A former senior bureaucrat and expert on Aboriginal health was sacked when his employer learnt he had a 45-year-old conviction - for having sex with his girlfriend when he was a teenager.

Mike Taylor, 62, was the head of the Biripi Aboriginal Corporation Medical Centre on the NSW north coast when a routine criminal record check brought up the 1967 conviction for the first time in his long public service career.

He was dismissed with one week's pay in March and is getting increasingly desperate because his entire career has been in a sector that is now closed to him.

''All of a sudden I am completely barred from any employment that I'm qualified for,'' he said.

His story resembles that of Lyn and Neville Cox, reported in The Sun-Herald last week.

The story, part of a Herald series on children and crime, looked at the employment restrictions on people who were convicted as juveniles of so-called ''young love'' offences.

Unlike Mr Cox, Mr Taylor was not a juvenile - he and his 16- year-old girlfriend had sex on his 18th birthday. She became pregnant, and the couple married, and remained together for 23 years, raising three children. In NSW, Mr Taylor's case would not have been an offence because the age of consent is 16, but they lived in South Australia, where the partner of an 18-year-old needs to be at least 17.

Mr Taylor was charged and served four months in a maximum-security labour prison.

''It was her [birthday] present to me. Not only were we not conscious of the law, we didn't even think about contraception. How unlucky can you get? Not only did she end up being pregnant, I ended up being sent to hard labour.''

Mr Taylor has managed Aboriginal health programs in NSW, South Australia and Tasmania, worked for the Commonwealth government, been a justice of the peace and local councillor and sat on government boards, including the NSW Justice Health Board. His previous criminal record checks apparently never produced any adverse results.

When the South Australian government recently introduced laws on spent convictions, it - like NSW - exempted sexual offences, which means that Mr Taylor's conviction, which has been spent, no longer is.

The Attorney-General of South Australia, John Rau, said he was grappling with a solution for ''young love'' offences.

"While I am obviously concerned about particular cases drawn to my attention, it is difficult to create a legislative scheme that allows these offences to be spent but not other more serious offences.''

Wronged For What Seemed Right