Baguio's city council led by Vice Mayor Edison Bilog has passed legislation to punish discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation and gender identity, disability and age.

The move punishes discrimination on those factors in politics, public places, public meetings, the right to organise, education materials, advertisements, speeches, hate acts, detention, and abuses by the state and others.

Punishments range from P1,000 to P5,000 or imprisonment of one to 30 days.

"I am happy that after almost five years it was finally approved, with the passage of this ordinance, hopefully, all forms of discrimination would now be stopped and any commission thereof will now be penalized, the rights of our citizens, including the LGBT community will now be protected," Bilog said, according to Sun Star Baguio.

The ordinance describes discrimination as "a distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference made on the basis of disability, age, health status, sexual orientation, gender identity, ethnicity and religion which has the purpose or effect of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing of the human rights and fundamental freedoms in the civil, political, economic, social, cultural, or any other field of public life of a person."

The Philippines has no nationwide anti-discrimination laws to protect LGBT.