George Broadhead, secretary of IHEU member organization the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA) has attacked religious groups who are protesting the new Sexual Orientation Regulations, which came into effect in Northern Ireland on 1 January 2007.
“The gay community really must get its act together or these important new measures will be steamrollered by religious bigotry,” he said. “These evangelical groups are becoming hysterical and desperate as they pile on the pressure to destroy the new Sexual Orientation Regulations. The religious lobby is now resorting to the use of dishonest and misleading tactics to try to panic politicians into scrapping the Regulations.”
Several religious groups are petitioning the Queen, asking her to put pressure on Tony Blair to withdraw the regulations, which have been introduced into Northern Ireland and will come into force in England and Wales in April 2007.
“These regulations have already been seriously compromised by the granting of extensive religious exemptions,” he continued. “The religious groups will not be satisfied until they have destroyed them altogether.”