UK Court Strikes Down Trinidad and Tobago's Gay Sex Ban in Final Ruling

The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, a London-based court that serves as the final appeals court for Trinidad and Tobago, struck down the country's ban on gay sex on Nov. 10. ABC News reported that the unanimous ruling cannot be appealed and ends a legal fight of nearly 10 years.

The decision nullifies a colonial-era sodomy law that allowed prison terms of up to five years, according to CNN. It could also shape similar cases elsewhere in the Caribbean, though the ruling formally applies only to Trinidad and Tobago.

What the court decided

Judge Philip Sales, who delivered the ruling, said the laws could not be seen as reasonably justifiable in a society that respects individual rights and freedoms. According to ABC News, he said the current understanding of the right to private and family life protects sexual orientation and private sexual activity between consenting adults. "Laws which seek to criminalize such activities cannot be justified," he said.

The Guardian reported that all five judges found that a 1986 law, the Sexual Offences Act, was new legislation rather than a continuation of colonial-era rules. That meant a "savings clause," which shields some inherited laws from constitutional challenge, did not protect it. The court also upheld the original remedy, which makes anal sex legal between consenting adults of any gender over 16, and it decriminalizes same-sex intimacy that the old law called "gross indecency," the Guardian said.

How the case reached the Privy Council

• 1925: CNN reported that British colonial authorities enacted a version of an older English "Buggery Act" in Trinidad and Tobago.
• 1986: Trinidad and Tobago repealed the sexual offenses provisions of the 1925 act and replaced them with tougher measures, according to CNN. They raised prison sentences and also punished women for indecency. Jones' lawyers later argued this made the law new, and therefore open to challenge.
• 2016 or February 2017: Activist Jason Jones launched his challenge. ABC News said he filed the case in February 2017, while the Guardian said he had been fighting the law since 2016.
• April 2018: Trinidad's High Court found the laws unconstitutional. The Guardian identified the judge as Devindra Rampersad.
• March 2025: The Court of Appeal reversed the ruling, at least in part, after finding the savings clause protected the provisions, according to the Guardian. ABC News described the reversal as partial. The appeals court later allowed Jones to seek a Privy Council ruling.
• Nov. 10, 2026: The Privy Council backed the High Court's original decision.

Who opposed the challenge

ABC News reported that the government of Trinidad and Tobago opposed Jones and sought a ruling upholding the 2025 decision. The Council of Evangelical Churches and the country's largest Hindu organization, Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha, also opposed him. ABC noted that the country has pushed for the Trinidad-based Caribbean Court of Justice to replace the Privy Council as its final court.

What this means for people in Trinidad and Tobago and the region

In Trinidad and Tobago, private sexual activity between consenting adults is no longer a criminal offense under the struck-down provisions. ABC News reported that the laws had not been enforced in recent history, but critics said they still sent a message. Jones said a court judgment and daily life in a home or workplace are two different things. "We may not see the benefits of this for 50 years," he told the Guardian.

Pride TT welcomed the ruling but said it did not end the struggle. The group said discrimination and stigma persist in employment, education, housing, health care and access to public services, according to the Guardian.

Beyond Trinidad and Tobago, CNN reported that the Human Dignity Trust says at least four other former British colonies in the Caribbean criminalize sex between men: Jamaica, Guyana, Grenada and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Not all of them fall under the Privy Council's appellate jurisdiction. ABC News listed Grenada, Jamaica and St. Vincent and the Grenadines as still having such laws.

Ria Mohammed, a Caribbean attorney quoted by CNN, said the decision is binding in Trinidad and Tobago, but it would be unlikely for a case from another jurisdiction in the same appeals structure to be decided differently. Jeshua Bardoo, a lawyer in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, told the Guardian he expects the ruling to be very persuasive in a case now underway there. He noted that a high court judge upheld that country's laws in 2024. Peter Tatchell, a British activist, said people in at least a dozen countries are likely to use the judgment to press for decriminalization.

A wider regional trend

ABC News reported that the Bahamas decriminalized homosexuality in 1991, and the U.K. government repealed such laws in 2001 in Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Montserrat and the Turks and Caicos Islands. It added that judges have recently struck down similar laws in Barbados, Dominica, St. Lucia and Antigua and Barbuda. The Human Dignity Trust's chief executive, Téa Braun, told the Guardian that the trend began with a 2016 judgment in Belize and that she hopes it continues.

Jones, who has lived in London for decades, said he did not feel he could comfortably live in Trinidad again, according to the Guardian.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by CNN, ABC News, The Guardian