Jim Wells to sue BBC over Homophobia claims #TheTruth

Apparently Jim Wells MLA told the Belfast Telegraph is the sue the BBC over reporting the story about the Lesbian couple he encountered while out campaigning for the 2015 Assembly elections. He claims that the comments were "doctored" and "misrepresented what he said"  He goes on to say that he will "stop at nothing to clear his name".

Well if he is to do that I cannot hold back on some truth that I have promised members of my family that I would not ever disclose. I also am lifting the gentleman's agreement I have with one of the BBC journalists who witnessed one of the events that I am about to unfold.

It is a little know fact that Jim Wells actually invited a leading Northern Irish LGBT+ activist the wedding of one of his daughters. I happen to know this to be true, because it was I who received the invite, you see said daughter's husband is part of my family. I had a quiet conversation with Jim on that occasion he shook my hand, spook to me and looked me in the eye. He was also close enough to smell my cologne and not one of these sensory seemed to be repugnant to Mr Wells.

I can only therefore surmise that later when he said all those who took part in Belfast Pride he found repugnant that the only sense that would cause that reaction would be if he tasted me!

However, this wedding and meeting took part before the first debate on marriage equality at Stormont. On that day I was attending the debate and there was an interlude between the debate and the vote for questions. It was during this time that I encountered Jim Wells as a homophobe for the first time. Homophobia is described as having an irrational fear of homosexuality and/or homosexuals. Which I think describes what actually happened in the the restaurant that day. I was in the queue beside the Rev Chris Hudson and across the way was the BBC journalist. Ahead of me was Jim Wells.

I started with a friendly "Hello Jim" at which he turned around, I was about to ask after the health of Grace his wife and the rest of the family but after a quick look at who I was, I happened to be wearing my rather large I'm Liberal badge with a rainbow Lib Dem bird, he said "Oh you're one of them" and quickly turned heal. Rather an irrational, fearful reaction if you ask me.

Even before that however, I was at a hustings in the Black Box about international development was as I was working in a politically restricted role at the time I couldn't of course at my name to this piece on the Liberal Democrats NI website. Today I feel we have to disclose that this was my first hand account. Jim Wells assistant who at the time was dating a member of family looked straight over at me and mouthed, "You can't possibly blog that".

A number of years later and that assistant actually married that member of my family. His boss was invited to the wedding, as was I. This was a much stranger family gathering Jim was actively seen to be looking in my direction and actively avoiding me at the same time by my mother and others. I even saw this myself from out of the corner of my eyes. I'm not sure what he was expecting if I ever went anywhere near him, but it was yet another example of what I can only describe as the actions of someone who has an irrational fear of something, the fact that that something was me a politically astute campaigner who amongst other things is gay may well indicate that there is homophobia as an undercurrent and not in the glib way which that word is used at times, but a genuine actual fear.

I feel sorry for Jim that he suffers from such fear. But if he wants the truth to come out I am more than happy to help in that happening.

New Minister of Health

So who have the DUP gone and replaced Edwin Poots with as Minister for Health, Social Services and Public Safety. Why none other than their member for South Down Jim Wells.

The question is whose health etc will be looking after?

In 2011 the new Health Minister said that the behaviour of those who took part the march at Belfast Pride was "totally repugnant". Now that he is a minister he should not be judging and without evidence generalising such a group of LGBT Northern Irish people, plus their families and supporters. He should be providing health and social services to them without discrimination as well as working to improve their public safety. So yeah this does include proper sex education and that included MSM sex as well as disease prevention. he may not condone the activity but he has budgetary responsibility for the consequences.

But that is that the only group whose health in now in the hands of this man. The following year he said that victims of rape and sexual assault should not be exempt from the strict Northern Irish laws banning abortion. His plan instead, contrary to the opinion of many medical professionals, is that such traumatised women should carry the child full term and offer it up for adoption. This of course means that the trauma of the assault would have to be revisited 9 months after the incident as well as the various times during that period that the mother has to go through pregnancy.

What is worse of course is that Mr Wells made these comments while Deputy Chair of the Health Committee and has long been muted as the replacement for Mr Poots. It looks like we have lost one science sceptic from the health department for one just as, if not more so, sceptical person. Who seems to ignore medical advise, scientific evidence and has a way with language that is ill thought out and offensive to groups which he now has some say over key elements of their well being.

