Christian mum suing son’s school over Pride parade calls being LGBTQ+ a ‘sexual lifestyle’
Izzy Montague appeared on Good Morning Britain and declared she thought being gay was “a choice”. (ITV/Good Morning Britain/Screenshot)
Christian mum Izzy Montague has referred to being LGBTQ+ as “sexual lifestyles” in the first day of her court case against her son’s primary school, which she claims “forced” him to take part in a Pride event.
The eight-day case against Heavers Farm Primary School in south east London began on Wednesday (1 February) at Central London County Court.
On the first day of the trial, Judge Christopher Lethem described Montague and her husband as “devout born-again Christians”.
Montague, who is a supported in her legal action by conservative organisation Christian Concern, gave evidence in court relating to a 19 September incident, where the headteacher’s daughter wore an inclusive t-shirt with the slogan: “Why be racist, sexist, homophobic, or transphobic when you could just be quiet?”
The court heard Montague had also expressed concerns to her son’s teacher prior to this event about the types of books they were reading in class.
She recalled a “reference to a same-sex family book”, which representative of the school, Ian Clarke, said was called The Family Book.
In relation to receiving a letter about the June 2018 Pride event, which aimed to celebrate “the things that make our family special”, Montague told the court: “It felt like it was lecturing me about something to do with British values and somehow we weren’t adhering to British values.”
She went on to claim the letter was “trying to hammer into parents and drive into them something that’s not happened before”.
Pride event aimed to celebrate diversity and tackle bullying
Clarke then pressed on Montague’s claim the letter was forcing the “indoctrination of an LGBT lifestyle”, he questioned “where does it say that?”
She replied: “I don’t know I just felt a topic had come up.
“I clearly was not in the know about it, but this was the way, in my opinion, to try to indoctrinate it onto us by passing it off that it was part of law or part of British values, or it was part of the national curriculum, it was trying to sell something no one wanted to buy.”
Clarke quoted from a blog post shared by the school, which described how June, and Pride celebrations, are about “the diversity of our whole school community and tackling bullying.”
He went on to question: “Isn’t the school simply using the month of June to celebrate wider issues of diversity and tolerance?”
Montague replied: “I believe it’s using Pride month and other issues around that time to sell Pride month.”
Clarke put to the court that if the event was held on 29 May, “would we all be sat here?”
“If they did any form of celebration of any sexual lifestyles we will still be sat here,” said Montague.
She continued: “A month that celebrates sexual lifestyles is a problem in any month.”
A record of anti-LGBTQ+ views
Montague first launched her lawsuit against the school in 2019, alleging direct and indirect discrimination, victimisation and breaches of statutory duties under the 1996 Education Act 1996 and the 1998 Human Rights Act.
In 2019, Montague hit out at a children’s book about gay penguins, which she claimed is “not natural”.
That same year she appeared on Good Morning Britain to debate inclusive education and declared that she believed being gay was “a choice”.
