FIRST Minister Nicola Sturgeon and tennis star Andy Murray are among 100 finalists in the Icon Awards, Scotland’s biggest event celebrating diversity and the LGBT community.
Organisers announced the finalists last night and revealed they received more than 60,000 nominations for 15 categories, including ‘role model’ and ‘straight ally’ of the year.
The awards, sponsored by the Sunday Herald, were set up to recognise individuals and businesses that champion diversity and inclusion.
Nicola Sturgeon, Scottish Conservative Leader Ruth Davidson and Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale are among the nominees for Politician of the Year, along with SNP MPs Hannah Bardell and Mhairi Black. Sturgeon is also in the running for Straight Ally of the Year.
Two-time Wimbledon winner Andy Murray is nominated for Sporting Icon of the Year while the Time for Inclusive Education (TIE) Campaign is up for Charity of the Year. TIE co-founder Jordan Daily is also a finalist in the Role Model of the Year category.
STV weatherman Sean Batty is nominated for the Media Coverage of the Year award alongside BBC correspondent Jamie McIvor, radio presenter DJ Dantheman and the team behind Scene Alba Magazine.
The nominees for Entertainer of the Year include comedian Scott Agnew, The Voice star Barbara Bryceland and Glasgow singing duo Robert and May Miller. Drag queens Dharma Geddon and Ginger Rogers are also in the running.
Elsewhere, nominees for Venue of the Year include Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts, Falkirk wedding venue The Parsonage and the Glasgow gay bar The Waterloo. TRNSMT Festival, Pride Edinburgh, Tedx Glasgow and the Mela Festival are up for best event.
The awards, back for the third year, will be held on Friday, September 15 at Glasgow’s Hilton Hotel and hosted by interior design guru and TV presenter John Amabile. The winners will be decided by a judging panel that includes University of Glasgow rector Aamer Anwar and Scottish FA Diversity Manager Hala Ousta.
Last year’s winners included Angela Crawley MP, who won Political Icon, and Scottish Police Muslim Association Chairman Fahad Bashir, who won Uniformed Icon. This year all profits made from the event will be donated to charity.
Chair Scott Barclay said: "I am incredibly proud to present an outstanding list of finalists. Each of those nominated have went above and beyond in championing inclusion in their own way and have helped Scotland become one of the most welcoming and diverse countries in the world.
“I wish every single one of our finalists the very best of luck at our Gala Final on the 15th of September and want to thank them for their work in shaping a better future for Scotland."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel