Lesbian and gay politics and participation in New Labour's Britain

This article draws on a two-year ESRC-funded research project on lesbian and gay equality in British local government to explore the possibilities for lesbian and gay politics and participation in New Labour's Britain. It is argued that in the absence of any explicit central government policy supporting lesbian and gay equalities, UK local authorities and community actors are required to act strategically and creatively with available policy discourses and initiatives to create spaces for their purposes. The effectiveness of such strategies, and decisions about which strategies to pursue, are also very much dependent on and affected by local political, cultural, and religious contexts and history.