San Francisco Frontiers - Hungary to reverse Orban-era anti-LGBTQ legislation

It marks the first significant reversal of Orban's curbs targeting the LGBTQ community since pro-EU Prime Minister Peter Magyar took power.

The new law will remove restrictions on the "portrayal" or "promotion" of sexual and gender diversity in content accessible to children and will simply seek to protect under-18s from material that can "seriously impair the child's physical, intellectual, emotional or moral development".

Magyar won a landslide victory in April elections, ending a 16-year stretch in power for Orban, who had taken one of Europe's most restrictive approaches to LGBTQ rights.

"The fact that restrictions on access to LGBTQ content are being removed is definitely an important and positive step forward," said Tamas Dombos from the Hatter Society rights group.

Parliament is scheduled to vote on the bill, which amends provisions in existing legislation, from 9:40 am (0740 GMT).

Magyar said the changes would bring Hungary in line with European Union regulations.

Orban's restrictions were found to be in breach of the bloc's values.

The prime minister did not address LGBTQ rights during his election campaign, but has since struck a friendly tone and indicated willingness to revise some Orban-era policies.

But hehas cast the changes to be voted on Tuesday not as a restoration of rights but a strengthening of child-protection rules "regardless of sexual orientation".

Orban's Fidesz party is expected to vote against the amendment accusing the government of "neutering" the original law due to EU pressure.

However, the governing Tisza party has a comfortable two-thirds majority that would enable it to pass the bill without any opposition support.

- 'Homophobic and transphobic' -

Orban's government had gradually curbed LGBTQ rights in the name of "child protection" from 2020 by barring the legal recognition of transgender people's gender identity.

A child protection bill was introduced in 2021 amending multiple statutes with the stated aim of cracking down on paedophilia.

However, it also banned the "promotion" of homosexuality and gender transition to under-18s

This outraged activists and leaders across the EU who criticised it for stigmatising LGBTQ people and equating same-sex relations to paedophilia.

Last year, the legislation was amended to also serve as the basis for banning annual Pride marches.

In April, the EU's top tribunal, the European Court of Justice found that the 2021 law violated "the very identity" of the bloc.

The changes will remove "homophobic and transphobic provisions" from the law in compliance with the ECJ's ruling, according to LGBTQ rights activist Dombos.

- 'Still a lot to do' -

"But there is still a lot to do," he added.

"Even if the government's sole aim is to restore the legal status quo that existed before 2020, there are still a great many laws that would need to be amended... and we don't know whether the government's working on that."

These include laws that prevent legal recognition for transgender people and adoption for same-sex couples.

Human Rights Watch said the new amendments "left other discriminatory provisions in Hungarian law intact".

"The bill removes restrictions on the 'portrayal' or 'promotion' of homosexuality and gender diversity from several laws, but leaves unchanged section 5/A of the Family Protection Act, which contains similar restrictions on content accessible to children.

"Nor does bill address discriminatory language in the Fundamental Law (Hungary’s constitution) or restrictions in the Freedom of Assembly Act that have been used to prohibit Pride and other LGBT-related assemblies," it added.

Q.Taylor--SFF