Current Affairs

PinkNews Awards 2018 complete winners list

Oct 17 2018
Written by Sofia Lotto Persio

Emily Thornberry, Ed Miliband and Stephen Webb (Paul Grace)

The winners of the PinkNews Awards 2018 have been named during a ceremony at Church House in London on Wednesday (October 17).

The 11 categories celebrated achievements and support for LGBT+ rights in a wide range of sectors and activities. The winners were recognised for their work in advancing LGBT+ rights, with three categories recording joint winners.

Tony Blair reflects on LGBT+ rights progress and why the #PinkNewsAwards matter. pic.twitter.com/zGd11w8AoL

— PinkNews (@PinkNews) October 17, 2018

Lord Hayward and Conor McGinn MP won in the Politician of the Year category, the organisations Cara-Friend and The Rainbow Project were named Community Group of the Year, and podcasts Homo Sapiens, by Will Young and Chris Sweeney, and Reasons to be Cheerful, by ex-Labour leader Ed Miliband and award-winning radio host Geoff Lloyd, took home the Broadcast Award.

Politician of the Year and Broadcast Award were two of four categories open to public vote. PinkNews readers also crowned Kellogg’s My Perfect Bowl Ad Campaign of the Year, and recognised the work of all the activists who worked to decriminalise homosexuality in India as Campaigner of the Year.

Indian-born campaigners Subodh Rathod and Niranjan Kamatkar collect the award for Campaigner of the Year at the 2018 PinkNews Awards (Paul Grace)

One of the new categories introduced this year celebrated LGBT+ representation in drama. The inaugural Drama award was won by the critically-acclaimed BBC series A Very English Scandal, based the true story of the alleged attempted murder of Norman Scott, the ex-lover of the then leader of the Liberal Party Jeremy Thorpe.

The PinkNews Lifetime Achievement Award, which honours the work of an individual or organisation throughout the decades, was presented by former Prime Minister Tony Blair to the founders of Stonewall.

Lifetime Achievement Award winners, Stonewall founders, pose with former Prime Minister Tony Blair (Paul Grace)

The LGBT+ rights group will celebrate the 30th anniversary of its founding next year, as it was created in 1989 to campaign for the repeal of Section 28. The legislation was introduced the previous year by then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and prohibited schools and local authorities from “promoting” homosexuality. The law was finally repealed in Scotland in 2000 and the rest of the UK in 2003 under the Blair government.

Lisa Power MBE collected the award on behalf of all Stonewall founders, which included Sir Ian McKellen and Michael Cashman.