Over on the party website, Ed Davey has written about LGBT+ history month, which has started:
The fight towards equality is a long one and we all owe a huge debt to the activists and campaigners who have fought tirelessly for the freedoms so many are able to enjoy today. Let us celebrate historical figures like Alan Turing and Marsha P Johnson, as well as modern day activists such as Lady Phyll, founder of UK Black Pride.
When we look back, we can celebrate legal milestones from repealing Section 28 to securing same sex marriage – and Liberal Democrats should be proud of the pivotal and central role we played in those campaigns and those victories.
I’m also immensely proud of the progress we are making within our own party; last year we passed the ‘Supporting Trans and Non-Binary People Within the Liberal Democrats’ motion at our Autumn conference. The Party has also recently adopted a definition of transphobia, which will support efforts to call out transphobic behaviour and empower us to challenge transphobia both within and outside the party.
However, as we celebrate the progress we have made, let us not forget that there is a great deal more to be done. Discrimination, bullying and violence remain an everyday reality for so many. They are grim reminders of the necessary work yet to be done in the march towards justice.
As we grapple with the virus, let us not overlook the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on LGBT+ communities.This includes increased strain on mental health, domestic abuse and homelessness. It is important, especially at these times, that we continue to prioritise the wellbeing of all communities and stand with those who so often are not heard.
You can read the full article here.
https://twitter.com/EdwardJDavey/status/1356196049459830784
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12 Comments
So Ed’s response to the vaccine debacle is to release a statement about LGBT+ history month?
Seems like I left the party at the right time.
@Richard S
You are spot on.
This is why the majority of the population regards the party as irrelevant.
Meanwhile, in other news, Ed lays into Johnson over Johnson’s prevarication over a public inquiry into the government response to the Coronavirus crisis
https://www.libdems.org.uk/boris-inquiry
The way Richard S and “Peter” are thinking, it’s as if saying anything at all about X means one has nothing whatsoever to say about unrelated issue Y.
The reason we’re considered irrelevant is the majority of the public, who don’t think about politics every day, have forgotten we exist. It’s not as if they’ve considered us and made an active choice to reject us.
Yes of course he could comment about both. Why hasn’t he?
He has. That’s the point.
Ed has asked for an enquiry to investigate how the UK has handled covid. This seems very premature given that we are currently at peak cases and deaths. Maybe not at THE peak yet because new variants are appearing all the time.
Perhaps Ed felt the need to say something because he seems to have been vey silent about the EU handling of their vaccine procurement.
Why should a British opposition party be making statements on the affairs of the EU vaccine rollout? Especially when the Article 16 debacle was resolved over the course of about 12 hours.
Alex, as you well know, I’m talking about the EU commission’s threat to close the internal Irish border, and now to ban vaccine exports while the ink is still dry on the treaty. Your kind of posting is fine for getting technical wins on the internet but it does nothing to persuade anyone to become a liberal.
BTW this is very relevant to topic of the article. I imagine if you do a survey on what the main thing LGBT+ people are worrying about at the moment, number 1 is when they and their partners can get vaccinated and when their children can get back to school. Not whether LGBT+ history month is being celebrated in an appropriate manner.
@Hannah, The EU fiasco is not over. Von der Leyen is now claiming that the UK compromised safety with its vaccines, according to The Times. This woman is highly irresponsible, spreading fake news that may deter members of the UK public from accepting vaccination.
According to the Telegraph, she refuses to accept any responsibility for the mistakes made by the EU.
Richard S: Lib Dems at all levels have put out a lot of publicity about Covid-19 recently, and rather less about LGBT+. I consider Ed’s press release about LGBT+ month to be token; the sort of thing that anyone who considers it at all important is going to want to put out, and something that doesn’t take a lot of effort to do so. Its effect on our ability to comment on Covid-19 and the government’s handling of the crisis is zero.
I agree with @Hannah; there is little point in a minor opposition party commenting about this scrap with the EU over vaccines. We are in no position to influence the EU over it, and it is not our job to act as a shield for this government either. Better to use what little publicity we can get on something that we can affect. In any case, the only reason the EU could threaten to close the Irish border was a clause in the Brexit treaty that Johnson negotiated, which treaty the Lib Dems opposed. The UK had previously threatened to invoke the same clause.
Our position is such that virtually nothing we say as a party is going to gain any publicity. This might be why you are apparently unaware that Layla Moran commented on the EU invocation of Article 16 (before it backed down), saying the EU was wrong to do so. Although, both you Richard and Peter have commented on the article that quotes her on it, so it’s odd that you haven’t noticed it. But hardly anything we say gets reported anyway, and by the next GE in 2024 no-one is going to remember or care about what we might or might not have said about some argument between the UK and EU governments 3½ years earlier. Our manifesto and record on attacking the government is going to get far more scrutiny. And if the Tories succeed in blaming the EU over this, then only the Tories will benefit.
Richard & Peter’s comments look like “I’m alright Jack” to me. “If you have nothing to say, the very least you can do is to shut up” Tom Lehrer
PS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIlJ8ZCs4jY