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The Italian government was recently ordered by a Sicilian court to pay €100,000 compensation to a man issued with a disabled driving licence on the basis that he is gay.

Danilo Giuffrida, 27, had volunteered information on his sexual orientation to the military authorities during a physical examination after being called up in 2000 for Italy's then mandatory year of military service.

He was categorised as having a "disturbance of sexual identity" and the military authorities informed the transport ministry that he was "not in possession of the necessary psycho-physical requirements". As a result, his driving licence was immediately revoked.

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Giuffrida agreed to retake his driving test and passed it for a second time. But the driving authority classified his sexual orientation as a mental illness and issued him with a licence for one year, instead of the usual 10, on the grounds that he was gay. The disabled licence must be renewed every year instead of the standard period of every 10 years.

The judge who presided over the case in Catania, Sicily, said the conduct of the government ministries showed "evident sexual discrimination" against the claimant and "contempt for his constitutional rights". In addition to the compensation, the ministries were ordered to pay €10,000 to meet Giuffrida's legal costs during his protracted litigation.

The rather bizarre sexual analysis of the Italian military and driving authorities has its origins in early religious ideas. In some societies that were keen to promote a fast and stable increase in numbers, anything that did not assist was condemned as sinful.

This meant lumping together the rather odd assortment of bestiality, masturbation, withdrawal and homosexuality. To practise any of these was a major dissent. The word “bugger” was originally a word meaning a heretic. Historically, English law has labelled all sorts of unconventional social categories as mentally defective, including, at one time, unmarried mothers.

Professor Gary Slapper is Director of the Centre for Law at The Open University

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