We live in interesting times, but then so was the days of the dinosaurs.

Who is ultimate victim of rape?

There has been a lot of talk about rape in the past week. Whether it be about Julian Assange or Todd Akin, but we've had another case right here in Northern Ireland.

When I was working for the Yes! campaign in Northern Ireland I had to walk past The Family Planning Association on the way to get my lunch. Quite often there were pickets outside. Because unlike anywhere else in the UK abortion is still illegal in Northern Ireland.

It does not of course prevent Northern Irish women seeking abortions, indeed over 1000 traveled to seek one last year alone, they merely have the additional trauma have having to travel to England, Scotland or Wales. But today their anguish wasn't helped by the next Health Minster the DUP MLA Jim Wells.

Speaking on the Nolan Show he said that the ultimate victim of rape is the unborn child. Adding:

"Should he or she be punished for what has happened by having their life terminated? No.

"In Northern Ireland, there are hundreds of married couples who would love to adopt children - a child, a baby - and who could give support in that situation."

Now there isn't just one victim of any rape. Indeed in the last year in Northern Ireland there were 525 cases reported. This figure is actually higher than the number reported in the Republic of Ireland which has three times the population!

So what about the mental well being of all those 525 victims?

Not all of those 525 will want to face a nine month reminder of the horrid crime carried out against their person. Suffering through morning sickness, the back pain, the increase in girth (not to mention having to buy maternity clothes). That is to say nothing of the additional mental anguish both during and after pregnancy of having gone through being forced to carry the child full term.

Who is the ultimate victim of Northern Ireland not allowing abortion, even in such conditions?

Of course to get across to England, Scotland or Wales, these women are using savings theirs or their families, digging into pension funds or going to loan sharks to afford the additional expense of getting a ferry or flight and accommodation to cover them meeting with the two doctors, both strangers to the woman, to get the approval to abort.

Now of course earlier this week i pointed out that the DUP used biblical verses to attack gay marriage. Someone even tried to tell me that while the civil and ceremonial laws were outlawed the moral ones were to be upheld. Therefore I'm not quite sure why Jim Wells wasn't quoting the following biblical verses to defend his position, the DUP after all have cleared their members to do so.

If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father.  Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her. 

Deut 22: 28-29 New Living Translation

  If within the city a man comes upon a maiden who is betrothed, and has relations with her, you shall bring them both out of the gate of the city and there stone them to death: the girl because she did not cry out for help though she was in the city, and the man because he violated his neighbors wife.

Deut 22: 23-24 NLT 

So why stop at merely letting the women who has suffered at the hands of the rapist go full term and give the child up for adoption, surely the DUP should be marrying her off as this is a tradition form of biblical marriage? One goes on to wonder how any DUP politician would deal with a daughter who found herself pregnant as the victim of rape?

But of course they realise how ridiculous it is to call for that. So instead they merely add to the trauma of removing something that is causing the victim, and let us not forget the woman is a victim of a crime, undo anguish. Any other crime once the police come and take pictures of the evidence the results can be cleared away and people get on with their life, but for rape the DUP are prepared to let women live with the results, that have crashed into their lives unwarranted, for nine months.


Earlier today I did post this from the Huffington Post about how the pro-lifers are so much only looking at the rarer commodity for human reproduction. Of course going again the biblical precedent Onanism as masturbation is also called was because Onon in Genesis 38 while having sex with his dead brother's wife pulled out during sex and prevented her giving her dead husband the heir that was required from his younger brother's seed. God himself put him to death.

He'll travel to the Falls but not down the corridor - is that repugnant?

Now there was a time that a DUP elected politician attending a debate at St. Louise's School on the Falls Road would garner nothing but applause. Let me add that of course I'm delighted that the DUP send representatives to the Féile's West Belfast Talks Back event it shows an inclusiveness and more towards normality that was still somewhat lacking a few short years ago.

The problem comes from the DUP representative at this year's event. Yeah Jim Wells is the one who will happily attend a discussion on a wide range of issues on the Falls Road, but wouldn't attend a similar event in the Long Gallery just down the corridor and down some stairs from his Stormont office. Now I'm pretty sure that the behaviour of both audiences will be similar. Respectful of all the speakers, asking questions and listening to the answers. The clothing of those at both these debates will be normal summer street clothing I'd hazard as the weather today is as good as last Monday.

