PRIDE FM NEWS

Halifax-based Calderdale council is removing dozens of rainbow banners put up in the area through an £8,500 crowdfunding initiative.The Reform-led council says it’s removing the banners because they were placed on council property without approval. But the Labour Party in Calderdale says the banners were put up by a commercial company that has a contract with the council, and claims the move is politically motivated.

Egypt has followed Turkey in turning away an LGBTQ+ cruise ship. The Scarlet Lady, with 2,000 passengers on board, was first turned away from Turkey with authorities there saying the cruise had been chartered by groups known for behaviour that doesn’t align with the country’s society and moral values. Now the Egyptian government has followed l suit, without giving a reason for its decision. Cruise organisers are now looking for alternative ports. The Scarlet Lady is part-way through a 10-day Athens to Venice trip around the Mediterranean.

A summer-long experiment to provide more seating outside venues in Manchester’s Gay Village is now underway. The city council says it wants to help businesses away from the main Canal Street thoroughfare and has given the go-ahead for outside seating at bars in Bloom Street and Richmond Street. Venues such as The Lodge, The Goose and New York, New York have already set up chairs and tables outdoors - perfectly timed to take advantage of the present heatwave! The council’s monitoring the move, which, it’s hoped,will become a permanent feature.

Two more Pride events are joining the calendar this summer. In Devon, Okehampton Pride returns to Simmons Park on the eighteenth of July for its second year, with music, drag acts, thirty market stalls, sports activities, a dog show and a conga line around the park. Co-founder Daniel Burgess says visibility is key — describing Okehampton as an LGBTQ+ black spot and stressing how important it is for people to know they can be themselves. Meanwhile, the Isle of Cumbrae in Scotland is set to host its very first Pride festival on the twelfth of September, with organisers planning a seafront parade and community stalls in Millport. The event was inspired by neighbouring Arran Pride and aims to lay strong foundations for years to come.

Dannii Minogue has paid an emotional tribute to BBC Three's I Kissed a Girl as its final season comes to a close. The broadcaster has cancelled the groundbreaking queer dating show — Britain's first gay reality dating series — citing funding challenges. Minogue said she was riding waves of emotion, adding that queer joy being seen on screen is a defiant act. She admitted the team had hoped the show would open a doorway for more LGBTQ+ representation in the reality space — but says that hasn't happened in the way they expected.

Olympic swimming champion Mark Foster has revealed he lived a double life for years, hiding the fact that he is gay. In a new autobiography, Foster describes the pressure he felt to conform during his competitive career and the exhausting effort involved in keeping his sexuality secret. He says he hopes by speaking openly now he can help younger athletes feel they do not have to make the same choices he did.

Keighley Cougars, the Yorkshire rugby league club, have spoken exclusively to Attitude magazine about how they responded to a wave of homophobic abuse after becoming one of the UK's most openly LGBTQ+ inclusive sporting organisations. Co-owners Ryan O'Neill and Kaue Garcia say they received a torrent of hate following their decision to fly the rainbow flag and champion queer inclusion — but say the overwhelming response from fans, players and the wider community made it clear they were doing the right thing. The club, which this week received a Peugeot Attitude Pride Award, says they will not let hate win.

Attitude magazine has revealed the winners of its 2026 PEUGEOT Attitude Pride Awards Europe. This year's Pride Icons are rock band Placebo, whose anthem Nancy Boy has become an enduring symbol of LGBTQ+ self-expression, and singer-songwriter Cat Burns, celebrated for her openness about queer identity, autism and ADHD. Other honourees include ABC News journalist James Longman, Miss England trailblazer Grace Richardson, poet and BAFTA winner Dean Atta, YouTube creator Jessica Kellgren-Fozard, and Keighley Cougars owners Ryan O'Neill and Kaue Garcia, who have transformed the rugby league club into one of the UK's most proudly inclusive sporting organisations.

Leicester Pride is gearing up for its biggest year yet, with organisers expecting more than twenty thousand people to attend the free festival at Abbey Park on the fifth of September. Chair Martyn Parker described the season of Prides across the Midlands as becoming a powerhouse in the UK calendar, saying the event exists to show that everyone deserves to feel seen, valued and accepted. Leicester has established itself as the largest free one-day Pride festival in the Midlands, with a full programme of live music, entertainment and a city-centre parade.

