ST Online Forum: Not correct to say that majority of lawyers in Law Society favour retention of Section 377A (Aug 23)

Not correct to say that majority of lawyers in Law Society favour retention of Section 377A

I REFER to Mr Jason Wee Kheng Hoe's posting, 'Section 377A should be repealed - reputation in legal and multinational community at stake' (Online forum, Aug 16).

In the third paragraph of his posting, Mr Wee states (and in so doing, wrongly premises) that, apart from a minority view, 'Singapore's Law Society' (sic) favours the retention of Section 377A of the Penal Code in its present form. Not only is this incorrect, it is also grossly misleading. It is sincerely hoped that Mr Wee has made a careless but honest mistake.

In point of fact, in November last year, the Council of the Law Society appointed an ad hoc committee comprising legal practitioners and academics to review the proposed Penal Code amendments including the issue of whether Section 377A should be retained.

Members of the Law Society at large were asked for their feedback. Comments were received from various members and the ad hoc committee submitted its report to the council in March 2007. It is important to note that the society's members were not asked to vote on a referendum.

After due consideration of its members' feedback and the views of the ad hoc committee, the council submitted a report on March 30, 2007 ('Report').

On the issue of the retention of Section 377A, a majority of the council members considered that the retention of Section 377A in its present form cannot be justified. The Report was careful to add that the council recognised that this view does not necessarily represent the views of its members collectively. Indeed, a significant minority of council members as well as numerous members of the society at large took an opposing view, and strongly supported the retention of the section 377A in the Penal Code.

It is therefore clear that Mr Wee is wrong in stating that the Law Society is not in favour of the retention of Section 377A in its present form. It is all too convenient to generalise that the majority view of some 21 members of the council is one and the same as the majority view of the over 3,000 members of the Law Society. It is not.

Ong Chin Lee

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Retention of gay sex laws “cannot be justified”: Singapore’s law society to government

Retention of gay sex laws “cannot be justified”: Singapore’s law society to government

The Law Society of Singapore has released a statement disagreeing with the Ministry of Home Affairs' proposal to retain the country's laws against gay sex.

The Law Society of Singapore – at the invitation of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) last November to comment on the government’s proposed amendments to the Penal Code – has advised the government that “the retention of s.377A in its present form cannot be justified.” Last November, MHA announced their intention to retain gay sex laws although laws which criminalise anal and oral sex between consenting heterosexual adults will be repealed as part of Singapore's first major penal code amendments in 22 years. Section 377A currently makes “gross indecency” between two males an offence punishable by up to 2 years’ imprisonment.

The Law Society, the professional association of lawyers in Singapore, which formed an ad hoc committee of 16 members to study the matter has issued a report which was reproduced in part by gay activist group People Like Us on its web site: “The majority of the Council considered that the retention of s.377A in its present form cannot be justified. This does not entail any view that homosexuality is morally acceptable, but follows instead from the separation of law and morals and the philosophy that the criminal law’s proper function is to protect others from harm by punishing harmful conduct. Private consensual homosexual conduct between adults does not cause harm recogniseable by the criminal law. Thus, regardless of one’s personal view of the morality or otherwise of such conduct, it should not be made a criminal offence.

“Moreover, the assurance given by [the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA)] in the Explanatory Notes to Proposed Amendments to the Penal Code that were initially issued by MHA that prosecutions will not be proactively prosecuted under this section is an admission that the section is out-of-step with the modern world. The retention of unprosecuted offences on the statute book runs the risk of bringing the law into disrepute. “Council also recognised that the above view did not necessarily represent the views of its members collectively. A significant minority of Council members as well as members of the Society at large have an opposing view, and strongly support retention of s.377A in the Penal Code. They took the view that the criminal law can and should be deployed to define what the majority or a significant proportion of society believe to be unacceptable conduct even when it takes place in private between consenting adults, and that there are sufficient jurisprudential and logical grounds for this.

“Differing views were expressed on the constitutionality of s.377A. In other jurisdictions, legal discrimination based on sexual orientation has been considered against constitutional guarantees of equal protection. Council did not come to a concluded view on the constitutionality of s.377.”