Tory MPs demand Boris Johnson take action after BBC censors ‘f****t’ from Fairytale of New York
Tory MP John Hayes, a long-time opponent of LGBT+ rights, is very upset about Fairytale of New York (Getty)
After Radio 1 censored the word “faggot” in “Fairytale of New York”, more than 25 Tory MPs have decided the best use of their time is calling for an attack on BBC funding.
The manufactured annual controversy over the song by Kirsty MacColl and the Pogues is in full swing, with BBC Radio 1 announcing last week it would censor the homophobic slur in the festive track.
In a letter to prime minister Boris Johnson, MPs from the hardline conservative Common Sense Group have urged him to respond by decriminalising evasion of the license fee.
The letter, reported by The Mail on Sunday, says: “In light of the BBC’s repeated refusal to address its organisation’s undoubted liberal bias, illustrated most recently by its bizarre decision to censor a well-known Christmas song, (perhaps, similarly, the whole canon of popular music is to be reviewed by a highly paid zealot!), we believe it is now time to decriminalise the licence fee, so enabling ordinary Britons to choose whether or not to pay for the BBC’s content.”
The list of MPs who put their name to the letter is bravely unspecified, though the newspaper notes it is led by ex-minister Sir John Hayes, a long-time opponent of LGBT+ rights.
Kirsty MacColl and Shane MacGowan originally sang ‘Fairytale of New York’. (Tim Roney/Getty Images)
Hayes was one of a group of 73 diehard MPs who voted against extending equal marriage to Northern Ireland last year, and he has also lashed out at “radical LGBT groups,” lamenting that “sadly” some Conservatives support transgender rights.
He has previously compared reform of gender recognition laws to “what Maoists once did to the people of China and Bolsheviks to those in Russia”, insisting: “We should celebrate the God-given differences between men and women, enjoying the special characteristics of two naturally-ordained human types”.
Another signatory is named as the Tory MP Tom Hunt, who hit out at “high-profile public organisations… promoting divisive political agendas”.
Tory MPs want charitable status revoked from National Trust for exploring history of colonialism.
In addition to the BBC, the letter takes aim at the National Trust, which has come under repeated fire from Conservatives for its commitments to LGBT+ history and of studying the links of its properties to colonialism.
Tory MP Andrew Bridgen and ex-MPs Ann Widdecombe and Sir Nicholas Soames previously hit out at the trust for a survey asking daring to include a question about sexual orientation on a voluntary survey.
The letter goes even further, calling for the trust to have its charitable status revoked. It seeks “the withdrawal of charitable status of guilty parties, notably the National Trust”.
