Hungary: Bill will allow same-sex families to be reported

With the country already under fire for its existing anti-LGBTIQ+ legislation, the Parliament of Hungary has passed a new bill encouraging citizens to report same-sex families to the state.

According to Bloomberg, the bill – which was adopted on 11 April – allows the public to report anyone who contests the “constitutionally recognised role of marriage and the family” and those who contest children’s rights “to an identity appropriate to their sex at birth”.

This law will allow the authorities to investigate those suspected of these violations. Hungary’s Constitution defines marriage as only being possible between a man and a woman, effectively banning same-sex marriage.

The bill has been sent to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán for his signature.

The move comes after 15 countries joined a European Commission lawsuit again Hungary over its 2021 queer-phobic child protection legislation.

That law restricts showing or exposing children to any content about LGBTIQ+ people or issues in the media and in schools on the basis that this would be harmful to them. It also equates promoting LGBTIQ+ inclusion to promoting paedophilia.

Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden, as well as the European Parliament, have now all signed on to the European Commission lawsuit.

The law uses the pretext of protecting children to discriminate against LGBTIQ+ people

The legal action in the European Court of Justice asserts that Hungary’s law violates the European Union (EU) Charter of Fundamental Rights and Article 2 of the Treaty on the EU.

The court has the power to force Hungary to remove any discriminatory clauses or language in the legislation.

The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said in 2021 that the law was “shameful” and “goes utterly against the fundamental values of the European Union – the protection of minorities, human dignity, equality and respect for human rights”.

“This law uses the protection of children – which we are all committed to – as a pretext to discriminate heavily against people on the basis of their sexual orientation,” said von der Leyen.

Hungary’s defiant right-wing Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, has accused the European Commission of interfering in the country’s sovereignty. “Here Brussels bureaucrats have no business at all, no matter what they do we will not let LGBTQ activists among our children,” he said.

In May 2020, Hungary also banned transgender and intersex people from legally changing the gender or sex assigned to them at birth.