Fighting With Pride CEO: This LGBTQ+ History Month, justice for veterans is still unfinished

There’s a particular kind of silence that follows injustice. Not the quiet of peace, but the quiet of people who have been told – explicitly and repeatedly – that their service doesn’t count, their dignity doesn’t matter, and their identity makes them dispensable.

For decades, LGBTQ+ veterans lived in that silence. They served their country with loyalty, courage, and pride, yet many were met not with gratitude, but with humiliation, discharge, criminalisation, and lifelong consequences that still echo today. The ban on LGBTQ+ people serving in the Armed Forces ended in 2000, but for too many, the punishment didn’t end there. It simply changed form.

This LGBTQ+ History Month, as CEO of Fighting With Pride, the only LGBTQ+ Armed Forces charity, I’ve been thinking about what ‘progress’ really means. Because yes, we can point to milestones. We can point to the end of the ban. We can point to high-profile apologies that have come – some quietly offered, others more publicly delivered – not least the explicit apology from then prime minister Rishi Sunak in July 2023, and in October last year the ultimate implicit apology when the King dedicated a bespoke memorial. We can also point to shifting attitudes and growing awareness.

The last three years have seen long-overdue recognition that LGBTQ+ veterans were wronged

But history doesn’t move forward neatly. It doesn’t arrive in one triumphant moment, wrapped in a ribbon of closure. For LGBTQ+ veterans, the journey has been a long march – often lonely, often exhausting, and for some, heartbreakingly slow.

At Fighting With Pride, we exist because that march is not over.

I remember when the Etherton Review into treatment during the ban was published. At the time, I was working with the veterans minister, supporting the early stages of what would become one of the most important official acknowledgements of the harm done to LGBTQ+ service personnel. The Etherton Review confirmed what affected veterans had always known: they had been systematically betrayed by the institutions they served. Careers destroyed. Medals stripped. Pensions lost. Relationships shattered. Mental health impacted. Lives diverted onto harder paths, simply because of who they were.

But what stays with me most isn’t just the scale of the injustice – it’s the extraordinary resilience of those who endured it

Because despite everything, most survivors kept going, though sadly some did prematurely lose their lives to mental and physical ill-health. Most built lives after being forced out. They found ways to survive. They supported one another in the shadows when the world told them they were alone. And then, when the time came, they stepped forward – often reliving trauma – to speak truth for the public record. That takes bravery of a rare kind. Not the bravery of battle, but the bravery of persistence.

That is what Fighting With Pride is built upon: determination, solidarity, and the refusal to accept that the story ends with discrimination.

One of the most visible symbols of this journey is the LGBTQ+ Armed Forces Memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum, dedicated by the King, head of the UK Armed Forces. ‘An Opened Letter’ statue stands not just as a marker of history, but as a statement of belonging. A permanent reminder that LGBTQ+ people have always served, have always sacrificed, and have always been part of our national story – even when erased from it.

I think of those who never lived to see the beautiful statue. Those who died before they received an apology, those whose names we will never know.

The memorial is deeply moving, but it is not the finish line

In truth, one of the hardest realities we face is that justice arrives at different speeds. For some veterans, progress has come in the form of restored pride, recognition, and a sense of closure. For others, it is still painfully out of reach. Some are still battling for medals. Some are still trying to correct service records. Some are still fighting to be believed.

And some are still missing.

That is why our campaign, Battle for the Lost Veterans, matters. There are wronged veterans who have never come forward – perhaps because they don’t know they can, perhaps because they fear reliving the past, or perhaps because decades of silence have convinced them it’s safer to stay hidden.

They may be living with unresolved trauma. They may be isolated; many veterans who’ve recently come forward for Fighting With Pride support have previously been disconnected from both LGBTQ+ and ex-forces communities. They may believe that support isn’t meant for them. They may not even know the ban was lifted.

It’s heartbreaking to think some will have passed away without ever hearing the words they deserved to hear: you were wronged, and you mattered.

Finding them isn’t just a logistical challenge – it is a moral duty

At Fighting With Pride, we support LGBTQ+ veterans through practical help, advocacy, and community. We help people navigate the complicated systems of redress and recognition. Offering connection and belonging, we create spaces where veterans can speak freely, sometimes for the first time in their lives.

We do it because we believe that no one who served their country should be left behind.

This LGBTQ+ History Month I’m concerned about how history will remember this period. Will it be framed as a moment of national reckoning… or a correction? Or perhaps, a clean and tidy redemption story? It shouldn’t be.

It’s a story of veterans who were forced to become campaigners, not because they wanted attention, but because they wanted justice

Because the real story – the honest story – is messier, more human, and more unfinished. It’s a story of people who were pushed aside and then had to fight their way back into view. It’s a story of veterans who were forced to become campaigners, not because they wanted attention, but because they wanted justice. It’s a story of courage that didn’t end when they left the military – it began again when they demanded the country look them in the eye.

And perhaps most importantly, it’s a story of time.

More than a quarter of a century after the ban was lifted, we are still uncovering the cost. Still meeting people who are only now ready to speak. Still working to repair damage that should never have been done. Still trying to ensure that recognition is more than symbolic.

Progress is real, but it is not equal.

So this LGBTQ+ History Month, I want to say directly to veterans affected by cruel discrimination: your service was real. Your sacrifice was real. The injustice you experienced was real. And if you are one of the lost veterans, still out there in silence, believing no one remembers: we are looking for you. You are not alone; it’s not too late.

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To learn more about the vital work Fighting With Pride does for the LGBTQ+ veteran community, can visit their official website.

Peter Gibson is the CEO of the UK LGBTQ+ Armed Forces charity, Fighting With Pride, appointed in 2025 after five years as the Conservative MP for Darlington. A qualified solicitor and advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, he champions support, justice and recognition for veterans affected by historic discrimination.