Senior Tory defends gays and single mothers in keynote speech 'supporting families'

A senior Tory risked upsetting party traditionalists yesterday when he defended single mothers and gays in a speech on the family, while failing to mention the importance of marriage.

Education spokesman Michael Gove said civil partnerships and adoption rights for gays were 'right and moral' and the Right had been 'wrong in its rhetoric' on single mothers.

In a speech whose main theme was supporting families, Mr Gove, a very close ally of party leader David Cameron, only mentioned the word 'marriage' once.

He preferred to talk about 'commitment' between partners, a term he used eight times.

In the keynote speech to the Institute of Public Policy Research, New Labour's favourite think tank, Mr Gove declared an end to the party's war on single mothers and gays.

He said the Conservatives had been 'wrong to get hung up on homosexuality'.

'I think we indulged prejudice in the 1980s and missed the point,' he said.

'It's not gay men who are abusing women and abandoning children  -  it's straight men.

'And the demand for civil partnerships, proper inheritance rights and equality in adoption rights from gay couples is not a rejection of commitment but a desire to see commitments celebrated and publicly embraced. It is right and moral.'

Lord Tebbit criticised Mr Gove's speech, saying children grow up happier if ' they have both a male and female role model'

He added: 'I also think the Right was wrong in its rhetoric about single mothers.

'We need to recognise that it's those fathers who have abandoned their responsibilities, not mothers left holding the baby, who should be challenged about their behaviour.'

Mr Gove's only mention of marriage was when he said: 'I believe David Cameron's commitment to back marriage in the tax system and end the couple penalty is right'.

It is a far cry from former social security secretary Peter Lilley singing a song at the 1992 party conference castigating single mothers who got pregnant to jump the council housing queue.

Only six years ago, Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith ordered his MPs to vote against allowing gay couples to adopt children.

In his speech Mr Gove also accused Gordon Brown of undermining families and communities through his obsession with state control.

And he argued that by seeing everyone as individuals and failing to stand up for families, Labour was widening the education gap, as the poorest families are more likely to break up.

'Helping adults commit and stay committed not only opens the door to a depth of emotional enrichment, it also provides the best possible start in life for children,' he said.

'The sad truth is that if you are eligible for free school meals you're almost 200 times more likely to leave school without a single GCSE pass than you are to get three As at A-level.'

Last night, Lord Tebbit spoke out against his party's new support for gay adoption, saying: 'I disagree with Michael Gove on this. Every statistic shows that children grow up more likely to do well in school, stay out of trouble, and have a happier life if they have both a male and female role model.'

He added: 'Too often we look at these things from the point of view of the adult rather than the child. I think that adoption by homosexual couples is unsatisfactory for the child.

' What homosexual people choose to do under their duvets is up to them, but the example they set to children is of interest to society as a whole.'