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Mr. Brady: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Etherington: I will not, because I have only two or three minutes.
Mrs. Teresa Gorman (Billericay): I take issue with my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow), who made great play of the importance to him of his constituents in Buckingham, and perhaps particularly of those of a homosexual persuasion. I put it to him and to the House that we come to this place not only to exercise our own conscience, but to represent the views of those who elected us--our constituents.
I hope that my hon. Friend will acknowledge that the great majority of his constituents, and of mine, have strong misgivings about not only this legislation, but the Government's intention to repeal section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988. We have an obligation--often in the face of Labour Members' criticisms, which are not always particularly well-balanced or rational--to express the views of those constituents. Majorities, like minorities, have a right to hold and express their views. I am speaking partly on behalf of that majority today.
I, like everyone else, do not seek to criminalise young people in any context whatever. However, we should remember that the number of prosecutions of young people in the 16-to-18 age group for anything related to homosexuality is minute. I think that, in the past several years, there have been only two such prosecutions. Therefore, we are talking not about people hunting down 16-year-olds to prosecute, but about the concerns of the parents of those children.
As hon. Members have said, some of those parents may very much favour changing current legislation, but some do not favour it. As some of my colleagues have said, the children of some of those parents may be in education or in care institutions. Although I welcome the fact that young people in care will receive special protection in the Bill, young people who are not in care--such as those in schools and other activities, such as swimming clubs and military groups--will not be protected by the Bill. Those young people may be subject to pressures that induce them to become involved in various activities.
As we know, some young people, including boys, become prostitutes. In many cases, those young people may well be led into such practices for money, or even simply for a type of affection, rather than as the result of an automatic predilection, be it biological or otherwise.
Ms Oona King:
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Mrs. Gorman:
No, I shall not give way now. I want to make some progress. I am sure that the hon. Lady will be able to speak and tell us her views.
I am particularly concerned--I have raised this issue in the House before--about the health aspects of the matter. In the United Kingdom, we are bombarded with propaganda on the health risks to young people caused by smoking, drinking and drug taking. However, if we mention the health risks involved in homosexual activities, we are shouted down and told that we are bigoted or prejudiced or, in many cases, completely wrong.
I should like again to quote the chief executive of the Public Health Laboratory Service, Dr. Nicholl, who states in a report:
Mr. Gordon Marsden (Blackpool, South):
I am listening to the hon. Lady with as much dispassionate intensity as I can muster. I am concerned about her line of argument. She is talking about public health issues, which affect heterosexual as much as homosexual people. Does she accept that the logical implication of her argument is that the age of consent should be raised for heterosexuals as well as homosexuals? Will she acknowledge that the gay community and homosexual organisations have done at least as much as other organisations to alert people to the public health issues that she is talking about?
Mrs. Gorman:
I agree with some of what the hon. Gentleman says, but not all of it. I do not want to get into a debate with him because we have a short time available and I want to put my point of view.
Mr. Bercow:
My hon. Friend and I have been friends for 15 years and I am sure that we are not going to fall out over this issue. Is not the weakness of her argument that it is based on the premise that the proposed change in the law will somehow result in a dramatic explosion of homosexual activity? That premise is fundamentally flawed. Why does she think that the advice of the British Medical Association and the Royal College of Physicians on the pursuit of good health is wrong and that she is right?
Mrs. Gorman:
My hon. Friend ignores the fact, which I have already pointed out, that in the past few decades we have had an explosion of HIV-AIDS--a disease that was practically unknown before the more liberal attitude to homosexuality was adopted in this country. We have to some extent managed to conquer that problem, thanks to more advanced medical techniques, but that does not alter the causal relationship. When we tell young children
Mr. Stephen Twigg (Enfield, Southgate)
rose--
Mrs. Gorman:
I shall not give way, because all hon. Members have an opportunity to make their own contribution and I do not want to detain the House for too long.
We should keep the issue in proportion by bearing in mind the number of people of a homosexual persuasion in the country. Those listening to our debates might get the impression that we are dealing with a massive problem involving large numbers of people who should receive a lot of attention. The report of the national survey of sexual attitudes and life styles shows that around 1 per cent. of the male population are of homosexual persuasion. That is some 300,000 people, which means that there are about 30,000 males of the relevant age group. It is not the case that every school has half a dozen or more boys who are being bullied because they are homosexual or are at risk of being enticed by older males into homosexual practices. For that reason if for no other, the attention that we are giving to the need to lower the age of consent is out of all proportion with the problem.
Jackie Ballard:
Does the hon. Lady agree that, no matter what the size--whether it is 1 per cent., 10 per cent. or 49 per cent.--one of the first duties of this place is to protect the rights of minorities?
Mrs. Gorman:
I agree with that, but another important purpose of being in this place is to present the views of the majority. The majority on this issue, as in the debate on section 28, is almost ignored, partly because the membership of the House of Commons is not representative of the population on the issue. We have a much higher percentage of people of homosexual persuasion in the House than in the population at large. That tends to drive the debate in a direction that reflects the personal considerations of some Members rather than the attitudes of the population as a whole.
Ann Keen:
How will the majority be affected by the Bill? How will they feel and what difference will it make to them?
Mrs. Gorman:
The views of parents of boys aged 16 to 18 and their concerns about their children should be reflected in our debates. Some will agree and some will disagree, but the majority of parents feel concern. The number of children at risk is relatively small. For that reason alone, we do not need to alter existing legislation against the wishes of the great majority of the people whom we represent. We are bombarded by propaganda in this country and sometimes we are led to believe that there is a regime of persecution of our young people on the issue. That is a great exaggeration. There is no evidence that existing legislation needs to be changed. The change will cause great concern to many parents. We have a duty to represent their views and consider whether we need to
"The risk of contracting Aids is vastly greater in homosexual people than in heterosexuals."
10 Feb 2000 : Column 462
The report also stated that, last year, of the 1,070 heterosexual people living in Britain who contracted human immune deficiency virus--many of whom underwent HIV testing because of increased concern among women about the disease--only 62 contracted the disease in this country. When I pointed out to the hon. Member for Rochdale (Lorna Fitzsimons) that the great majority of the women in that group came from the sub-continent, she jumped on the statement and said that it simply showed that heterosexual populations in other countries are severely affected by the disease.
The fact remains that, in some of those countries, particularly African countries--it has been a feature also in post-communist Romania--the incidence of HIV-AIDS among the female population is related to the use of anal intercourse as a form of contraception. That fact has been medically documented. Therefore, the issue of what happens in some cases of homosexuality between consenting male adults--an issue that was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr. Gill), whose comments were subsequently sedentarily described by Labour Members as bigotry--is relevant to the debate. We should put that on the record because it is highly significant.
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