If we’re so tolerant why is gay-bashing on the up?

In a sense they were right, though the true picture is more complex and alarming. Yes, there is good news about our relatively enlightened state. Only 37 per cent of those polled think homosexuality is entirely wrong. A fairly high number? Put that fact in context: look back to Britain in 1963.

Homosexual acts were illegal and although almost 66 per cent of respondents believed homosexual acts should not be penalised, 93 per cent compassionately believed gay men were ill and needed medical treatment. In the 1950s, gay men who fell foul of the law, like the computer genius Alan Turing, to whom Gordon Brown has posthumously apologised, were indeed liable to medical treatment, or rather torture: doctors were keen on injecting hormones that sometimes caused men to grow female breasts and rendered them impotent.

So we are entitled to congratulate ourselves on a Britain today in which Cabinet ministers, company directors, policemen and now even a rugby star can come out as gay. London has established itself as the world's gay capital, with a huge gay and lesbian population. The city's scores of clubs and bars offer proof of this vitality.

That, though, is not the whole story. The violent demise last year of the gay civil servant Ian Baynham, kicked to death in Trafalgar Square, serves a reminder that increased gay visibility and openness sometimes incites murderous responses. What's more, in contemporary London 90 per cent of gay men and women questioned in 2009 said they had experienced homophobic insults. Gay-related attacks against gays increased by almost 20 per cent — though Boris Johnson says the increase is "an upsurge in low-level hate crimes".

In an attempt to ensure that our future is more gay-accepting rather than just tolerant, a film called Fit, dealing with the epidemic of gay bullying in schools, is being sent by Stonewall to every school in Britain. YouGov research shows 90 per cent of schools have experienced homophobic bullying and 90 per cent of teachers had no training in how to tackle the problem.

The film's writer/director, Rikki Beadle-Blair, originally toured Fit as a play. The 20,000 schoolkids who saw it provide disturbing proof of how much Fit was needed. "I would ask how many [pupils] thought homosexuality was wrong," says Beadle-Blair. "The vast majority — about 80 per cent — would put up their hands. But kids would come up after the performance and say quite openly I walked into this room homophobic and will leave it a changed person'."

It sounds too good to be true but the Government has faith in the film's persuasiveness. If it works, then perhaps the next generation will lead the way towards what Johnson optimistically calls the "post-homophobic age". Only when we get there will we really be able to celebrate our city as gay-friendly.