“The LGBT associative and activist world will be very attentive to the positions taken” by ministers, warns the Queer Pantin association.

The Queer Pantin association reacts to the announcement of the composition of the Barnier government.

“The LGBT associative and activist world will be very attentive to past positions” new ministers “and see what will be proposed”warned Erwan Passey, co-founder of the Queer Pantin association, on franceinfo on Sunday, September 22, the day after the announcement of Michel Barnier’s government, and while Gabriel Attal promised to ask the new Prime Minister “to clearly state that there will be no going back on medically assisted procreation, the right to abortion, LGBT rights.”

“Many of us are very worried about the appointments that have been announced,” says Erwan Passey. He tempers the position taken by Gabriel Attal who “seems to forget” according to him “that within his government itself, there were already ministers, whom he himself had proposed, from the ranks of the Manif pour tous or people who had taken similar positions at the time of the vote on marriage for all”. “Including on conversion therapies, on transitions for trans minors, there were also strong positions taken on their part”, the activist emphasizes.

Erwan Passey also points out Michel Barnier who voted against the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1982. “Perhaps Mr Barnier has evolved on these issues”admits the representative of Queer Pantin. “But his past actions and positions clearly do not speak in his favor. Our concerns are entirely legitimate regarding our rights and our lives.”

Erwan Passey still believes that Emmanuel Macron is doing “pinkwashing to restore one’s image a little”, pointing to the intervention of the Head of State so that LR Laurence Garnier, opposed to same-sex marriage and the constitutionalization of abortion, was not appointed to the Ministry of the Family. The activist is no more reassured by the appointment of Othman Nasrou as Secretary of State for Citizenship and the Fight against Discrimination. “I don’t feel that his positions are in our favor,” Erwan Passey is worried. Osman Nasrou, opposed to marriage for all, had judged in a tweet in 2015 “brave and realistic” Valérie Pécresse’s proposal to repeal the Taubira law. “Putting an openly LGBTphobic person in a ministry which, for us, is as important as the fight against discrimination, I don’t see that as a positive signal,” Erwan Passey worries.