A rainbow plaque has been unveiled in honour of the late gay icon Paul O'Grady outside his former home in Vauxhall, south London, where he lived between 1985 and 1995. His widower André Portasio said Victoria Mansions was more than just a home — it was where O'Grady found his voice as Lily Savage, formed friendships that lasted a lifetime, and became part of a community he would champion and fight for throughout his life. Among those gathered for the unveiling were drag queen Danny Beard, activist Peter Tatchell and Frankie Goes to Hollywood frontman Holly Johnson.

Leeds Hunters, the northern queer-inclusive-rugby-club, have put in a bid to host the Bingham Cup in twenty-twenty-eight. The Bingham Cup is the world’s largest amateur queer rugby tournament, expected to attract up to four thousand players from across the globe. Named after Mark Bingham — a gay American rugby player who died in the September the 11th attacks — the tournament has been held every two years since two-thousand-and-two. Leeds Hunters say their priority is ensuring every player can take part with confidence and a genuine sense of belonging, and the club has been explicit in its support for trans inclusion.

The former lead singer of the Village People, Victor Willis, has died at the age of 74. Willis, who performed as a policeman or naval officer, sang with the group for their hits YMCA, Go West and In the navy, before leaving in 1980. His later years were marked by substance abuse, before he announced in 2007 he was finally free from drug use.

West Midlands Police has issued a public apology for what its acting Chief Constable Scott Green called the historic mistreatment of LGBTQ+ communities across the region. In an open letter, Green acknowledged that laws were wrongly used to target gay and bisexual men, ruining lives and leaving people afraid to be open about who they were or who they loved. He said he has been deeply saddened by the trauma experienced by members of the community as a consequence of policing, and pledged to build a more positive and trusting relationship with LGBTQ+ people across the West Midlands going forward.

Canada has confirmed it will compete in next year’s Eurovision Song Contest in Bulgaria.
The country became eligible after joining the European Broadcasting Union, which supervises the competition, and will be the first new participants since Australia joined in 2015. Eurovision says Canada’s decision is a further sign that the song contest welcomes the world.

Veteran campaigner Peter Tatchell has accused FIFA of failing to check whether World Cup teams from countries that criminalise homosexuality would ever select an openly gay player. Tatchell was in Seattle where he called on football's governing body to enforce its own anti-discrimination rules. FIFA wrote back saying player selection is a matter for individual associations, a response Tatchell described as a shocking failure of governance. FIFA did confirm that rainbow flags are permitted at all World Cup matches.

A new stage musical based on the hit 2014 film Pride has opened at the Dorfman Theatre in London. The show reunites the film's screenwriter Stephen Beresford with director Matthew Warchus, telling the true story of how a group of LGBTQ+ activists in the 1980s began fundraising for a south Wales mining community during the miners' strikes — an unlikely alliance that blossomed into an enduring friendship between two very different communities. The Guardian describes it as a magnificent new musical in the same feelgood tradition as Billy Elliot and The Full Monty.

A new collection of global academic research finds that discrimination against LGBTQ+ people remains widespread across many parts of the world. Studies spanning Spain, China, Indonesia, India and Latin America point to ongoing challenges in schools, workplaces and wider society — including evidence that gay men face invisibility and violence in Indonesian cinema, that LGBTQ+ youth in Spain feel let down by teachers, and that inclusive workplace policies and positive media representation make a meaningful difference to how gay colleagues are treated.

The government has published its draft Conversion Practices Bill, which would ban abusive attempts to change someone's sexual orientation or gender identity in England and Wales. People found guilty could face an unlimited fine and up to five years in prison. Stonewall's chief executive Simon Blake called it a historic and long overdue step forward, saying LGBTQ+ people are not broken or in need of fixing. It has been eight years since Theresa May first vowed to introduce such legislation, with progress repeatedly delayed by political dispute and U-turns under successive prime ministers. The bill includes safeguards to protect legitimate healthcare, therapy, open conversations and free speech.

Japan is on the verge of introducing a nationwide LGBTQ+ education programme, designed to improve public understanding of gender and sexual diversity. The plan has been approved by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and is expected to be signed off by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's cabinet — despite the new PM's opposition to same-sex marriage. The programme would require schools to provide students with information about LGBTQ+ issues and give access to counsellors, and would also see universities add training on sexual diversity for future healthcare workers. Japan remains the only G7 nation yet to legalise same-sex marriage.

