Jim Clarke Politics Show North West

Manchester Gay Village features on tourist literature for the city. Its thriving bars and restaurants attract thousands of gay and straight visitors every week.

Seventy gay couples were blessed during the Manchester Pride festival

The Gay Pride festival is now a popular feature of the city calendar.

Back in the 1960s it was very different.

Homosexual acts between consenting adults were illegal.

Prosecutions happened on a daily basis.

Gay culture was an underground culture.

In October 1964 the fight for change began, here in the North West.

Campaign group

Colliery manager Alan Horsfall and a group of friends set up the North West Homosexual Law Reform Committee.

It was the first campaigning organisation set up and run by gay men and its work led directly to the decriminalisation of homosexuality.

Gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell says the NWHLRC are forgotten heroes.

Mr Tatchell said: "It is high time their contribution was fully recognised.

To come out as openly gay men in the early sixties and campaign for a change in law was an immensely courageous act."

Politics Show North West meets up with Alan Horsfall, one of the surviving founders of that groundbreaking group.

He talks to us about the battles he faced, and the battles still facing gay men and women.

Gill Dummigan will be live from the gay village talking to some of today's campaigners.

... Also on Politics Show North West

Castles in the sand?

It is the Conservative party's turn to pack their buckets and spades this week and head off to Bournemouth for their annual conference.

Arguably the last one before the general election.

But what does the future hold for the party?

Do they stand a chance of gaining power or are they set for another embarrassment at the hands of Labour or even the Liberal Democrats?

Shirley Williams took the seat from the Tories in 1981

Politics Show North West has been to Crosby on Merseyside where television presenter Debi Jones is standing for the Conservatives.

Crosby has a permanent place in parliamentary history.

Back in1981 the safe Tory seat was won by Shirley Williams, an electoral upset that was thought to herald a new dawn in British politics.

That did not happen and the seat reverted to the Tories.

Labour territory?

Since 1997 Crosby has been a safe Labour seat and the Tories need a similar electoral eruption if they are to overturn a very healthy Labour majority.

But this is exactly the sort of seat the Tories need to capture if they are to begin the long road back to power.

This is Daily Mail land, a prosperous chunk of middle England that has deserted the Tories.

It is a predominately middle class constituency containing some of Liverpool's most affluent suburbs such as Formby .

Politics Show joins Debi Jones as she walks the streets with local councillors and party members meeting the people of Formby and asking her what she thinks she needs to do to win the seat back.

The Conservative Party in the area are hoping that Debi can bring enough sparkle to the campaign to stop Crosby becoming the latest in the long list of Merseyside's Labour strongholds.

Politics Show

So the Tories face tough questions.

We put some of them, live in the studio, to the Sale and Altrincham MP, Graham Brady.

Politics Show NW with Jim Hancock and Gill Dummigan.

Have your say

Let us know what you think. That is the Politics Show, Sunday, 03, October, at 12.30pm.

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