By *Jomo Thomas
In one of the most consequential rights decisions of this century, the London-based Privy Council struck down sections of the law in Trinidad and Tobago that criminalised private consensual same sex conduct.
These discriminatory laws, rooted in British colonial rule, have long fuelled stigma, discrimination, and violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, even when rarely enforced. For the ever-present danger, recall the Oct. 6, 2026, incident where an 18-year-old boy was stabbed 28 times at Arnos Vale allegedly because of his sexual orientation.
The court’s decision brings to an end a 10-year battle by Jason Jones, a Trinidadian man who argued that the law was discriminatory and flies in the face of the fundamental human rights of those identified as LGBTQ. Before Tuesday’s decision, Jones confidently predicted the outcome. He told the media, “The Privy Council will never uphold a 500-year-old homophobic piece of British law that goes against the rights of the individual! Not in 2026! I’m going to win.”
Jones sought a declaration that sections 13 and 16 of the Act, (identical to sections 14 and 148 of our criminal code), which prohibit “buggery” and “sex acts” other than sexual intercourse, are unconstitutional. He asked the court to find that these sections infringe a number of his fundamental rights and freedoms, especially his right to respect for his private and family life.
The Privy Council unanimously allowed Jones’s appeal. It held that the Trinidad and Tobago Constitution does not protect sections 13 and 16 of the Act. Lord Sales and Lord Burrows, writing for the court, said, “The Judicial Committee holds that constitutional provisions which immunise old laws from challenges based on fundamental constitutional rights should be interpreted narrowly so as not to protect large areas of old law from constitutional scrutiny even after Parliament has comprehensively reviewed and sought to modernise them.
“The relevant time for that assessment is when the rights of the individual bringing the challenge are in issue, and the question of justifiability is before the court. In the assessment whether sections 13 and 16 of the 1986 Act meet the reasonably justifiable standard in the proviso, the rights and interests of Mr Jones which are at stake involve a particularly important facet of his existence and identity since the ability to form an intimate and loving relationship with another person lies at the core of the right to private and family life.”
Highlighting that the Constitution affirms the dignity of the human person and the importance of respect for family life, the Law Lords reasoned that the “criminalisation of private, consensual same-sex relations interferes with a fundamental aspect of Mr Jones’s life and identity”.
Anand Ramlogan SC, who represented Jones, said the judgment was a “landmark victory for gay rights, equal dignity and respect for private and family life in Trinidad and Tobago”.
The decision follows a string of court victories scored by LGBTQ advocates in Antigua, Barbados, Dominica, Guyana, St Kitts and St Lucia since 2022.
Last week Thursday (Nov.6), when the Court of Appeal sat here (in St. Vincent and the Grenadines), on its calendar was an appeal against the February 2024 decision rendered by Justice Esco Henry that upheld the buggery laws in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Justice Henry’s ruling dismissed the challenges to sections 146 and 148 of the Criminal Code, which criminalise anal intercourse and gross indecency between persons of the same sex.
The Vincentian state and a coalition of Christian churches cited health concerns and the expense of providing retroviral drugs to help fight increasing incidents of HIV/AIDS. Recall that just before that trial commenced, a coalition of Christian groups marched through the streets of Kingstown. One speaker at the rally called on God to confuse the lawyers representing the claimants. Justice Henry, who has since been elevated to the Eastern Caribbean Court of Appeal, found that the prohibitions were reasonably justifiable.
Therefore, LGBTQ-oriented people in SVG and beyond eagerly awaited the Privy Council’s decision in Jones. Attorneys on both sides of the appeal agreed with Justice Trevor Ward, president of the appeal panel, that it was proper to postpone the hearing of the Vincentian appeal to await the decision. Last Tuesday the decision dropped.
The Javin Johnson and Sean McLeish, the claimants in the St. Vincent case and their attorneys, must be clearly buoyed by the Privy Council decision. The law lords were unanimous in concluding that “the interference with the most intimate aspects of Mr Jones’ private life is too severe for the relevant provisions to be considered as striking a fair balance and to be reasonably justifiable according to the test in the proviso”.
The “reasonably justifiable” argument, rejected by the Privy Council, is the foundation stone on which Justice Henry grounded her 2024 decision. The Vincentian matter will be decided soon. Plain Talk is of the considered view that Johnson and Mc Leash are the odds-on favourites to win their appeal.
Of interest to some Vincentians is that Anand Ramlogan, a former attorney general of Trinidad who represented Jason Jones at the Privy Council, is lead counsel for PM Godwin Friday and Foreign Minister Fitz Bramble in the election petition challenge brought by ULP candidates, Luke Browne and Carlos Williams.
*Jomo Sanga Thomas is a lawyer, journalist, social commentator and a former Speaker of the House of Assembly in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
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