In an interview given to Parisian and published this Thursday, Caroline Cayeux said she regretted her “stupid and clumsy” remarks on homosexual people and “reiterates” her apologies. The new Minister of Territorial Communities has been at the heart of a controversy since she said “maintain her words” by qualifying marriage for all as “designs against nature”.
She deplores remarks which “go back ten years” and which “do not at all reflect (his) thought”.
“And if I cannot deny having made them, of course I would not use them again and regret them. I understand that these stupid and clumsy words could have hurt so much. I would like to renew all my most sincere apologies here because they do not reflect not at all my thought”, affirms Caroline Cayeux.
“This expression was shocking and painful”
“It’s a bad trial that I’m being given”, she had estimated on Public Senate, giving as an argument the fact of having “many friends among all these people”. A sentence that caused a lot of reaction, especially within the government itself. Caroline Cayeux also claims to have exchanged with Clément Beaune, Minister Delegate for Transport on this subject.
“I felt that I had hurt him and I want to tell him all my friendship,” she said. “I measure how shocking and painful this expression was for many people,” she continued this Thursday in the columns of Le Parisien.
Actions “against all forms of discrimination” as a “local elected official”
The minister recalls her commitment “against all forms of discrimination” since she was elected local. She also wrote a letter of apology to the anti-homophobia associations that had filed a complaint against her.
Caroline Cayeux also specifies that as mayor of Beauvais (Oise), she “accompanied an association (…) to open a weekly office, by providing them with an associative premises, a place of reception and advice towards the victims of homophobic acts and comments”.