Pride Month

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

Monday 23rd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew (Daventry) (Con)]

It is a real pleasure to follow the Minister and to speak in this important debate. I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone in the House, across my Daventry constituency and across the country a very happy Pride Month.

The Minister is absolutely right to say that Pride is still needed. I have certainly seen significant changes over my lifetime, including things that I never thought would be possible when I was growing up as a young gay man in Anglesey, but he is right to say that these are important issues that we should continue to discuss. On the whole, I have been privileged to have a life in which I have been accepted pretty much everywhere I have lived, but I have had those difficult occasions that I have spoken about before, not least being badly beaten up and my father coming to my rescue and being beaten up too, trying to protect his son. Those are the things that we need to remember.

We also need to remember people like the young man that I heard about in Manchester a few years ago who had been kicked out of his home because his parents could not accept his sexuality. His life took a nosedive and, sadly, he ended up selling himself for sex to survive. He was eventually murdered by someone who he was supposedly trying to get some money off. These are the disgusting consequences that may happen if we do not remind ourselves of the journey that we have been on as a country.

I have to say that things are pretty good for me. Most of the time, most people do not care that I am a gay man—

[Chris Bryant]

Are you?

[Stuart Andrew]

Yeah—but I am butch like you! [Laughter.]

As I was saying, most people do not really comment on the fact that I live with a man. They are more interested in the fact that he works for Marks & Spencer and gets 20% off. But it is important that we have these conversations because there are still people around the world, and in communities in this country, who cannot come out. There are people in communities in our country who live a different life from the one that they want to live, and there are people around the world, as the Minister rightly says, who will be put to death if they love the person they really want to love.

That is why Pride Month is important, and its theme of activism and social change emphasises a reflection on the contributions of LGBT individuals and communities in creating a better world for us all. We are lucky in this country that we have a host of people in our history who have been at the forefront of fighting for equality. Yes, there are the famous people—Dame Kelly Holmes, Tom Daley and Sir Ian McKellen, to name but a few—but there are so many inspiring LGBT people from right across the decades, as the Minister mentioned.

I would like to mention Sophia Jex-Blake, Scotland’s first female doctor, who fought for so many women to be allowed to train as doctors and founded medical schools up in Scotland, where she eventually met her life partner, whom she lived with until her death in 1912. I also want to mention Patrick Trevor-Roper, who was one of only three witnesses who could be convinced to appear before the Wolfenden committee. His evidence helped to start the journey to decriminalisation. Those people, in my view, are incredibly brave.

Given that we have commemorated the 80th anniversary of VE Day this year, I think we should also remember one of my personal heroes, Dr Alan Turing, a man whose brilliance cracked the Nazis’ Enigma code. This was an incredible feat, given that Enigma had 159 million million million settings. He played a crucial role in cracking the intercepted messages that enabled the allies to defeat the enemy in the Atlantic and in other engagements. We owe him so much, but his treatment later, when he was prosecuted for being gay, is a shame that I know we all find abhorrent. The Government rightly apologised and he was later posthumously pardoned. In my view, he is a true hero of our nation.

Of course, we have had champions in this place, too—people like Chris Smith, who bravely became the first openly gay MP; Edwina Currie, who led a debate on changing the age of consent; and too many other hon. and right hon. Members to name. I do want to name one or two from the Conservative side because I know everyone will do their own pitches. There are people like our former colleague Eric Ollerenshaw, who was on that first Gay Pride march in 1972. He recalled to me that he was actually spat at by the police—that is how bad it was. There are people like Mike Freer, who campaigned hard on issues like PrEP, and our former colleague Elliot Colburn.

I would like to take this opportunity to say happy birthday to LGBT+ Conservatives, which celebrates its 50th birthday this year, making it one of the oldest LGBT-affiliated groups for a political party in the world—a title it shares with LGBT+ Labour. I wish LGBT+ Labour a happy birthday as well. In 1975, the LGBT Conservatives were established by Professor Peter Walter Campbell. I am that old that I have seen LGBT Conservatives go through several guises over the 30 years since I first joined. Back then, it was known as TORCHE—Tory Campaign for Homosexual Equality. I pay tribute to the work it has done over those 50 years.

Little did those founders and that first generation of our LGBT Conservatives and Labour know it, but they were merely years away from a global HIV/AIDS epidemic. Around the world, hundreds of thousands of people would lose their lives, including people here in the UK. Gay and bisexual men lived in fear, and many felt powerless and hopeless. If we fast forward to 2025, we find ourselves in a truly different world, and I want to thank all those who have made that change possible. I recognise that those contributions have come from parties across this Chamber, and I thank them all for it.

I am proud of our record as a party over the last 14 years for the lives of LGBT people, not least the rolling out of highly active antiretroviral therapy treatment for HIV in England and funding the first ever HIV testing week. In 2013, we introduced same-sex couples’ marriage in England and Wales, which was one of the most memorable debates in my time in the House and one of my proudest moments here. We introduced the legalisation of self-testing kits for HIV, as well as a host of other things that we are proud to have done.

I also want to remark on the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), who is no longer here, about people in the armed forces and to pay tribute to Lord Etherton. When I was the Equalities Minister, I had the privilege of meeting him several times as he went through that report. He did not just get evidence from thousands of people; he personally read every single testament because he wanted to know those stories inside out, and thank goodness he did that. I pay tribute to him for the work he has done.

Thinking about all these achievements and those of former MPs and other inspirational figures, I find it appalling and deeply disappointing that some Prides across the country have banned our political parties from this year’s parades. LGBT Conservatives, LGBT Labour, LGBT Lib Dems and all others are not allowed to attend. Like the Minister, I also remind the organisers that it was these groups and so many MPs in this House that brought about the changes we enjoy today. As Jo Cox said, there is more that unites us than divides us. Them causing this divide is a retrograde step, and I pay tribute to the likes of Owen Meredith and others who have taken up this fight. I call on the organisers to think again, especially as two parties celebrate their 50th birthday in terms of LGBT issues.

I am aware that many colleagues want to contribute, but I have a couple of questions for the answering Minister. I would like an update on the HIV programme. It touched me that people across the House want to embark on that ambition of having no new HIV infections in this country by 2030; of course, we have only one Parliament left to get that done. Could the Minister set out where the Government are up to on that and what plans they have to ensure that we meet that ambitious target? Will the Government ensure that they are working with our devolved regions to ensure a UK approach to eradicating new HIV cases—not just England, but Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, too? We can end new HIV cases without a vaccine or cure, and wouldn’t it be great for the UK to be the first place to do so? We want the Government to succeed on this issue, building on a lot of the work that we did in office and working with great organisations like the Terrence Higgins Trust. Let us make that an ambition for all of us. Let us remember why we have Pride in the first place, and make this Pride count.

[Several hon. Members rose—]