Christian GP’s appeal challenges the very heart of government

I note that Dr Hans-Christian Raabe, the Christian GP dismissed as a Government drugs adviser for his views on homosexuality, has launched a legal bid to win his job back.

As reported in the Daily Mail this week, Dr Raabe was removed from the Advisory Council for the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) in February following attacks on him in the Press.

Ministers said he was sacked because he failed to disclose an ‘embarrassing’ academic report he co-authored in 2005 that linked homosexuality to paedophilia. But in fact the Home Office itself quoted similar documents on its own website.

The German-born doctor has now begun a judicial review against Home Secretary Theresa May and is being represented by leading human rights lawyer James Dingemans QC (pictured).

He is being backed by the Christian Institute, which is funding the case.

I previously blogged that by sacking Dr Raabe, the Home Office had demonstrated intolerance, cowardice, ignorance and an unwillingness to investigate complaints properly.

I also noted that a major review on the subject of paedophilia published in 2007 and available on line, which reviews all 554 papers published on Medline on pedophilia, also acknowledges that the jury is still out on the matter:

’The main evidence in favor of a relationship between pedophilia and homosexuality is the common cause of fraternal birth order and postnatal learning… It seems to be questionable logic to view these two conditions as completely unrelated.’

That Dr Raabe should be sacked from his role as a drugs advisor on the basis of his expressed opinions on an entirely unrelated issue (homosexuality) is itself at very least unfair.

But the fact that the data he quoted were actually derived from peer-reviewed scientific journal articles (including one quoted approvingly by the Home Office itself!), and on a matter where experts agree that there is a diversity of learned opinion, makes his dismissal both outrageous and inexcusable.

Home Secretary Theresa May has never apologised to Dr Hans-Christian Raabe but will be under new pressure now.

But the issue goes up much higher that the Home Secretary.

The Prime Minister David Cameron by his previous comments on homosexuality, has also demonstrated that he does not understand what true tolerance actually is.

I wish Dr Raabe all the best in his appeal. It will be interesting to see how he gets on.