North Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee

The North Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee (NWHLRC) was a committee founded in Manchester in 1964, to pursue the aim of reforming the law relating to male homosexual acts. In 1969 it was renamed the Committee for Homosexual Equality, and in 1971 it became the Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE).

In 1963, Antony Grey, then Secretary of the London-based Homosexual Law Reform Society (HLRS) was authorised by his Executive to investigate setting up local committees of the HLRS. Grey put Allan Horsfall in touch with Stanley Rowe, who had begun setting up a local group in Manchester, and Horsfall attended a meeting at Rowe's home on 4 June 1964. Also at the meeting was Colin Harvey, Senior Social Worker for the Church of England North West Board of Social Responsibility. Harvey reported to the Board, and its chair, Ted Wickham, Bishop of Middleton, offered to facilitate the group, provided it became a properly constitued committee and allow it to meet in his board room, on Blackfriars Road, Salford. The NWHLRC was formally launched at a public meeting on 7 October 1964, at Church House in Manchester.

Allan Horsfall was appointed Secretary of the NWHLRC, and Niel Pearson, a local solicitor, as its President.

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