Group brands party standing in May 5 poll as ‘far to right’
Scottish Family Party say they adhere to family values
A controversial political party standing in Lanarkshire’s council elections have been accused of holding“extremist” right wing views by a charity.
Hope Not Hate say the Scottish Family Party’s policies – which include blocking transgender surgery, scrapping the LGBT inclusive education programme in schools and opposing any hate speech legislation – are bigoted.
However, the party, who are standing in four seats across South Lanarkshire and five across North Lanarkshire, have called the charity “far left activists” with an agenda.
The Scottish Family Party was established in 2017 and say they are running a campaign based around traditional family values and the belief
a child should be brought up by a mother and a father.
They also stress they are Scotland’s only anti-abortion party.
Advocacy group Hope Not Hate said they have concerns about the party’s policies, and their usage of “conspiratorial” language, comparing them to American far right groups.
The charity’s Patrik Hermansson told us: “They aren’t a fascist party, but they are far to the right and use a lot of extremist rhetoric and ideas in their policies.
“I would say they are anti-gay, antitrans and anti-abortion, and a lot of the language they use – based around what they say is protecting children – is very conspiratorial.
“It mirrors a lot of American Christian far right parties where it’s all about disguising the actual far right views under the guise of looking out for children.
“They want to cut LGBT issues from being discussed in schools and they are strongly against any rights for transgender people to change sex – that’s something they appear very concerned with.
“It’s concerning they are a growing party. They haven’t had much traction in any previous elections, but they are becoming more normalised each time they stand.”
A Scottish Family Party spokesman told us the party believes that transgender people can dress in another gender’s clothing or change their name, but not identify themselves as anything other than the gender they were born as.
The party also advocate scrapping any hate speech legislation, saying it would support freedom of speech. However, campaigners fear that would result in an increase of abuse towards minorities with no resource to halt it.
In their manifesto, the group state they oppose the LGBT inclusive education programme, saying it “mandates the indoctrination of schoolchildren into a radical ideology of sexuality”.
They also argue that “medical confidentiality should not be granted to under-16s, unless there are credible allegations of parental abuse or neglect,” and that they would seek to roll back harassment laws, as “violating your dignity” should not be a matter for the law.
They also wish to remove psychological abuse from being considered domestic abuse, stating that it is “open to spurious application”.
For example, they argue that laws relating to making a person “dependent on another person” or “feel humiliated or degraded” could be interpreted to cover behaviours far short of “abuse” and risk “bringing the threat of legal sanction into more superficial relationship conflicts”.
A spokesman for the party added that LGBTQ support groups currently run by South Lanarkshire Council should not be run by the local authority and should be organised privately by individuals, while other groups such as Scottish Women’s Aid would have their funding cut or removed.
The party’s leader, Richard Lucas – who founded the Scottish Family Party after leaving UKIP – strongly denied the claims that his party was bigoted.
He said: “Hope Not Hate are far left activists who label anyone right of centre as extremists or fascists.
“If you look at who they consider to be far right, you’ll see they include the likes of Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage there.
“We aren’t an anti-LGBT party, we aren’t anti-gay and we have no views on same sex marriage.
“The two things we have stressed is there shouldn’t be things like the Pride rainbow flag being used in primary schools, as primary school children are not old enough to understand things of that nature.
“Secondly, we believe children need a mother and a father.
“That isn’t being anti-gay, as we are also against IVF treatment being given to single people. The most vital thing is that there is a mother and a father for a child.”
The party’s other policies include repealing the smacking ban as part of plans to give parents more freedom to raise their child however they wish, encouraging families to have more children and revamping the Scottish education system.
They would also seek to remove any quotas for university courses that benefit those from poorer postcodes, such as Rutherglen, arguing that university selection should be granted to the most able, regardless of background.