Gay emancipation

This issue contains 4 sections.

Even today, lesbian women, gay men, bisexuals and transgenders (LGBTs) are still experiencing discrimination, violence and unequal rights. Individual citizens, businesses and institutions all have a responsibility to help improve the position of LGBTs. Government also has a part to play in this respect.

The government intervenes, for example, wherever the LGBT community faces a lack of safety and social acceptance, and encourages action to foster them. It is cracking down on violence against LGBTs, encouraging cooperation between gay and other civil society organisations in the field of education, in neighbourhoods, in geriatric and other care services, in the sporting world and in the workplace, and seeking to increase the strength and resilience of LGBT teenagers.

The Rutte-Asscher government will take further steps to promote LGBT rights. People who refuse to officiate at same-sex marriage or civil partnership ceremonies may no longer be appointed as registrars. The ‘sole grounds’ formulation will be dropped from the Equal Treatment Act, so that schools may no longer dismiss gay teachers or refuse admission to gay pupils on the grounds of their sexual orientation. These proposals will be further elaborated in the coming months.