Pride organisers condemn political activity at event

Pride organisers have criticised political campaigning at an event where party activists were urged not to attend.

Oxford's parade on 7 June was one of several UK Pride events that banned parties in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling on gender.

Organisers said they were particularly upset that Oxford Socialist Party illegally collected money for striking Birmingham bin workers.

The party said it wanted to "raise the need for unity between the fight for LGBTQ+ rights and the fight for workers' rights".

In a statement, Oxford Pride said it was "deeply disappointed" by the decision of two political parties to attend.

It said Oxford Socialist Party collected money without a council licence.

It added that activists from the party reportedly made false claims that the money was for Pride.

Oxford City Council confirmed it was investigating an official complaint.

Oxford Socialist Party did not comment on the allegation of false claims when approached by the BBC.

In a statement, it said: "Now is the time LGBTQ+ workers and young people need to deepen ties with other workers' struggles.

"The extremely positive response to our presence and the solidarity shown by those attending the event towards the Birmingham bin workers shows that attempting to keep politics out of Pride does not represent the views of most of the LGBTQ+ community."

In a Facebook post, the party said the bin strike collection raised £162.58.

Oxford Pride said a second group, the Socialist Workers Party, handed out literature at the event.

The party commented: "On the Saturday of the Oxford Pride march we continued [our] tradition of public engagement with a stall in Bonn Square which was supported by the passing public who stopped to sign our petitions against the Supreme Court ruling and another against more austerity cuts.

"Two of our members were handing out flyers for a protest against planned attacks on disabled people.

"At a time when the LGBT+ community is facing the most serious of political attacks from the far right we do not think silence is an option."

Oxford Pride said it had wanted to create a "safe and non-partisan space" at the event.

Other Pride events, in Birmingham, Brighton, London and Manchester, have previously said political parties would not be welcome until they demonstrated a "tangible commitment to trans rights".

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