Virginia Blackburn

WHAT was the National Trust thinking? Whose bright idea was it to try to force volunteers at Felbrigg Hall in Norfolk to wear the rainbow badge celebrating gay pride? When someone suddenly realised it was losing both volunteers and supporters in droves, it backed down pretty quickly but what on earth motivated them to pull such a stunt in the first place? Britain is a pretty tolerant country but what these people who are so determined to force their own agenda on to everyone else don’t seem to realise is that it risks blowing up in their face. People don’t like to be told what to think. They’re also beginning to upset the very individuals who supported it in the first place. The person who gave Felbrigg Hall to the National Trust was Robert Wyndham Ketton-Cremer, who by all accounts never talked about his sexuality and whose family have been very upset by the Trust recently outing him as gay.

Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t but the Trust had no right whatsoever to do such a thing, not least as he came from a very different generation which did not wear its heart on its sleeve. None of us has the right to start imposing our mores on people who lived at a different time.

To say this, risks accusations of homophobia so just to get this straight (as it were) two of my closest friends are gay, both in long-term relationships, and I have always had a lot of gay chums. It is not homophobic to say that the National Trust’s behaviour has been outrageous and shameful. It exists