Evan wins Secularist of the Year 2009

By | 8th February 2009 - 6:46 pm

We may be only five weeks into 2009, but Lib Dem MP Evan Harris has already won an award – Secularist of the Year. The BBC reports:

The Liberal Democrat was named joint winner, with Lord Avebury, for their work in abolishing the blasphemy libel law in England and Wales. Dr Harris called the law “ancient, discriminatory and illiberal” as well as not compliant with human rights and against free speech. The offences of blasphemous libel and blasphemy were abolished last summer. …

Dr Harris has also campaigned to separate religion and the state claiming the current system has a number of anomalies, including which faith schools children are admitted to. He said religion should not be a factor in determining choice – children should just go to their local school. The prize was handed over by Oxford professor and atheist Richard Dawkins at an awards ceremony in London on Saturday.

Read more by or more about , , , , or .
This entry was posted in News.
Bookmark the web address for this page or use the short url http://ldv.org.uk/11109 for Twitter and emails.

2 Comments

  • Notory Feb 08 - 8:19 pm

    I assume that it will be alright to take the micky out of Allah now without comeback.Will Lord Avebury will defend me if others take umbrage?

Post a Comment

Lib Dem Voice welcomes comments from everyone but we ask you to be polite, to be on topic and to be who you say you are. You can read our comments policy in full here. Please respect it and all readers of the site.

If you are a member of the party, you can have the Lib Dem logo appear next to your comments to show this. You must be registered for our forum and can then login on this public site with the same username and password.

Your email is never published. Required fields are marked *

*
*
Do you agree to the T&Cs?


Recent Comments

  • User AvatarGeorge Kendall Feb 22 - 6:13 pm
    @mpg: "Not just liberalism. But secularism also stems from the Christian tradition. That is the irony of it all." And, another irony: The US constitution...
  • User AvatarMichael Hall Feb 22 - 6:06 pm
    David Allen No one is suggesting mass demonstrations of the kind we saw in Libya and other countries in the Arab Spring Council officers of...
  • User AvatarGeorge Kendall Feb 22 - 6:00 pm
    @paul barker Thanks for the comment. As you say, comparing opinion polls with the previous election result isn't comparing like with like. But, even if...
  • User AvatarKevin Maher Feb 22 - 5:56 pm
    Preparation for the 2015 election would be a lot more focused if we were allowed to commence selection of PPC's.
  • User AvatarLiberal Eye Feb 22 - 5:56 pm
    As Matt says. In his "Diaries" Alan Clark, for a time a minister at the Dept of Employment under Thatcher described the DfE as a...