UKIP wants to introduce ‘LGBT rights tests’ for migrants, but not for UKIP candidates

The UK Independence Party, which has repeatedly failed to discipline its own Parliamentary candidates for homophobia, says it will introduce LGBT rights tests for immigrants.

The right-wing pro-Brexit party went ahead with the launch of its manifesto today ahead of next month’s General Election, though the election campaigns of the main parties remains suspended following the Manchester bombing.

In recent weeks the party has repeatedly refused to take action against Parliamentary candidates who have made anti-LGBT public statements, including a candidate who compared gay people to Nazis.

Just last week when challenged over a candidate who claimed gay people had “destroyed” marriage, an official UKIP spokesperson told PinkNews: “The very essence of freedom and toleration means that one accepts what one is opposed to, not as seems to the current reading, slavishly follow whatever it is the person pointing the finger happens to believe.”

However, despite insisting that they would not censor their candidates’ views on LGBT rights, the party’s manifesto wants to apply rigorous standard to immigrants.

It says:  “In Britain, we do not believe in treating women or gay people as second-class citizens, and we hold to a fundamental belief in democracy and free speech. UKIP’s points-based immigration system will therefore include one further major principle: we will test the social attitudes of migration applicants to foster community cohesion and protect core British values.”

Party leader Paul Nuttall said: “We will be the party that stands up for gender equality, freedom of expression and equality before the law, and make sure these values are applied in every community within our country.

“No doubt we will suffer insults from the politically-correct brigade for doing so, but that will not deter us.”

Under the rule, presumably the party’s Parliamentary candidate in Witney Alan Craig would not be eligible to enter the country.

Mr Craig, who UKIP refuses to sack, is an extreme opponent of LGBT rights who has repeatedly referred to LGBT people evoking Nazi imagery.

In a blog he wrote: “[The] Gaystapo are now on a roll.

“Their gay-rights storm troopers take no prisoners as they annex our wider culture, and hotel owners and registrars, magistrates, doctors, counsellors and foster parents, grandparents, adoption agencies and traditional street preachers find themselves crushed under the pink jack-boot.

“Thanks especially to the green light from a permissive New Labour government, the gay Wehrmacht is on its long march through the institutions and has already occupied the Sudetenland social uplands of the Home Office, the educational establishment, the politically-correct police, and the Guardianista management of the BBC.”

The only other policy on equality in the UKIP manifesto relates to education.

The UKIP manifesto empowers schools regulator Ofsted “to conduct snap inspections of schools when parents or pupils have raised concerns that (…) anti-equality views are being expressed by staff or governors”.

This comes despite UKIP leader Paul Nuttall’s long-held opposition to LGBT anti-bullying lessons in schools and inclusive relationship education.

Attacking Labour Party plans to tackle homophobia in schools previously, Mr Nuttall said: “Children deserve their innocence, which is precious and already under attack from every direction. It needs to be protected not defiled by those tasked with their care.

“[The] justification that it will help tackle homophobic bullying is just politically correct nonsense.”

He added: “It is going to confuse and worry these little children.”

The party manifesto also pledges to “end sex education in primary schools”.

Related:

Here is what the Labour manifesto pledges on LGBT rights

Here is what the Lib Dem manifesto pledges on LGBT rights

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