gay-friendly cities in the world.
This article gives a broad overview of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) history in Canada. LGBT activity was considered a crime from the colonial period in Canada until 1969, when Bill C-150 was passed into law. However, there is still discrimination despite anti-discrimination law. For a more detailed listing of individual incidents in Canadian LGBT history, see also Timeline of LGBT history in Canada.
Law in Australia with regard to children is often based on what is considered to be in the best interest of the child. The traditional and often used assumption is that children need both a mother and a father, which plays an important role in divorce and custodial proceedings, and has carried over into adoption and fertility procedures. As of April 2018 all Australian states and territories allow adoption by same-sex couples.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in the Australian state of Tasmania have the same legal rights as non-LGBT people. Tasmania has a transformative history with respect to the rights of LGBT people. Initially dubbed "Bigots Island" by international media due to intense social and political hostility to LGBT rights up until the late 1990s, the state has subsequently been recognised for LGBT law reforms that have been described by activists such as Rodney Croome as among the most extensive and noteworthy in the world. Tasmania imposed the harshest penalties in the Western world for homosexual activity until 1997, when it was the last Australian jurisdiction to decriminalise homosexuality after a United Nations Human Rights Committee ruling, the passage of federal sexual privacy legislation and a High Court challenge to the state's anti-homosexuality laws. Following decriminalisation, social and political attitudes in the state rapidly shifted in favour of LGBT rights ahead of national trends with strong anti-LGBT discrimination laws passed in 1999, and the first state relationship registration scheme to include same-sex couples introduced in 2003. In 2019, Tasmania passed and implemented the world's most progressive gender-optional birth certificate laws. In July 2023, the Tasmanian government officially included and also added "asexual or asexuality".
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights in Western Australia have seen significant progress since the beginning of the 21st century, with male sex acts legal since 1990 and the state parliament passing comprehensive law reforms in 2002. The state decriminalised male homosexual acts in 1990 and was the first to grant full adoption rights to LGBT couples in 2002.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Australia's Northern Territory have the same legal rights as non-LGBT people. The liberalisation of the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in Australia's Northern Territory has been a gradual process. Homosexual activity was legalised in 1983, with an equal age of consent since 2003. Same-sex couples are recognised as de facto relationships. There was no local civil union or domestic partnership registration scheme before the introduction of nationwide same-sex marriage in December 2017, following the passage of the Marriage Amendment Act 2017 by the Australian Parliament. The 2017 Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey, designed to gauge public support for same-sex marriage in Australia, returned a 60.6% "Yes" response in the territory. LGBT people are protected from discrimination by both territory and federal law, though the territory's hate crime law does not cover sexual orientation or gender identity. The territory was the last jurisdiction in Australia to legally allow same-sex couples to adopt children.
The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) is one of Australia's leading jurisdictions with respect to the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. The ACT has made a number of reforms to territory law designed to prevent discrimination of LGBT people; it was the only state or territory jurisdiction in Australia to pass a law for same-sex marriage, which was later overturned by the High Court of Australia. The Australian Capital Territory, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland are the only jurisdictions within Australia to legally ban conversion therapy on children. The ACT's laws also apply to the smaller Jervis Bay Territory.
Freedom of religion in Australia is allowed in practice and protected to varying degrees through the constitution and legislation at the Federal, state and territory level. Australia is a pluralist country with legislated principle of state neutrality and with no state religion. The nation has over 13.6 million people who identify as religious and over 9.8 million who identify with no religion.