Keir Starmer pledges to create a role to support LGBT rights if he is PM

Labour’s Keir Starmer said he would create a new role to support LGBT+ rights if he becomes PM at the PinkNews awards last night. “My Labour government will appoint an international LGBT+ rights envoy,” he said.

Giving out a posthumous lifetime achievement award to his friend, fellow barrister Jonathan Cooper, at the event, Starmer also backed trans rights, saying: “It’s time to ban conversion therapy in all it’s forms. It’s time for tougher hate crime laws”. He also pledged to “modernise” the Gender Recognition Act.

Leading the auction was Emily Thornberry, who hit out at former Home Secretary Suella Braverman for using “issues such as trans rights as a political football”.

The auction featured a bottle of champagne signed by Liz Truss, which seemed a harder sell than Braverman-branded tofu.

London theatre group drops Kyiv show over safety concerns

A LONDON theatre group who planned to take a show to Ukraine have cancelled the idea as it has become too dangerous in recent weeks. Actor Kristin Milward of West London’s Finborough theatre decided not to go “because of the escalation of the war”, she told us.

Milward was set to perform a piece about Russian agression by a Ukrainian playwright in Kyiv. She still plans to go in the future, telling us: “I want to tour it.”

Emin’s brain sculpture for Parkinson’s UK

TRACEY Emin is one of a few famous artists selling a “brain” sculpture in aid of Parkinson’s UK at Christie’s next month. The sale, called Me, My Brain & I, will also feature works by Gavin Turk and Conrad Shawcross, and Alex Reid, who has the disease. Reid says Parkinson’s has made him “adapt and evolve”, and hasn’t stopped him being creative. Emin’s piece is expected to raise up to £20,000.

Out of the blue and into the black

The title of a new biography of Liz Truss has been changed to refer to her difficult first few weeks as PM. “Out of the Blue: The inside story of Liz Truss and her astonishing rise to power” by Harry Cole and James Heale has tweaked its subtitle, replacing the word “astonishing” with “explosive”. A final chapter called “Into the Red” has also been added. More changes may be needed.

Faith among ES glitterati

Londoner’s Diary 20th October

STARS Paloma Faith and Eve posed at a party to mark a year since the relaunch of the Evening Standard’s ES magazine at Mayfair’s Mark’s Club last night. Up the road, models Leomie Anderson and Roxy Horner were at a Kilian Paris bash at Nikita London. Actor Benedict Cumberbatch held a screening of the new All Quiet on the Western Front film at The Mayfair Hotel, and writer Adam Kay was at the PinkNews awards. At Notting Hill’s Casa Cruz, swimwear guru Kimberley Garner hosted a dinner with Forbes magazine.