Sadiq Khan spent £200k of taxpayer money on London Pride events in 2025, figures show

Sadiq Khan spent £200,000 of taxpayers’ money on Pride events last year, according to recently released figures.

London Pride, the annual LGBTQ+ festival, received a £125,000 grant, while a number of other events received substantial totals, data from Freedom of Information requests shows.

The organisers of Black Pride, a festival for LGBTQ+ people of African heritage, received £30,000, £18,514 was spent on the “Mayor's Pride reception”, while another £25,200 was spent on City Hall's “participation in London Pride parade”, which included money for a “float, dressing, security, welfare”.

Manchester's mayor Andy Burnham gave much smaller numbers - spending £33,000 on Manchester Pride and £900 on “entry to the Pride Parade” in August last year - while both mayors gave £2,575 to pro-transgender rights charity Stonewall for participation in its “Diversity Champions” programme.

The figures, first reported by the Mail, also show that several police forces spent more than £10,000 funding and participating in Pride events, with grants of up to £2,000 given towards organising Pride rallies.

FoI requests have revealed that West Midlands Police spent £328 on “Policing with Pride” t-shirts and £83 on “Flags, stickers & other accessories”, Gwent Police spent out £500 on “Rainbow Gwent Police-branded fans and miscellaneous coloured whistles”, while British Transport Police spent £300 on a Pride Month 2025 workshop “to explore the powerful intersections of race, sexuality, and upbringing while considering how these experiences shape personal and professional identity.”
Wiltshire and Dyfed-Powys forces handed over £1,000 grants to local pride events, Devon and Cornwall Police spent £975 sponsoring events during Pride Month, and South Wales Police gave a £2,000 grant to Cardiff Pride, an annual festival also known as Pride Cymru.

London City Hall also arranged several events during Pride Month last year for staff to attend - according to the response to the FOI, it spent £300 on a “Pride Month Soho Walking Tour” and £250 on a “Queer literature lunchtime session.”
Whitehall departments also spent thousands on Pride events, with the Cabinet Office spending £7,395 so that 750 civil servants could take part in 27 Pride events.

The Ministry of Defence also spent almost £700 on 65 Pride t-shirts for “MoD Civil Servants to wear whilst on the London Pride 2025 parade”, despite attempts to crack down on Whitehall diversity spending.

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William Yarwood, media campaign manager at the TaxPayers' Alliance said: “Taxpayers are sick to the back teeth of spending on woke events.

“Brits expect money to be spent on frontline services and keeping the streets safe, not on subsidising political jamborees and branded rainbow merchandise.

“Sadiq Khan, the blob and police forces must stop playing politics and get back to the basics of governance and crime-fighting.”
Sir John Hayes, chair of the Common Sense group of Tory MPs, said: “It's pretty bizarre that police should feel it necessary to spend money that should be spent on deterring and detecting crime on those kinds of events.

“More than £10,000 on Pride events is not what my constituents would expect the police would be doing and I'd much rather that was spent on maintaining law and order.”
A spokesman for the Mayor of London said: “London's Pride is the largest LGBTQI+ event and parade in the country, bringing more than 1.5million people together and showing why our capital is a global beacon of openness and inclusion.

“Pride showcases London's diversity at its very best, supporting LGBTQI+ communities and attracting visitors from across the UK and around the world, as we build a fairer London for everyone.”