Yet Jim Wells is quite prepared to cross into one section of Northern Ireland society for a discussion of issues that a few years ago he wouldn't have been seen in, yet he wasn't even prepared to head to a different part of the building he works in to talk to another. What is worse he turns down the invite to the other with a message that had veiled meanings that he has refused to comment on or clarify. The different treatment of two different sections of the community that are protected under the two different parts of Section 75 of the Belfast Agreement is something that should be shown up and shouted about for what it is.

Repugnant! 

A politician who were to show such overt prejudice in another part of the United Kingdom would be condemned by his party leadership and would not be considered suitable to hold front bench office. The fact that Mr Wells is earmarked for an office that will have the health and social well being of the LGBT community within his remit is something that is abhorrent to a large number of the LGBT people I have spoken to since Jim's comments were made public. However, he is in the DUP and the position is one that the DUP have chosen under d'Hondt so sadly there is little chance of castigation from on high in his party. Ranks have already been closed, no comments are being made except to lie about the amount of notice given of Pride on the Hill.

Now is the time to engage Jim. If you don't I expect you are going to be picketed wherever you go. Something that he is well aware of happening when people are angry about not being consulted or appearing to have their views taken on board, and if "passions run high" who can tell what takes place. Not that I'm expecting the physical presence of this young DUP protester this evening but a peaceful protest and picket.

Jim Well's response watch Day 7

Me with QUBSU VP Welfare Adam McGibbon

As we know last week Jim Wells said:

"I understand that you [Belfast Pride] contacted my Kilkeel office regarding what is termed a 'Belfast Pride' debate.

"As you are probably know I find the behavior of those who take part in this march totally repugnant.

"I do not thereforee wish to be association in any way with this event.

"My position on this matter will not change in the future and I would politely suggest that any further requests of this nature will be a total waste of your time."

As one of the Northern Irish LGBT community, and the LGBT people of faith community who has also been to a Wells' family event I thought I'd give him to the right to clarify just what he meant in that statement and his subsequent comments to Diana Rusk at the Irish news.

It is now 7 days on from the Pride on the Hill event and Mr Wells has yet to answer the following questions that I posed to him on 26 July.

1) You turned down an invite to a debate as part of the festival not to the parade itself by saying that you found the behavior of those at the parade totally repugnant. As the areas covered included the higher level of LGBT teens who commit suicide, adoption by L&G couples, heteronormative views and traditions within schools etc some of this is within a Health remit. Does your statement that your "position on this matter will not change in the future and I would politely suggest that any further requests of this nature will be a total waste of your time" mean that you are never likely to meet with LGBT groups to discuss such issues?

2) You said you found the costumes and behaviour of those who take part in such parades repugnant. I'll be wearing my kilt with daywear sporran and casual shirt, my activities will be to march in beat to the music and represent my party. How is this anymore repugnant than many other parades that take place in this wee country of ours?

3) Diana Rusk reposted that you were asked if it was the behaviour of the participants that he felt were "repugnant" and not the activities of gay people, to which you said you had no comment. That is a political evasion that the LGBT community see as avoiding giving an awkward answer. As John McCallister said yesterday "The DUP don't condemn same sex cohabitees, or everyone who has sex outside marriage, bacause there are too many of them." The implication being that your party's refusal to meet and answer questions of the LGBT sector under part 1 of Section 75 is to do with electoral maths rather than a matter of principle. How do you respond to that and do you want to answer Diana's original question?

4) There is anger in the LGBT community at the DUP's continued marginalisation and apparent demonisation of the community. While the party talks about being newly progressive, how can continued non-attendance or no comment on issues raised about the LGBT members of our shared society be seen as condusive from the party with the largest level of support?

Still no response. I don't think there is anything in these questions that could be construed in anyway repugnant. We wonder if we will ever get answers.

