Experts blast Tom Daley's claim that 'colonialism is to blame for homophobia across Commonwealth'

Claims in Tom Daley's BBC documentary which suggested homophobia across Commonwealth countries stems from colonialism have been labelled 'grossly inaccurate' by a historian. Tom Daley travels around the Commonwealth to speak to fellow LGBT athletes in his new documentary Tom Daley: Illegal to Be Me Tom Daley with fellow LGBT advocates and athletes from across the Commonwealth at the opening ceremony of this year's Commonwealth Games Conservative academic Adrian Hilton tweeted that the 'stem' of homophobia is 'religio-cultural' 'I have been told that sport and politics shouldn't collide but at the same time you have to acknowledge what's going on around you,' Daley says in the BBC One show, which aired last night. Daley carrying the baton at the opening ceremony of the 2022 Commonwealth Games, held in Birmingham this summer Daley posing with his husband, Oscar-winning filmmaker Dustin Lance Black, after being awarded an OBE in July Daley, who came out as gay in 2013, has spent the last year visiting 'the most homophobic countries in the Commonwealth' He added that while India has made strides towards being a more liberal and accepting society in the past 75 years there has been 'some rowing back of that under the present regime' and there is 'still a lot of homophobia' 'People don't come out, parents do not accept their children being gay,' he said. Barrister and political commentator Rupert Myers tweeted that he is 'not convinced' that homophobia is 'entirely a 'legacy of colonialism'' Journalist Benjamin Butterworth tweeted that he agrees with Tom Daley and added that 'Britain needs to right its historic wrongs' In their research they tested 'the still quite prevalent idea that British imperialism 'poisoned' societies against homosexuality', but argue that evidence to back this up is 'inconclusive at best'.