THERE were gasps of disbelief at the Sundial Theatre in Cirencester last week when the Ukip candidate for the Cotswolds asked if those who had voted Conservative or Liberal Democrat at the last election knew they were voting for gay marriage.

The occasion was the hustings, organised jointly by the Standard and Churches Together in Cirencester, last Thursday and attended by all five candidates standing for election to the Cotswolds parliamentary seat.

The Sundial theatre was provided free for the event by Cirencester College.

The political debate, chaired by Matt Frost of Cirencester Baptist church, was for the most part orderly and even tempered, with the horn signifying an overlong response from any of the candidates having to be sounded only two or three times.

The questions debated, selected from those submitted by members of the audience, were for the most part national issues, including reducing the country’s debt, building 200,000 new homes every year, addressing climate change, voting on an EU in-out referendum, the running of the UK parliament by MPs from Scotland, pulling out of the European Convention on Human Rights and the value of Trident as a nuclear deterrent.

The one local issue, upon which all the candidates were in broad agreement was the closure of the A&E department at Cheltenham General Hospital. Manjinda Kang (Labour), who answered every question from a national Labour Party standpoint said the Labour Party would introduce 20,000 more nurses to the NHS.

Chris Harlow (Ukip) said Ukip would put an extra £3 billion into the NHS but people from overseas would have to have private health insurance for their first two years as UK residents.

Paul Hodgkinson (Lib Dem) said his party in Gloucestershire was working to reverse the decision to close the department but added that it was important that Cirencester hospital, which he described as a gem, was used more. “It’s a great hospital, let’s do it,” he said.

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Conservative) agreed and said his partner had had superb treatment at Cirencester hospital. “We have to keep it by using it more and finding more services to put there,” he said.

Mr Hodgkinson added that the Clinical Commissioning Group, which made the decision to close Cheltenham A&E, was not working and should be replaced. “We need far more democratic decision making,” he said.

On climate change Penny Burgess (Green) said the Green party would achieve a zero carbon economy by 2030, invest in flood and heatwave defences and ban fracking. “We have to stop using all fossil fuels and look at the alternatives,” she said.

With the exception of Chris Harlow, all the candidates said they would vote to stay in the European Union.

It was during the final session, when the candidates were asked why anyone should vote for them, that Mr Harlow made his remark about gay marriage, although he said after the meeting that Ukip would not reverse that particular legislation. He added that Ukip would end mass immigration from eastern Europe and leave the EU.

Ms Burgess said the Greens would restore public services to public hands, lift nine million people out of fuel poverty and one million out of food banks.

Mr Clifton-Brown said he was proud of his own record locally during his 23 years as the Cotswolds MP and was proud of his government’s record, adding: “I take nothing for granted, ever. I work hard for this constituency and will keep working hard.”

Mr Kang said Labour would put qualified teachers back in schools and train 20,000 more nurses.

Mr Hodkinson said his priorities were to protect the countryside, to improve the infrastructure and to address the issues of the terrible ambulance response times and the closure of Cheltenham A&E.

He added, with a glance at Mr Clifton-Brown, that he would be a full-time MP.