Doctors and nurses in England will be required to ask every patient from the age of 16 to declare their sexual orientation. The National Health Service (NHS) in England says it needs to record the sexual orientation of adults to fulfil its legal duties to provide equally for gay people. The move has come in for immediate criticism. Tim Loughton, a former children and families minister, said: “It’s political correctness and compliance with the Equality Act gone bonkers.” He said the NHS should concentrate on the quality of care: “That’s not contingent on sexual orientation. Some might feel intimidated into providing information which is deeply private for them.” Claire Fox, a panellist on BBC Radio 4’s The Moral Maze, said the “paternalistic” measures risked eroding the freedoms won in the sexual revolution under the guise of an “evidence-based audit culture”. She said: “The state has got no business in our bedrooms. Tell a 16-year-old to define their sexuality and it immediately forces them into a box. The whole point of the sexual revolution was to remove the box.”