Romeo Beckham is set to make his acting debut in a gay tennis romance called Forty Love. The film, directed by fashion photographer Pierre-Ange Carlotti in his feature debut, sees Beckham play a charismatic rival to a French tennis star whose arrival unsettles everything the lead character thinks he knows about competition, ambition — and himself. The cast also includes Catherine Deneuve, and the film is due for release in France in November. Romeo will be following in his mother Victoria's cinematic footsteps — yes, we mean Spice World.

LGBTQ+ people in the United States are leaving the country in record numbers, according to a new report from Rainbow Railroad, the international LGBTQ+ asylum assistance organisation. The group received over twenty thousand requests for help relocating last year — a fifty-one percent increase on the previous year and the highest figure since it was founded in 2006. Strikingly, nearly a third of those requests came from American citizens fleeing the current administration's anti-LGBTQ+ policies, compared to just thirteen percent the year before. At the same time, fewer queer refugees from other countries are seeking asylum in the US, after the Trump administration effectively shut down the federal refugee admissions programme earlier this year.

A piece of LGBTQ+ history is making its first ever trip outside the United States this summer. A fragment of the original rainbow Pride flag — designed by artist and activist Gilbert Baker and first raised in San Francisco in 1978 — is travelling to Cork in Ireland, where it will go on display at the Cork Public Museum for four months. The loan has been agreed between San Francisco's GLBT Historical Society and the city of Cork, and will coincide with the opening of the museum's first permanent LGBTQ+ exhibition. The museum's curator says the flag's arrival sends a strong message that the museum is a place for everyone.

Toy Story 5 is in cinemas, and some viewers have been wondering whether the film contains an LGBTQ+ wedding. The opening scene features a marriage between the loveable plastic utensil Forky and a new character called Karen Beverly — a DIY toy made from a knife. One critic argued the couple constitute a queer pairing because they are described as husband and knife rather than husband and wife. Most viewers and reviewers, however, have concluded it is simply a very good pun from the writers — though PinkNews notes that if you want to read it as an LGBTQ+ wedding, absolutely go for it.

Liverpool's council leader has pledged to cherish the city's Pride Quarter after concerns were raised that it's disappearing before our eyes. Podcast host John Hyland raised the alarm warning that multiple queer venues in the Stanley Street area have closed in recent years. Council leader Liam Robinson responded warmly, saying the city knows how important its gay quarter is and vowing to raise Liverpool's voice even louder at a time when queer rights are being challenged elsewhere. His comments came with a pointed reference to neighbouring Saint --Helens, whose Reform-led council recently announced it will no longer support or promote Pride.

PinkNews is marking Pride Month with a handy explainer on what the plus in LGBTQ+ actually stands for — after a clip went viral of a comedian admitting she thought it meant plus size. In fact, the plus covers all sexual and gender identities not captured by the letters themselves, including pansexual, asexual, intersex and genderfluid people. The acronym has evolved significantly since the term LGBT first came into common use in the late nineteen-eighties, and debate continues about the best way to be truly inclusive.

A digital rights group is raising the alarm about the spread of facial recognition technology into queer bars. Reports from San Francisco's Castro District have revealed at least three venues are using biometric scanning kiosks at their doors, collecting customers' names, addresses and behavioural data. The campaign group Fight-for-the-future says the technology is a complete betrayal of community trust, warning that gay bars should be spaces where people can gather without fear of the kind of surveillance that has historically been used against vulnerable communities.

The Netherlands is set to become the latest country to ban conversion therapy, with the Dutch government announcing plans to outlaw the practice for both minors and vulnerable adults. The move has been welcomed by LGBT+ organisations, who say conversion therapy causes lasting psychological harm. The Netherlands joins a growing list of European countries to have introduced such a ban, including France, Germany and Spain.

Fighting with Pride, the charity that’s been campaigning for reparations for gay people thrown out of the military, says it fears many hundreds could miss out on thousands of pounds. With less than six months to go before the deadline for claiming compensation, the charity says this is because they’re not open about their sexuality or too ashamed to admit what happened. LGBT servicemen and women weren’t allowed in the military until 2000, despite homosexuality being decriminalised decades earlier. The Ministry of Defence says it deeply regrets the treatment of LGBT veterans and is working hard to publicise the compensation scheme.

