Campaign for Homosexual Equality

The Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE) is one of the oldest gay rights organisations in the United Kingdom. It is a membership organisation which aims to promote legal and social equality for LGBT people in England and Wales. CHE was one of the two main English gay rights organisations of the 1970s, along with the Gay Liberation Front, but during the 1980s organisations such as Stonewall (UK) and Peter Tatchell's OutRage! became more influential. CHE had 2,800 members and 60 local groups by 1972. At its peak in the middle 1970s it was claiming 5,000 members and some 100 local groups. By the 1990s its membership had diminished.

CHE's activities included pressing for law reforms, providing educational material for use in schools, and attempting to influence the provision of medical, psychiatric and social services. Since the 1980s, CHE has continued to campaign, although with reduced membership the range of its activities have been greatly reduced.

Beginnings
CHE began in 1964 as the North Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee (NWHLRC), founded in Manchester by Allan Horsfall and Colin Harvey. The formal launch took place at a public meeting on 7 October 1964 at Church House in Manchester. After the Sexual Offences Act 1967 came into force, the London-based Homosexual Law Reform Society was thought by many to have achieved its aims.

The NWHLRC, which in 1967 had already fallen out with Antony Grey of HLRS/Albany Trust over the northerners' wish to press ahead with the Esquire Clubs venture to establish member-run gay clubs, felt that much remained to be done, and named itself the Committee for Homosexual Equality (CHE) in 1969 with a view to becoming a national body for England and Wales, in co-operation with its counterpart north of the border, the Scottish Minorities Group (SMG).

Among CHE's leading members in this period were the writer and broadcaster Ray Gosling, and the academic Michael Steed. Both are still Vice-presidents of the organisation.

Other early members included Martin Stafford and Paul Temperton.

Change to campaign
In 1971 CHE's name changed once more, to the Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE).

It raised money to rent an office in Manchester and employ a full-time General Secretary, Paul Temperton, and it set out to become a fully democratic "bottom-up" membership organisation.

In 1971 CHE members took part in the first major gay demonstration in London. On 28 August the Gay Day began in Hyde Park, followed by a march to Trafalgar Square, nominally to protest at the age of consent. Between 500 and 1,000 marchers were reported to have attended.

In 1973 CHE held the first national gay rights conference in Morecambe (see below for a list of Conferences).

In 1974 CHE organised a national Homosexual Equality Rally in London. The rally was supported by the women's movement and people from ethnic minorities. Where earlier actions had concentrated on legal protection from criminal persecution, this rally was part of gay and lesbian people starting to establish a distinct sexual identity. Those who turned out for the rally did so to support the extension of constitutional rights and universal values to lesbian and gay people.

CHE, together with its Scottish (SMG) and Northern Irish (USFI) equivalents, produced a draft Law Reform Bill in 1975 and devoted much energy to lobbying parliamentarians to introduce it. Among other things, the Bill would have brought about a common age of consent of 16 for all sexual behaviour, something not in fact achieved until many years later.

In 1979 CHE's head office was moved to London.

CHE conferences
CHE has been holding annual conferences since 1973:


 * 1973: Morecambe
 * 1974: Malvern; the conference "signalled a formal coalescence between the separate strands represented by GLF and CHE, and CHE's formal commitment to a policy of militant reformism".
 * 1975: Sheffield
 * 1976: Southampton
 * 1977: Nottingham
 * 1978: Coventry
 * 1979: Brighton
 * 1980: York
 * 1981: Durham

In recent years the Conference has been a one-day event in London.

Local groups
For more information see List of CHE Groups

CHE's local groups throughout England and Wales were often highly independent, producing their own newsletters giving details of social and campaigning activities in their own area. Local groups and members had input into CHE policy through the National Council, which met quarterly at different venues through the country, and was composed of CHE members elected by the whole membership. Annual conferences also continued to be held; these were major, multifaceted events covering a long bank-holiday weekend and can be seen in hindsight as key moments in the struggle for gay rights in Britain.

The national organisation later decided that the running of local groups was no longer part of CHE's core function—a decision that was by no means universally supported by the membership. Thereafter many of the groups continued as independent bodies, often with names such as "The xxx Area Gay Society". Following the splitting-off of the local groups, CHE gradually ceased to be a mass-membership organisation, and other groups such as Stonewall and OutRage! have become more prominent in the UK campaign for gay rights.

Publications
CHE produced a national newsletter from 1969 to 1971: this gave rise to the CHE Bulletin, which ran from 1971 to 1974; also, the CHE Magazine Working Party (set up in 1971) produced Lunch from 1971 to 1974. From 1975 to 1976 CHE published CHE Broadsheet. Between 1976 and 1977 a newspaper called Out was produced.

One-off publications include:
 * Attacks on Gay People: A Report of the Commission on Discrimination (A5 booklet, c.1980}
 * Homosexuality: Calling for Honesty in Education (A5 booklet, c.1987)

Friend
London Friend was set up in London in 1971 as a CHE taskforce intended to become CHE's counselling arm. It became a successful organisation in its own right, and was separated from CHE in 1975.

Activity post 2000
In 2005 Derek Oyston, a CHE member from Gateshead, left a substantial amount of money to CHE. The Executive then consulted with the membership about the possibility of applying for charitable status. but it was decided not to pursue this route as it would have made it difficult for CHE to conduct political campaigns.

Lord Smith of Finsbury (former MP and Cabinet Minister) is a vice-president of CHE.

In 2010 CHE's Secretary Griffith Vaughan Williams died. He had been one of the most active members of the organisation for many years. Shortly before his death, he signed a contract for the official history of CHE and its times to be written by Peter Scott-Presland. Work on this book is ongoing.

Allan Horsfall, CHE's Life President, died in August 2012, and CHE held a well-attended event in Manchester Town Hall in his memory. Ray Gosling, another of the founders, died in November 2013.

Awards and donations
In 2006 CHE began discussions with GALHA about a possible awards ceremony to follow on from the discontinued Mike Rhodes Awards. This led to the inauguration of the Derek Oyston Achievement Award, given on two occasions, in 2009 and 2011. The Derek Oyston Film Award has been awarded annually since 2009. CHE has also on several occasions helped to support the Pre-launch for LGBT History Month.