Poor David Cameron. He spends years telling voters how the Tories are no longer the ‘nasty’ party, then along comes his gaffe-prone Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Grayling, who goes and spills the beans on what senior Tories are secretly thinking.
According to Cameron’s public statements, the Tories are no longer the sworn enemy of gay people, and are even appealing for their votes. Clause 28 was a long time ago in the past, he would have you believe.
According to Grayling in private, however, it’s perfectly ok for B&B owners to discriminate against gay guests, even though the law of the land makes such discrimination illegal.
There are probably several thousand gay voters in the Hexham constituency, who have the right to know whether the Tories believe anti-gay discrimination is acceptable in modern Britain.
Today we started the morning delivering our newsletters to Kirkwhelpington residents - weather fantastic, sun hot, shirt sweaty. Even before I was a candidate I was a regular visitor to Kirkwhelpington, as the mother of one of my wife's friends has lived here for years in the house next to the church (pictured above). A few years ago we saw actress Emma Thompson at the summer fair, who's husband's family come from the village.
After finishing our deliveries we headed up the A696 to deliver our newsletter to Otterburn residents, a number of whom were sensibly outside soaking up the sun (who knows, today could be the English summer). I stopped to have a chat with a few people, who gave me some good-natured ribbing about the Labour Party. My mum used to live in Jedburgh, and on the way back we would usually stop at the Percy Arms for a pint and Sunday lunch.