With Wimbledon getting underway on the twenty-ninth-of-June, PinkNews has been looking back at the queer players who have made their mark on the famous grass courts. The roll of honour includes Billie-Gene-King, who holds the all-time record of twenty Wimbledon career titles, Martina Navratilova with nine singles titles, and Russian-Australian player Daria Kasatkina, currently the highest-ranked openly gay woman on the Women's-Tennis-Association tour. Swiss player Mika Brunold, who came out last year, has become only the second active male tennis player to identify publicly as gay.

EastEnders fans now have a date for the soap's special Pride episode — it airs on Thursday the second of July at half past seven, just two days before London's Pride parade on the fourth. As previously revealed, RuPaul's Drag Race star La Voix will be performing at the Queen Vic, fulfilling what is said to be a long-held dream. Viewers can also expect plenty of Walford drama in the run-up, with a new villain and a scheming newcomer both causing trouble before the community comes together to celebrate.

New global data from the Gallup organisation suggests that while acceptance of gay and lesbian people improved significantly during the twenty-tens, that progress has stalled in the current decade. Researchers point to the end of the marriage equality push, the rise of anti-trans campaigning in the US and UK, and the polarising effect of social media as likely factors behind the slowdown. The data also notes that some countries are now actively restricting the right to even ask such questions.

Heartstopper author Alice Oseman has announced an international book tour running from July through to November, timed around the publication of Heartstopper Volume Six and the release of the Netflix film Heartstopper Forever. UK dates include Alexandra Palace in London on the first of July and signings in Wales, York and Dublin. The tour then heads to the United States, Mexico, Canada, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand and France.

With Andy Burnham in the news at the moment, Attitude magazine has been taking a close look at his four-decade record on "el-gee-bee-tea-gueue-plus" equality. From marching against Section 28 as an 18-year-old student to formally apologising last year for decades of homophobia within Greater Manchester Police, the verdict is clear — Burnham is one of the most consistently pro-queer politicians in British public life.

A 17-year-old boy has been charged with attempted murder following an attack on a 50-year-old man in Smethick in the West Midlands. The victim, who is believed to be Sikh, remains in hospital in a critical but stable condition. West Midlands Police say the attack is now being treated as a hate crime following a homophobic comment made during the assault. A second teenager has since been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and is being questioned by police.

Graham Norton has won a US court order requiring Meta to reveal the identity of the person behind a Facebook page he says has subjected him and his family to years of false and harassing claims. The page, called The Westminster Wire, allegedly published multiple posts a day containing fabricated stories about Norton's personal life and health. Among the most distressing, he told the court, was his 94-year-old mother coming across a post falsely claiming she had died. The ruling clears the way for Norton to pursue legal action in England.

A petition calling for a public inquiry into the long-term impact of Section 28 — Margaret Thatcher's law banning the promotion of homosexuality in schools — has passed fifteen thousand signatures, triggering a requirement for the government to issue an official response. The petition, which runs until September, argues that the hostile culture created by the law continued well beyond its repeal in 2003 and still affects LGBTQ+ people throughout their lives. If it reaches one hundred thousand signatures, it could be debated in Parliament.

Historic moment at the men's World Cup. American assistant referee Brooke Mayo has become the first openly gay match official to take part in a men's FIFA World Cup, running the line in today's Group A fixture between the Czech Republic and South Africa in Atlanta. Mayo, who is 37, has spoken previously about the difficulties of growing up gay in the South and about how the football pitch is the place where she feels most supported being her authentic self.

Pride in Surrey has announced it is postponing this year's Guildford festival until the eleventh of September 2027, citing rising costs and a sharp fall in corporate sponsorship. Organisers say many Pride events across the country are facing similar difficulties this year. They have also clarified that Surrey County Council played no part in the decision — though they noted the council has never offered support or attended the event in any capacity. All tickets have been refunded.

British drag legend Myra DuBois has been cast in Titanique at the Criterion Theatre, joining the cast from the first of September. DuBois will play the role of Ruth, describing it as the role of a lifetime and promising to bring it "dramatique gravitas, levity, brevity and integrity." The Céline Dion musical parody has been a runaway success since opening in London, winning an Olivier Award for Best New Comedy and picking up four Tony nominations following its Broadway transfer earlier this year.

