BRIGHTON and Hove Pride is a glorious, exuberant carnival of sexual and gender diversity, which attracts visitors from far and wide.

This year’s parade and after-party is the 25th Pride event in the city. Welcome to Silver Pride.

As well as fun and revelry, the festivities also have a serious message. They celebrate the contribution of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people to the city, and the on-going endeavours for equality and acceptance.

Britain has made great progress on LGBTI human rights since the turn of the century. We have gone from being the country with the largest number of anti-gay laws in the world to being one of the world’s most progressive nations. But homophobia isn’t over yet.

As recently as 2013, to create a database of “serious sex offenders,” police all over the UK turned up unannounced on the doorsteps of men who had been convicted under anti-gay laws of consenting adult same-sex relations decades ago.

Lumping them together with rapists and paedophiles, they demanded DNA samples. It was only after protests to the Association of Chief Police Officers that such swoops were discontinued.

Although LGBTI acceptance has improved significantly, according to the latest British Social Attitudes survey, 28% of the public continue to believe that homosexuality is either “always” or “mostly” wrong.

Some parents still kick their children out of home and on to the streets after discovering they are LGBTI. This is one of the biggest causes of youth homelessness.

All Britain’s wonderful new equality laws have exemptions for religious organisations, which permit faith-run service providers, such schools and hospitals, to discriminate, in certain circumstances, on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity.

The UK now has same-sex marriage but it involves segregation and discrimination in marriage law. There is the 1949 marriage legislation, which is for opposite-sex couples only, and the 2013 marriage legislation, which is for same-sex couples only. Separate laws are not equal laws.

In a democracy, there should be one marriage law for everyone. Plus there is homophobic discrimination in both civil partnership and civil marriage statutes.

In the case of a same-sex civil partnership or civil marriage, when one partner dies the surviving partner does not have the same right as a married heterosexual spouse to inherit their deceased partner’s full pension.

Laws governing transgender people are still inadequate.

The Gender Recognition Act 2004 was a big step forward but it is too narrow with regard to the categories of trans men and women to which it gives rights. It needs further reform to accommodate a wider diversity of trans people and gender transitions.

One-third of British LGBTI people have been victims of homophobic hate crimes. In Brighton, there were 163 homophobic and transphobic incidents recorded in the last year: including a vicious assault in Preston Park during the 2014 Pride festival when a man was beaten unconscious.

This is a reminder that even in liberal Brighton LGBTI people are not always safe.

Fifty-five per cent of young LGBTI people say they were bullied at school – with some of them suffering savage assaults in the classroom or playground. Despite this, nearly half of all schools have no anti-bullying programme that explicitly tackles homophobia and transphobia.

It’s no surprise, then, that suicide, self-harm, mental ill-health, substance abuse and HIV infections are much higher among LGBTI youth, compared to the national average. So how do we turn things around for future LGBTI generations? Schools have a key role to play in overcoming prejudice. After all, no child is born anti-LGBTI. They become homophobic as a result of exposure to the bigoted attitudes of adults and other kids.Education can help prevent that.

I know this from my own successful talks in schools and from the effective work of education providers like Diversity Role Models and Educate and Celebrate.

They provide structured lessons to pupils to counter prejudice and they get positive results: less homophobia, biphobia and transphobia.

But sadly, they are under-funded and their work only reaches a small proportion of schools.

To combat bullying and hate crime, education against all prejudice – including racism and sexism, as well as anti-LGBTI intolerance – should be a mandatory subject in every school. It ought to start from primary level and continue throughout a pupil’s secondary years. The aim should be to encourage the understanding and acceptance of difference, which is vital for a happy, harmonious society.

Is the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, listening?

  • Peter Tatchell is a prominent LGBTI campaigner and director of human rights organisation, the Peter Tatchell Foundation. For more information visit petertatchellfoundation.org