Edinburgh Pride festival marks Stonewall anniversary

Thousand of people have taken to the streets of Edinburgh to celebrate the city's Pride festival.

The annual march began outside the Scottish Parliament after speeches from campaigners and MSPs, focussing on this year's theme: "This Is Me".

This year's event marks the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York when young LGBT people changed the face of the gay rights movement.

Pride officially got under way in the capital on Friday with a 5k run event.

This year's parade followed a route up the Royal Mile, before turning on to George IV Bridge and finishing at the Edinburgh University Students' Association campus at Potterrow and Teviot.

Speaking outside the Scottish Parliament, Green co-convenor Patrick Harvie referenced the campaign that led to the scrapping of the controversial Section 28 law banning the "promotion" of homosexuality in schools and said it was now important to stand together to fight for trans rights.

'Same level of hatred'

Earlier this week gender identification changes proposed by the Scottish government were shelved to allow further consultation on the way trans people receive legal recognition.

Mr Harvie said section 28 was repealed because communities stood together and called for people to do so again.

He added: "Now those within our communities who are experiencing that same level of hatred, of stigma, of aggression and in this case of transphobia, they need to know that we will stand together again.

"I am sorry that this parliament very recently was used as a platform for transphobic hatred and bigotry but I am determined that we won't let that tell us we're going to lose."

Also speaking at the event was the Liberal Democrat MSP Alex Cole-Hamilton, who told the crowd that Pride mattered "because we still have frontiers to push back on, not just in terms of trans equality, but so many ranges."

Speaking ahead of the event, Pride Edinburgh spokesman Jamie Love said: "We're the oldest Pride event in Scotland and one of the largest free Prides in the UK - for this reason, like every other year, we are looking forward to welcome Pride-goers from all walks of life.

"Our goal is to truly and authentically celebrate and accommodate diversity. We'll have a trans-space, a youth area, a family area and more to really make Pride a home for everyone."