Kate Forbes: Christian viewpoints being squeezed out of UK politics

Christian politicians are written-off as “biased” and “irrelevant”, Kate Forbes has said.

In a speech to the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (Arc) conference in London, the former deputy first minister is reported to have said contributions to debate from Christians are regularly ‘de-legitimised’ by critics.

Referring to the assisted dying debate, she said that “any contributions from people of Christian faith” are treated as “automatically biased and therefore irrelevant”. 

Forbes said she had come under pressure to “lie” about her faith during the 2023 SNP leadership contest, which she lost to Humza Yousaf.

She said: “The end result felt like a victory because during that period I thought: I have not given in when I could have.”

Forbes, who stepped down from parliament ahead of the May election, was on maternity leave when the contest to replace Nicola Sturgeon was called.

She faced criticism for comments on gay marriage, saying she would not have voted for it had she been an MSP at the time, and on unmarried parents.

Speakers at the Arc conference include Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, ex-PM Boris Johnson, Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, and former Australian premieres Tony Abbot and Scott Morrison.

Peers Claire Fox and Kate Hoey, writer Julie Bindel and astronaut Victor Glover were also on the bill.

Forbes said “courage” is a requirement in public debate and in parliament, saying that neither the Right nor Left in UK politics now make “space for conscience”.

On assisted dying, she said: “One prominent campaigner railed against undeclared personal religious beliefs… in the debate and dismissed arguments from those who were guided by faith. But nobody demands that of anybody subscribing to the new faith, the new ideologies and the new philosophies of our day. 

“Their moral framework, their basis of decision-making, is accepted without question, as though anybody who is free of the burden of an inner conscience grounded in historical truths is unbiased and unprejudiced. 

“Those who hold to those truths – those truths that have birthed such great freedoms and liberties across the ages – are excluded by default.”