The Foreign Office is accused of breaking the law by flying flags in support of bisexual awareness week without planning permission. The pink, purple and blue flags appeared in the courtyard of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in September.<\/p>\n
These two flags had been purchased in 2021 for \u00a3285.93 each to mark the 30th anniversary of the lifting of the ban on LGBT+ people serving in the diplomatic service.<\/p>\n
The Conservatives<\/a> say the flags were visible to the public and did not have \u201cdeemed consent\u201d \u2013 meaning permission should have been requested from the local planning authority.<\/p>\n While the rainbow flag does not require formal consent providing certain restrictions are complied with, the Tories<\/a> argue there are no such provisions for the display of the bisexual flag.<\/p>\n Shadow Cabinet Office minister Mike Wood claimed the decision to fly the flags breached the ministerial and civil service code and the department \u201cintentionally broken planning law\u201d. He said this is a \u201ccriminal offence\u201d which can incur a \u201cfine of up to \u00a32,500\u201d.<\/p>\n He stated in a letter of complaint to the department: \u201cI am surprised FCDO did not fly the white flag, given the Labour Government\u2019s policy of sabotaging our Brexit<\/a> freedoms and surrendering our hard-fought sovereignty to the European Union<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr Wood added: \u201cIn 2012, the Coalition Government gave \u2018deemed consent\u2019 to the traditional \u2018rainbow\u2019 flag of six horizontal stripes: the simple colours of the rainbow embrace both sexes and all identities and backgrounds. But particularly in the civil service in recent years, through the adoption of identity politics and critical race theory, we have seen an aggressive and intolerant atomisation of society, which divides rather than unites Britain.\u201d<\/p>\n Foreign minister Catherine West defended the decision in a letter to Mr Wood. Ms West stated \u201cofficials were aware\u201d the flag did not have deemed consent but argued this is not required when it is \u201cdisplayed on enclosed land\u201d.<\/p>\n She said: \u201cIt was proposed that the bisexual flags would be flown from two flagpoles in the FCDO\u2019s King Charles Street internal courtyard, an area not accessible to the public, to show support to bisexual staff. In September 2024, officials sought and received approval from the FCDO\u2019s then Permanent Under Secretary to fly these flags.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile we accept that the location of the flags was partially visible from publicly accessible areas, this is not the same as it being \u2018readily visible\u2019 from outside the building, or a place to which the public have a right of access, particularly in view of the strict security arrangements outside King Charles Street.\u201d<\/p>\n She added: \u201cThe FCDO proudly supports inclusivity, diversity and tolerance, both at home and abroad.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Foreign Office is accused of breaking the law by flying flags in support of bisexual awareness week…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128448,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[56640,2520,56641,5763,12,19793,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-128447","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-bisexual-flag","10":"tag-foreign-office","11":"tag-lgbt-rights","12":"tag-lgbtq","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-planning-permission","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114563765541263445","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128447\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}