In the week of the LGBT TUC conference and Pride, it is worth taking time to celebrate the huge strides which have been made towards equal rights for LGBT people in Britain. 

The Thatcher years of active hostility and scapegoating led directly to the grotesque Section 28. 

This not only belittled lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their lives, it also sanctioned discrimination and prevented teachers from confronting homophobia when they came across it in their schools. 

The Tories always seem to have a penchant for divide-and-rule policies and LBGT people were their latest convenient “enemy within.”

Section 28 caused untold misery and did enormous damage which can only now begin to be properly addressed. 

Its baleful legacy persists in the still unacceptably high levels of homophobic bullying evident in our schools all these years later.

As I contemplated the 1997 Labour landslide and watched a Labour prime minister walk down Downing Street after 18 long years of Tory rule, even I would have hardly believed it if I had known that by 2010 we would have:

• Repealed Section 28
• Ended the ban on LGBT people serving in the armed forces
• Recognised same-sex relationships for the purposes of immigration
• Equalised the age of consent
• Legislated for LGBT employment rights at work making it illegal to sack someone for being gay
• Removed any LGBT discrimination from the sexual offences legislation
• Legislated to provide protection against LGBT discrimination in the provision of goods and services
• Given same-sex couples the right to adopt
• Passed the Civil Partnerships Act leading to the first-ever state recognition of LGBT partnerships
• Awarded statutory rights for fertility treatment for lesbians on the NHS
• Produced and implemented the Gender Recognition Act, allowing trans people to have their true gender recognised in law
• Included homophobia in the definition of hate crimes and increased sentencing for homophobic hate crimes
• Introduced the Equality Act.

These advances were made because we had assembled a progressive majority in the House of Commons and because of the dogged campaigning of hundreds of thousands of trade unionists and community activists, both LGBT and straight. 

They made certain that the bigots were not allowed to drown out the decent majority who recognised the justness of the cause and who were prepared to support the struggle.

We were so successful that by 2010 even the then Tory opposition leader David Cameron had decided to accept the changes and use LGBT rights to illustrate the modernisation of the Tory Party. 

His support for equal marriage was designed to wipe the Tory slate clean. 

He naturally wanted us to forget that he had referred to Labour’s desire to abolish Section 28 as “anti-family” and part of a “fringe agenda” and that he had voted against it in the Commons — although he has now apologised. 

He also wanted us to forget that he’d voted against LGBT couples being able to adopt and to make it harder for lesbian couples to have equal access to IVF fertility treatment. 

Labour’s legislative transformation was not easy to achieve and it was certainly not inevitable as some revisionist Tories would like to have you believe. 

They and their more reactionary allies in the press fought it tooth and nail. It took three attempts to abolish Section 28 because the Lords repeatedly refused to pass its repeal. 

It took three years and the use of the Parliament Act to equalise the age of consent. 

This was not before we had been treated to some disgraceful and puerile speeches by their lordships, and to loud accusations of being obsessed by buggery in the ever-reasonable red tops. 

Even this government’s flagship equal marriage legislation was only passed by Labour votes in the House of Commons. More Conservative MPs voted against it than for it.

Now we have a new and even more important battle to win. We have to make the equal rights we have enshrined in legislation a reality for every LGBT person in our country. 

Until every member of the LGBT community feels safe from homophobic attacks on the street or
bullying at work we still have a job to do. 

Surveys show that two-thirds of LGBT pupils have experienced direct bullying and 98 per cent of LGBT pupils have heard homophobic language used.

We have to roll up our sleeves and carry on the fight because around the world our brothers and sisters are facing jail or worse for the “crime” of being LGBT. 

Being gay is illegal in around 80 countries. And in too many places LGBT people are being beaten and abused for just living their lives as themselves. 

The battle is not yet won for LGBT rights. We need to keep up the fight because if we have the power to achieve what we have already, then we have the power to achieve true equality — both in law and in reality.

Angela Eagle is Labour MP for Wallasey.