Overcoming 'bigotry with a human face' How we got gay rights into our LP Manifesto

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Gay rights supporters picket Manchester City Council dorse the recent agreement be- groups were specitied.

No-one actually mentioned mands that the city's nominees the gay references in the policy, on the Area Health Authority and until one of the less discreet coun- Community Health Councils cillors suggested that " ... certain should support a shopping list of sections of the manifesto might pro-gay policies came in for an tions of the left, too. We expect- on women and blacks? And how ed a Labour council with a built- could we expect to have preferenin right wing majority, and that's ce over these groups? FOR THE first time, the Labour Party in Nottingham has written a Manifesto for the City elections with the widest participation from inside and outside the Party.

Working groups of interested members met regularly to discuss policies and write drafts of their sections of the manifesto, and last November a consultative conference enabled community groups to state their needs. - The gay response was initiated by the Labour Campaign for Gay Rights, several of whose members joined the working party to write up the 'equal opportunities in employment' policy and to propose relevant amendments on equal opportunities in city services.

It was not easy to convince some of our comrades of the validity of our demands, or why they should be spelled out unequivocally in the manifesto. These are some of the arguments we encountered.

"I'M NOT prejudiced against them, but..." What usually follows is a litany of racist comments, dressed up as objective observation.

And it's familiar to gays too, when we listen to straights talking about us. It is the language of the 'liberal bigot' - the person who is just a shade too sophisticated to be an outright bigot but still thinks that he or she needs to emphasise his or her superiority as a heterosexual.

During the preparation of the manifesto this language had been heard with depressing frequency, and not only from the Right.

The first hurdle we had to overcome was the argument. that Fighting for GAY RIGHT - So the relatively minor deunexpected and sustained attack.

Space was a problem for sec- Why were there no demands Progress We had made progress, howSo for the left to delete gay ever. The working party on the subject eventually agreed to include the section. Perhaps gays need not be subordinate to women and blacks after all.

But progress was short-lived.

An almost identical group of people meeting later in the guise of a District Party left caucus de-

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