I’m afraid I need to marry my partner before the next general election 

I’ve just returned from a dream wedding in Barcelona — full of love, laughter, sunburn, and insect bites.

My partner and I went together, spending three days with 70 wonderful friends. At least half of them asked us: “So, when do you think you’ll get married?”

Coincidentally, that same weekend, I saw Nigel Farage had been on the radio days before saying he thought it was “wrong” to introduce same-sex marriage.

“It is a settled issue. I didn’t support it. I thought it was wrong to introduce it to the public without even putting it in a manifesto,” the Clacton MP told Nick Ferrari on LBC.

Surrounded by the romance and special electricity of a wedding, the reality of his statement hit me hard: will I even be able to have a wedding under a Reform government? 

Farage’s stance isn’t new — but it’s the timing that shook me. He made these comments while standing on the brink of becoming a serious contender for Number 10.

He insists that “we have moved on” from the debate, but I don’t believe that. Not from a man who once proudly claimed to be the only politician “keeping the flame of Thatcherism alive.” If given the chance, I truly fear he would drag us backwards — and fast.

Just one year into Labour’s landslide victory — the most crushing Conservative defeat in history — Keir Starmer has somehow managed to tank his party’s popularity with a string of disappointments: on Palestine, Trump, LGBTQ+ rights, and his decision to squeeze the elderly and disabled instead of doing the obvious — taxing billionaires properly.

It’s been an astonishing downfall — and I’m not even sure Starmer has the self-awareness to realise it’s happening.

Farage does. And Reform is ready. A recent YouGive poll now suggests Reform could win more seats than Labour at the next election. With every passing week, the prospect of a Reform-led government in 2029 becomes more real.

So, when should my partner and I get married?

We’ve talked about it — vaguely. Not with intention, but the idea is there. We’ve joked about spending half our budget, which currently stands at around £20, on a Video Music Awards performance-worthy first dance. I’ve recently left my job and can barely afford to host a dinner party, let alone a wedding.

Logistically, we’re not there yet. Our time will come — but it’s not now and it may not happen in the next three years. But while I accept my anxiety can be irrational, this fear isn’t: I’m genuinely afraid we may lose the right to marry entirely if we wait too long.

We’ve already watched how quickly trans rights have been dismantled. The hostility directed at trans people today — now so casually expressed — would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

All it took was Piers Morgan identifying as a penguin, or JK Rowling sharing another inflammatory tweet about trans women, and suddenly we were back in a culture war. Politicians and celebrities who once marched at Pride no longer have the courage to say “a trans woman is a woman.”

In the LGBTQ+ community, we’ve always known that the attack on trans rights is only the beginning. There’s a growing wave of hostility, and unless Labour makes a drastic course correction, that wave may well crash with a Reform government in 2029.

We need to work together to stop that from happening. But it’s hard to rally behind Labour when there’s so little to believe in. I held onto my faith in the party for longer than I should have — but for the first time in my life, I feel politically homeless.

Still, we must do everything we can to stop Farage.

If you know someone who watched I’m A Celebrity and thought, “He’s just like us” — you must tell them what a Reform government could actually mean. Maybe they’ll echo Sir Rod Stewart and say Farage “deserves a chance,” not realising what he could really do with that chance.

On a recent episode of Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, a focus group of previous Labour voters discussed their plans for the next election. One woman said she was now a Reform supporter, after Farage “turned her head” on I’m A Celeb. Several others agreed, unaware — or perhaps unconcerned — about the deeper consequences.

More than ever, we need allies who are willing to speak up. Farage’s image as the bloke who’d buy you a pint is dangerously misleading. He is not harmless. He is not funny. He is a serious threat to our community.

His recent comments about gay marriage weren’t new — but what struck me was the confidence with which he made them. He didn’t need to soften his homophobia. He knows it won’t hurt him. His supporters will either agree or look the other way.

There are countless reasons why Farage would be a catastrophic Prime Minister. Even compared to the chaos of Boris Johnson’s time in office, a Reform government would be far more terrifying. His stance on equal marriage is just the tip of the iceberg.

Make no mistake: if Farage feels comfortable saying this now — with real power within reach — he will only go further. Be it same-sex marriage or further attacks on trans rights, he is coming for us.

So no, I don’t feel ready to marry my partner today, tomorrow, or even next year. And I certainly don’t want to marry him out of fear that we may not have the option later.

I want to marry him when the time is exactly right — because that is our right.

There’s still time before the next general election. But I can honestly say: I hear the clock ticking. And I worry that if we wait, we’ll have to wait until sanity returns to Parliament and Reform is a distant memory.

Perhaps Farage will stick to his word that equal marriage is “settled,” and I’ll be proven wrong.

But even his visible discomfort at the idea of my marriage is a warning. If he continues on the path he’s on — and we don’t stop him — he will make life for me and millions in the LGBTQ+ community much, much harder.