Sir Ian McKellen has revealed he shouted "Mar-a-Lago!" on set to get himself into a suitably furious headspace while filming a scene in which his character Magneto destroys New Jersey in the upcoming Marvel film Avengers: Doomsday. The 87-year-old, who plays the X-Men archvillain in the film due out in December, said the directors told him to look more furious — so he did just that. He then joked to his interviewer: "Will I be allowed back in the country?"

If you're planning a trip to Edinburgh in August, DIVA magazine has put together a bumper guide to LGBTQIA+ shows at this year's Fringe. Highlights include Rosie Jones with a new stand-up hour about dating and disability, Temi Wilkey celebrating the joys of single life in Lover Girl, and Dee Allum tackling football, mortality and trans identity in Raumdeuter. There's also absurdist physical theatre, a Hamlet reimagining in which the prince mourns a dead pig, and a late-night queer cabaret show called Those People. Something for everyone.

And finally. Actor Alan Cumming is backing a new fundraising initiative for H.I.V. charities - the Terrence Higgins Trust and George House Trust, inspired by his role in Channel 4's Tip Toe. Limited edition T-shirts bearing the branding of Spit-and-Polish — the fictional Manchester gay bar run by his H.I.V.-positive character Leo — are now on sale, with all proceeds split between the two charities. Cumming said that while treatments have transformed life for people living with H.I.V. , stigma, judgement and isolation remain very real problems for many.

And finally. Pop star Ariana Grande has launched a new foundation dedicated to supporting the queer community. The Brighter-Days-Ahead-Foundation will channel funding across four areas — defending queer rights, expanding access to mental health support, amplifying queer voices and stories, and providing emergency aid during crises. Grande said it has always been her privilege to support these causes and she is now able to extend that reach further.

Doctor-Who and It's-a-Sin creator Russell T Davies is writing his television memoirs. Titled The-Queerest-of-Folk: A-Life-in-Television and co-written with journalist Boyd Hilton, the book promises secrets, gossip and some hard truths drawn from nearly five decades in the industry — from Queer as Folk and Coronation Street through to his latest Channel 4 drama Tip Toe. It's due to be published in October.

If you're looking for a Pride getaway with a difference this summer, Gothenburg in Sweden is being tipped as one of Europe's most underrated queer city breaks. The city's West Pride festival, founded in 2007, takes over streets, squares and even trams throughout June with a programme combining performances, art exhibitions and community events. Gothenburg also boasts Sweden's first queer monument, a memorial tracing key moments in the city's queer history, and year-round queer venues including the much-loved bar that describes itself proudly as straight friendly.

With the FIFA World Cup now underway across the United States, Canada and Mexico, gay fans are being urged to think carefully about their safety at this year's tournament. England's official gay fan group, Three Lions Pride, has already announced it will not be attending, saying it cannot advise members they will be safe as openly queer supporters. A report by Human Rights Watch described a climate of fear in the United States, where a raft of executive orders has stripped back rights for queer people — particularly trans communities. Canada is considered the most welcoming of the three host nations, while Mexico, despite having some of the most progressive laws in Latin America, has the second-highest rate of gay hate crimes in the region.

RuPaul's-Drag-Race-UK winner Danny Beard has been cast as Paul O'Grady in a brand new stage show called SAVAGE. Written by Coronation-Street and Beautiful-Thing-playwright-Jonathan-Harvey, the production traces O'Grady's journey from working-class Birkenhead to becoming one of Britain's best-loved entertainers through his alter ego Lily Savage. The show has been created with O'Grady's blessing and draws on his own autobiographies. It opens at Curve in Leicester in February next year before heading on a national tour and transferring to the West End.

And finally. EastEnders fans have a treat in store this Pride month with drag artist and RuPaul's Drag Race star La-Vwah set to make a cameo in Walford, performing at The Queen Vic. It's a moment La-Vwah has reportedly long dreamed of, and her scenes are expected to air in early July to coincide with Pride in London.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has called for open public discussion of LGBTQ+ rights, telling a cultural event in Kyiv that those defending the country deserve equal rights regardless of, in his words, prejudices held by people from the fifteenth century. His comments come as Ukraine's parliament debates changes to the Civil Code, with LGBTQ+ organisations warning that some proposed provisions could undermine the country's commitments under its EU accession process.

LGBTQ+ people in Rochford, Essex say they feel unwelcome after the district's new Reform-controlled council moved to ban Pride flags and events in local libraries. The council said it was scaling back activities linked to particular groups or themes — a decision community members have described as straight out of Trumpland.