A court in England is expected to issue a ruling today on a law prohibiting gay sexual acts in Trinidad and Tobago that dates back over 100 years to the British colonial era in the twin-island Caribbean nation. The London-based Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, which remains the highest appeals court for several former British colonies, will decide whether a law backed by the islands’ government that criminalizes “buggery” and “indecency” between gay partners complies with the country’s constitution. At present the law allows for prison terms of up to five years for “buggery” and two years for “gross indecency.” In contemporary legal systems, the term “buggery” is largely obsolete and considered offensive. Trinidad and Tobago, an independent country, remains a republic in the British Commonwealth. While a number of other former colonies have overturned or repealed colonial-era sodomy laws — with England itself having decriminalized gay sex in the 1960s — similar restrictions remain in dozens of others. The Privy Council has been asked to rule on Trinidad and Tobago’s law after it was challenged by Jason Jones, an LGBTQ+ rights activist who was born in Trinidad and lives in the UK. Jones first challenged the law in the High Court of Trinidad and Tobago, winning a victory in 2018, but the islands’ Court of Appeal overturned that ruling in 2025. Jones and his attorneys then took the case to the Privy Council for a final appeal. Should the Privy Council rule against the policy, activists and legal experts say the judgment could pave the way for similar challenges from campaigners in other former colonies that still criminalize gay sex. At least four other former British colonies in the Caribbean — Jamaica, Guyana, Grenada and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines — criminalize sexual activity between men, according to the UK charity Human Dignity Trust, though not all are in the Privy Council’s appellate jurisdiction. Ahead of the ruling, Jones told CNN that he had filed his lawsuit to kick off a movement toward equality, though he acknowledged there was a long road ahead. “My case is not just about decriminalizing (gay sexual acts in) countries in the Commonwealth that carry these British colonial-era laws. It’s about making people aware (of) how homophobia is being weaponized to take away our democratic rights,” he said. Beyond LBGTQ+ rights, the case highlights how Britain’s imperialist legacy continues to influence the legal systems of some of its former colonies and has led many to question why some now-independent countries still cling to policies dropped by their former ruler decades ago. “We have to still think about the fact that these laws were inherited from our colonial masters,” said Ria Mohammed, an attorney and director of the Caribbean Centre for Human Rights. “They (the British) have long since abandoned them. So why are we holding on to them?” An ancient law The origin of the law goes back centuries, with England passing a “Buggery Act” during Henry VIII’s rule in the 1500s. The British Empire later enacted a version of it in Trinidad and Tobago with a 1925 act. After Trinidad became independent, it kept the ban in place due to a savings law clause that shields pre-independence laws from being challenged, Mohammed said. The clause was originally created by the British as a temporary measure to prevent legal vacuums as ex-colonies transitioned to independence, but some ex-colonies including Trinidad and Tobago continue to implement them. Critics say that has allowed outdated policies that no longer meet modern societal standards to remain in force in some countries. In 1986, Trinidad and Tobago repealed the sexual offenses laws of the 1925 act and introduced new, tougher measures which increased prison sentences for offenders and punished women for indecency, too. It was this move that paved the way for Jones’ challenge to the law. Jones’ lawyers argued that the new 1986 measures were distinct from those in the colonial-era act of 1925, so they weren’t protected by the savings law clause and could indeed be challenged. “This is no longer blaming Henry VIII and the British. This is our own homegrown homophobia,” Jones told CNN. The ‘ultimate irony’ Should the Privy Council rule in Jones’ favor, the judgment will apply to Trinidad and Tobago only. However, activists hope it could pave the way to challenges against gay sex bans in some of the other former colonies that still use the London-based court as their highest appeals court. “The decision is going to be binding in Trinidad and Tobago. But as a matter of logic, if you are a part of the appellate structure of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council … it is unlikely that a case from a different jurisdiction would be decided in a different way,” Mohammed said. As a result, the outcome of the case is likely to be closely watched across the English-speaking Caribbean, where several former colonies have kept the Privy Council as their final court of appeal while also continuing to maintain laws against gay sex. In some of these countries, Jones’ case has renewed debate about whether they should replace the Privy Council with the Caribbean Court of Justice as their final court of appeal. Five countries (Belize, Guyana, Barbados, Saint Lucia and Dominica) have already done so. Mohammed said it was ironic that to settle a challenge on a colonial-era policy, Trinidad and Tobago had to use the judicial system of its former colonial ruler. “That is the ultimate irony, and it also is a moment for us to sit and reflect about what are we really doing?” she said. “It really is about us having a mature conversation about what kind of society do we want to build.” By Michael Rios, CNN