Future DUP Health Minister calls Pride "totally repugnant"

Diana Rusk in the Irish News today is naming the DUP member who called the people who take part in the Belfast Pride Parade as "totally repugnant". As the Irish Times is like its UK counterpart behind a firewall you can learn about this on The Journal's website.

repugnant [rɪˈpʌgnənt]adj

1. repellent to the senses; causing aversion

2. distasteful; offensive; disgusting

3. contradictory; inconsistent or incompatible
from Collins English Dictionary

The fact that the person named ignores the fact that the people who are parading because they are still needing the devolved assembly to pay attention to a number of inequalities that affect the LGBT community, especially from the DUP spokespeople, is shocking. The fact that he is the future Minister for the Department of Health and Social Services, South Down MLA Jim Wells, is bound to be even more horrifying. It was while she was Chair of the Health Committee that Iris Robinson made her comments about homosexuality being an abomination. There are also some distinct health measures that the LGBT community use more than some others, e.g. the services of the various GUM clinics, so for the future health minister to make such comments is of obvious concern

Apparently though as I am repugant to all the senses Jim Wells is going to have to get rid of me from four out of five of his* having attended a family wedding linking both his and my family. I've been attending Pride and will be there with fellow LGBT Lib Dems on Saturday in the parade.

As there is that connection however I have invited Jim Wells to have a right to reply posted fully on this blog, I await his response.

The full story in the Irish News I have posted below so that people do not have to pay for the pay wall.

Future minister says gay pride event 'repugnant'

 by Diana Rusk, Political Correspondent

The future health minister Jim Well has branded as "totally repugnant" those who take part in Belfast's gay [sic] pride parade. Mr Wells made the comments in a text message to one of the event's oirganisers.

All the main parties bar the DUP took part in the political discussion at Stormont yesterday as part of Gay Pride Week.

The South Down assembly member, who is to take over from Edwin Poots as health minister in 2013, was among colleagues who rejected the invitation. He explained his reasons in a text he sent to Gay Pride secretary Simon Rae on Friday.

"I understand that you contacted my Kilkeel office regarding what is termed a 'Belfast Pride' debate," he wrote.

"As you are probably know I find the behavior of those who take part in this march totally repugnant.

"I do not thereforee wish to be association in any way with this event.

"My position on this matter will not change in the future and I would politely suggest that any further requests of this nature will be a total waste of your time."**

Mr Rea said the message was like a "painful shock" when he recieved it.

"I was personally offended and deeply disappointed," he said.

"I thought Jim Wells would have been the ideal candidate to take part in this debate. he is the chair [sic only deputy] of the health committee and will be the next health minister.

"Some of the issues will be a major part of his brief.

" A lot of the debate will be around health issues like suicide, self-harm, adoption, without even looking at the sexual health stuff.

"Regarding his future as the health minister, it is not a good start.

"He seemed to think I would know he would have an issue with being asked.

"We invite all parties to these political events. The DUP never take part and normally we either get no response of one stating  that they are not available.

"I think politicians need to realise that seven to 10 per cent of their constituencies are lesbian, gay or bisexual."

Sinn Féin lord mayor Niall O Donnghaile, the SDLP's Delores Kelly, UUP Deputy Leader John McCallister, Alliance councillor Michael Bower and Green Party Leader Steven Agnew all attended yesterday afternoon's debate. Mr O Donnghaile described Mr Wells' comments as "offensive" while Ms Kelly said he was guilty of a "demonisation of a sector of the community". Mr McCallister said his comments were unnecessary and unhelpful".

When contacted by The Irish News yesterday, Mr Wells said his comments referred to the activities of the participants of the parade.

"The gay pride people are trying to miscontrue my comments," he said.

"They refer to teh parade. If a heterosexual group were behaving in this way, I would still condemn it.

"The parade is repugnant - the costumes they wear and the way they behave during it."

Asked if he meant that it was the behaviour of the participants that he felt were "repugnant" and not the activities of gay people, he replied: "I have no comment on this."

He refusal to clarify that last comment is not the first time Jim Wells has been unable to comment on gay issues. I guess my clothing for Saturday a kilt with casual daywear is repugnant, though totally in keeping with Scottish use of the kilt way from a formal setting even down to the correct level of sporran. Or maybe it is my activity on the march, walking to the beat as I usually strive to do at these events, that is repugnant. But surely this activity is just like the 4,000 plus other marches across Ulster, including those that Mr Wells takes part in wearing an Orange piece of material around his neck which is so not really his colour. After all he must be busy being a member of 3 loyal orders.

* He didn't taste me.
** There is a photo of the text in question with the time stamp 15:55 on 16/7/11 which also throws out the DUP  excuse for not attending as they were not invited until Thursday of last week i.e. 21 July.

Caption Competition

What are Jim Wells MLA and Margaret Ritchie saying below

Picture ©Kelvin Boyes presseye.com

Answers in the comments below, I may have a wee prize for the best one.