A top Swiss parliamentary committee has approved legal changes that will see discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and sexual identity punishable by law.

Currently, under the Swiss penal code, discrimination against people on the grounds of their race, ethnic origin or religious beliefs is an offence, with the maximum penalty being three years in prison or a fine.

But in a statement released on Wednesday, the legal affairs committee of the Swiss upper house, the Council of States, recommended that article 261bis of the penal code be changed to also make discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and sexual identity illegal.

The committee's final recommendation comes a full five years after Socialist MP Mathias Reynard introduced a parliamentary motion on the issue.

With the move, the parliamentary legal committee has gone a step further than the Swiss government which had backed the inclusion of sexual orientation, but not sexual identity, in the legislation.

Outlining its decision to also include sexual identity, the commission said transsexuals and intersex people were the victims of hate crimes alongside homosexuals or bisexuals.

Roman Heggli of Swiss LGBT rights group Pink Cross welcomed the news.

“It is high time gay, lesbian and intersex people in Switzerland no longer be allowed to be vilified and attacked across the board,” he was quoted as saying in the Blick newspaper.