Video: PinkNews editor takes Boris Johnson to task
At the Stonewall hustings for the Mayor of London today the chair, PinkNews.co.uk editor Tony Grew, took Conservative Party Candidate Boris Johnson to task over the discrepancies between his voting record (which has been sometimes in favour of gay rights) and his journalism (which has sometimes been considered homophobic).
Mr Johnson refused to apologise but vigorously defended his voting record. To watch the exchange, please scroll down.
Ken Livingstone’s press office has distributed the following extracts from Mr Johnson’s writings to the LGBT media. All of these extracts are at least seven years old.
Seven years that have seen the Conservative Party leadership attempt to forge a closer relationship with the gay community and publicly support gay rights.
‘Labour’s appalling agenda, encouraging the teaching of homosexuality in schools, and all the rest of it.’ (The Spectator 15 April 2000) ‘
The essence of that Tory case is unchanged… it is more sensitive to spare parents’ anxieties, than to allow Leftwing local authorities to waste taxpayers’ money on idiotic and irrelevant homosexual instruction.’ (Daily Telegraph 3 August 2000)
‘Slowly Labour is winning the battle it really cares about, the Kulturkampf, adjusting what can be said, and what cannot be said… Homosexuality is to be taught in schools.’ (The Spectator 29 April 2000)
‘If gay marriage was OK – and I was uncertain on the issue – then I saw no reason in principle why a union should not be consecrated between three men, as well as two men; or indeed three men and a dog.’ (Friends, Voters, Countrymen p96)
