Probably people would look at me and think, "Well, I'm probably like them and therefore a little bit homophobic as well."

And then I made the really difficult decision to come out.

You know, I met a man that I fell in love with when I was nearly 40 and then I realised I was gay.

[Why are people homophobic?]

[Richard Beaven is a financial services director and LGBT activist.]

[He believes it's important to understand homophobia, in order to eradicate it.]

Mr. Mawby, do you think homosexuals should be sent to prison?

-Yes. Of course if they are ... -Surrounded by other men or ...

Unbelievable.

[Homosexuality was illegal in England and Wales until 1967, but homophobia still remains today.]

When I think about why people are homophobic, I think about a workshop that I ran in the city a couple of years ago.

It was really good, apart from this one guy who literally said nothing and he had his arms folded, clearly really uncomfortable about being there.

So I stopped the conversation and I looked at him and I said, "I notice you are not engaging with this."

"You are not part of the conversation."

And I said, "I suspect there are three things that I find a lot of people struggle to engage in this conversation with, and the first one is gay sex."

Lots of straight men find it very, very uncomfortable to think about how men have sex with men.

But we have to park that.

We're not having a conversation around sex, we're having a conversation about inclusivity and making people feel welcome.

And then I said, "The second thing I think lots of people like you think is that, you know, that 'all men who are gay fancy all men.'"

And I said, "You're just not my type."

And he started to smile and I said, "But there's the third thing."

And I said, "This is often a problem, is that, 'If I engage in this conversation then people might think I'm gay'."

[On top of this, Richard believes the HIV crisis still casts a shadow.]

There is now a deadly virus which anyone can catch from sex with an infected person.

So protect yourself.

It's safer if you use a condom.

So I think that crisis had a huge impact on or reinforced the fact that gay people are different.

And there was a lot of terrible language around "gay people spread diseases," and it was just ghastly at the time.

And I think that's influenced a whole generation in terms of the way they think about homosexuality.

-You know, Russia has got anti-gay legislation, Chechnya you find pogroms against gay people. - Oh my god, yeah.

If you could speak to Vladimir Putin right now, what would you say to him?

I would love to sit down and talk to him face-to-face because only face-to-face with people do you get any progress.

So the thing I particularly like about what Elton says there is about sitting down with people and talking.

I do think we have repressed a lot, so people have just put it in a box saying,

"Oh god I'm not allowed to say whatever it may be …"

But if you allow people time to say it, and to say words that they might be a bit clumsy about ...

It's fine, because you can help people learn.

It's fantastic when I talk to young people who are declaring whatever spectrum of sexuality they are on without thinking about it, I think of my own children.

They don't think about this in the way that those of us born in the 60s and 70s and the influences that we had do.

So, is this fixable? It's changeable.

It really is, and a few simple things can help.

If you've never met a gay person, go and talk to one.

You know what? They're quite nice to talk to.

And listen and we use something called reverse mentoring.

You know, if you're senior, go and find someone that's not like you that is in the organisation and listen.

Not for you to tell them, for you to listen to their story and who they are, because it might feel a bit uncomfortable.

But trust me, that works brilliantly well and I have seen people completely transformed.

Their mind is opened.

They realize, "They're just like everyone else."

Being a straight ally, I know that word gets used a lot now, really matters.

And say that you are a supporter of the LGBT+ community.

Just do it and you know what, people won't think worse for you they will think a lot more of you.

Because it's even more powerful if a straight ally talks about being inclusive and being welcoming of all forms of diversity.

That works really well.