A peer was speaking, and Dave listened. “The bill is a queers’ charter and will encourage that most loathsome creature, the male prostitute,” the man said pompously. “It will increase the temptations that lie in the path of adolescents.” That was strange, Dave thought. Did this guy believe that all men were queer, but most simply resisted temptation? “It is not that I lack compassion for the unfortunate homosexual—I am also not lacking in compassion for those who are dragged into his net.”

Dragged into his net? What a lot of rubbish, Dave thought.

A man got up from the Labour side and took the handles of Ethel’s wheelchair. Dave left the chamber and went up a staircase to the spectators’ gallery.

When he got there another peer was speaking. “In one of the more popular Sunday newspapers last week there appeared an account, which some of Your Lordships may have seen, of a homosexual wedding in a Continental country.” Dave had read this story in the News of the World. “I think the newspaper concerned is to be congratulated on highlighting this very nasty happening.” How could a wedding be a nasty happening? “I only hope that, if this bill becomes law, the most vigilant eye will be kept on practices of this kind. I do not think these things could happen in this country, but it is possible.”

Dave thought: Where do they dig up these dinosaurs?

Fortunately not all the peers were this bad. A formidable-looking woman with silver hair got up. Dave had met her at his mother’s house: her name was Dora Gaitskell. She said: “As a society, we gloss over many perversions between men and women in private. The law, and society, are very tolerant towards these and turn a blind eye.” Dave was astonished. What did she know about perversions between men and women? “Those men who are born, conditioned, or tempted irrevocably into homosexuality should have extended to them the same degree of tolerance as is extended to any other so-called perversion between men and women.” Good for you, Dora, thought Dave.

But Dave’s favorite was another white-haired old woman, this one with a twinkle in her eye. She, too, had been a guest at the house in Great Peter Street: her name was Barbara Wootton. After one of the men had gone on at great length about sodomy, she struck a note of irony. “I ask myself: What are the opponents of this bill afraid of?” she said. “They cannot be afraid that disgusting practices will be thrown upon their attention, because these acts are legalized only if they are performed in private. They cannot be afraid that there will be a corruption of youth, because these acts will be legalized only if they are performed by consenting adults. I can only suppose that the opponents of the bill will be afraid that their imagination will be tormented by visions of what will be going on elsewhere.” The clear implication was that men who tried to keep homosexuality criminal did so as a way of policing their own fantasy life, and Dave laughed out loud—and was quickly told to keep quiet by an usher.