Tory MP says he was wrong to say being gay was ‘gross and unnatural’

Words: Jamie Tabberer; picture: Wiki

A Conservative MP has said he has “recanted” his homophobic views of years past and blamed them on “intellectual laziness.”

Sir Desmond Swayne, Tory MP for New Forest West, has previously voted against reducing the age of consent for same-sex sexual activity.

He also voted to keep Section 28 – a Thatcher-era ban on the promotion of homosexuality in schools – and in the year 2000 described gay people as “gross and unnatural.”

However, 64-year-old has apprently had a change of heart – and explained his 180 in a blog post published on his official site this week titled: ‘How I came to Recant.’

“I simply never challenged the views that I had”

Describing his old views as “shocking, even to me”, Swayne wrote: “My transformation from extreme social conservative to libertarian deserves some explanation. How was it that I opposed those measures only to become the champion of the Equal Marriage Act, the Lord Commissioner responsible for whipping it through all its stages in the Commons?”

“I put my original prejudice down to intellectual laziness,” he continued. “I simply never challenged, or even thought about the views that I held.

“Furthermore, when I received a very large correspondence in support of my position and against the liberalising measures that we were debating, it was so much easier to simply reply by stating that I agreed with them, rather than investing any intellectual effort in the matter.”

He added this his “transformation” saw him “become the champion of the Equal Marriage Act, the Lord Commissioner responsible for whipping it through all its stages in the Commons.”

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