For further information please contact:

Anthony Schembri
on 0412523978

Alexandra Sosnov
on 0418 207 027

PRESS RELEASE - May 2002

GLRL Receives Law and Justice Foundation Grant

The Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby of NSW (GLRL) has received a grant for $13,000 from the Law and Justice Foundation of NSW. The Law and Justice Foundation is a statutory body to advance the fairness and equity of the justice system, and to improve access to justice, especially for socially and economically disadvantaged people.

Anthony Schembri GLRL Convenor said, “the grant from the Law and Justice Foundation will allow us to develop our much needed community law reform document on lesbian and gay parenting issues in NSW. The document will form the third phase of our parenting campaign that begun in 2000.”

“We plan to consult with gays and lesbians across NSW on some of the law reform options for lesbian and gay families addressing the significant discrimination experienced by our families and most importantly through involving our communities directly in this process’ said Anthony.
“It’s timely that the Law and Justice Foundation should award the GLRL this grant given we recently launched our state rights campaign highlighting the invisibility of lesbian and gay families in the lead up to the State Election”, said Alex Sosnov, GLRL Convenor.

“The grant was awarded acknowledging the GLRL’s groundbreaking work in raising community and government awareness of the extent of discrimination against gay and lesbian parents. We have published two reports into parenting the most recent of which was a world first in collating global research. The findings clearly demonstrated that lesbian and gay families are many and diverse and are as good, if not better, environments for raising children than any heterosexual model,” said Alex.

“So this grant will assist not only in our future lobbying efforts but in making plain to government the options for law reform in this area”.