Ian Duncan-Smith is claiming that comments from his policy group, which stated that same sex couples were "irrelevent" to his work shaping family policy, have been distorted.
Mr Duncan Smith told the Telepgraph that Same-sex partnerships do not "register on the Richter scale of how to bring up children", Mr Duncan Smith added.
Mr Duncan Smith later said a factual response had been "distorted into an alleged slur on gay couples" and that it had been taken "out of context".
To be fair to Mr Duncan Smith, he has a better record than most Tories on equality for gay people, and I genuinely hope he was not being homophobic. However, we all know that homophobia still exists in the Tory party (just look at the comments made in earlier posts regarding the homophobic comments at the selection meeting of North Norfolk Conservatives).
However, with Iain Dale & John Wilkes with comments from Cassilis, all Tories, taking this issue up and being quite shocked, it appears that there is a feeling even amongst more "modern" Tories that this is the old Tory Party rearing its ugly head.
Read the BBC report HERE.
3 comments:
Having read some of the quite extensive debate on this subject, I now think that IDS was misinterpreted by the Telegraph, and have posted as such. I do think though he should have been more careful about his phraseology - as an experienced politician he should have been prepared for the line of questioning and not talked about irrelevance or gay couples not even registering on the Richter scale.
More concerning than IDS' comments however are some of the comments that have been placed on Iain Dale's site since all this blew up. I've quoted some on my blog. They show that the Tory party has a long way to go before the prejudiced attitudes of old are wiped out. As a centrist and someone who has voted for a wide variety of parties in recent years (even the Lib Dems!) I thought the Tory party was changing, but there is clearly still an unsavoury contingent within it that is clear for everyone to see.
There is homophobia in all parties. Many of the people that posted these comments are not Conservatives at all.
Nich, every where I look in the Troy I see gay people (mostly out too). I think it;s entirely unfair to put "tories" and "homophobia" together.
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