This ex-MP didn’t vote for LGBT-inclusive sex education because he was ‘in a gay bar’
Jared O’Mara was an independent MP at the time of the vote. (House of Commons)
Former Labour MP Jared O’Mara said that he didn’t vote for the introduction of LGBT-inclusive relationship sand sex education (RSE) because he was in a gay bar at the time.
MPs voted to introduce new LGBT-inclusive RSE guidance in March by an overwhelming majority of 538.
Twenty-one voted against the measure with a further 35 absent from the ballot, including O’Mara, then MP for Sheffield Hallam.
Vice asked all 56 MPs who didn’t show their support why they hadn’t, with O’Mara giving perhaps the most memorable response.
“On the day of the vote he was at a gay bar in Sheffield for a documentary,” a spokesperson said.
“He’s spent the best part of the past 10 years drinking in that gay bar, half of his office staff are gay. He is an ally and fully supports the motion.”
Jared O’Mara quit Labour after several controversies.
O’Mara was elected as a Labour MP in the June 2017 general election, winning Sheffield Hallam from former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.
Throughout his campaign he spoke about living with disabilities – O’Mara has autism, depression, cerebral palsy and anxiety.
Upon election was promptly appointed to the women and equalities committee but stood down from the post a month later, after it emerged he had posted a series of homophobic, and misogynistic comments on an internet forum some 15 years earlier.
Labour MP Angela Rayner said at the time that O’Mara had acknowledged “those views he had 15 years ago were completely unacceptable and he changed his views from then”.
After a series of further controversies, including allegations that he had verbally abused a woman and used “transphobic slurs,” O’Mara was suspended by Labour in October 2017.
Nine months later, in July, it was announced that he would be readmitted following an internal review, however days later he resigned from the party.
He continued to sit as an independent MP until the dissolution of parliament on 6 November, and is not standing in the December election.
