by Soho Politico

Over the past few weeks I have been collecting information from human rights to shed light on one of David Cameron’s allies in his new European grouping. This is the first of a multi-part investigation.

Despite the persistent criticism that it has allied itself with extremists, David Cameron’s Conservative Party now sits in the European Parliament with the European Reformists and Conservatives group (ECR), led by Poland’s Michal Kaminski – a man allegedly with a racist and homophobic past.

But so far it has gone unreported that another ally of the Conservatives in Europe has a much more serious and recent record of homophobia.

Valdemar Tomaševski, MEP from Lithuania, and member of the Tories’ Euro coalition, is on record as having branded homosexuality a “perversion”.

Not only that, I can now reveal for the first time that he also personally voted for a Lithuanian law that has been described as a harsher, more wide-reaching version of Britain’s Section 28.



The Lithuanian law was widely condemned by human rights watchdogs. The draconian “Law on the Protection of Minors from the Detrimental Effects of Public Information” bans discussion of homosexuality not only in schools but in any public places and media that could be accessed by young people.

Amnesty pointed out that if adopted, the proposals would also permit the prosecution of an extremely wide variety of activities, including campaigning on human rights issues relating to sexual orientation and gender identity, providing sexual health information to lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) people or the organization of gay film festivals, or Pride events.

Tomaševski voted for the law on 16th June, shortly before vacating his seat in the Seimas, Lithuania’s national parliament, to become a MEP (see his voting record [in Lithuanian] here – Row 10) Update: here is an English translation.

Amnesty International has strongly condemned the Lithuanian hate law, saying it “deprives young people of their right to freedom of expression and access to information and risks isolating children who are already amongst the most at risk of violence at school or within the family.”

It’s UK LGBT Campaigner Kim Manning-Cooper said:

This is a very bad day for LGBT rights in Lithuania. By adopting this deeply homophobic legislation, the Lithuanian authorities have taken a huge step backwards. This law is a clear infringement of freedom of expression and non-discrimination rights and should be repealed immediately.

A raft of other human rights groups and campaigners have also added their criticisms of Lithuania, among them Peter Tatchell, who said in June:

This legislation is homophobic discrimination. As such, it clearly violates the European Convention on Human Rights and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. It also violates the equality and anti-discrimination clauses of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Lithuania has signed up to these international humanitarian declarations but it is now defying them. It wants the rights of EU and UN membership, but not the responsibilities.

A mere week after voting to pass the homophobic law, Tomaševski was welcomed with open arms into the Tories’ ECR group.

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(with many thanks to the kind people at the Lithuanian Gay League for responding to my request for information about Tomaševski’s voting record in the Lithuanian parliament)

Cross-posted to the Soho Politico blog too.