Physics teacher and trade unionist.
Keira Bell is a name that will be remembered. Like Victoria Gillick before her, she argued in the High Court that minors could not consent to certain medical treatment. But that is where their paths differ. In 1983, Gillick lost when the High Court ruled that girls under 16 could be prescribed birth control without parental consent.
News that Rosie Duffield will be missing the Labour Party conference over threats to her personal security brings to a head an appalling situation where a female Labour MP cannot stand up for the rights of women without triggering opprobrium. Keir Starmer cannot and must not sit on the fence any longer. Maybe he is trying to sit tight and hope that this goes away? This seems unlikely: Duffield’s opponents are motivated by an evangelistic zeal to silence those who dare to disagree with them.
What is your sex? It is a simple question and one that we can all surely answer. When it comes to filling out a census, ascertaining a person’s sex is particularly important. Working out the number of men and women living in an area allows for the appropriate provision of public services. But in its approach to conducting Scotland’s census next year, the Scottish government risks undermining this.
The shameful treatment of Alexander Bramham at a Pride event in Manchester on Saturday ought to have been a wake-up call to everyone. Bramham – a gay man – had to be escorted by police away from a baying mob.
But their robotic chanting should ring alarm bells among transsexuals. “Trans rights matter”, or “trans lives matter”? It was not easy to tell behind the venom and contempt being hurled at Bramham. Either way, intolerant, mindless activists are using us as a shield to unleash homophobia with impunity.
Stonewall was established in 1989 to oppose the now-infamous Section 28 – which prohibited local councils from intentionally promoting homosexuality. It then spent 25 years campaigning for lesbian and gay equality.
But, speaking to The Times, actor and gay rights campaigner Simon Callow said that the charity has taken a ‘a strange turn to the tyrannical’. Callow was talking about Stonewall’s push for self-identification for transgender people . He added that an ‘extraordinarily unproductive militancy’ now surrounded its position.
Ofcom has joined the exodus from the Stonewall Diversity Champions programme. The explanation came in a carefully worded statement yesterday in which the communications regulator explained that their, ‘commitment to supporting the rights and freedoms of LGBTQ+ people is as strong as ever.’
Transsexuals like me never asked to be at the centre of one of the most toxic debates in society; we just wanted to transition and get on with our lives. But what was once a niche medical condition has become a civil rights issue so big that it now challenges our understanding of what it means to be a man or woman.
The British state broadcaster regularly pushes content on complex gender issues, much of it targeted at a young audience, across its various platforms. Children need protecting from this dangerous, irresponsible approach.
On Thursday, teachers planning residential trips were told that it was just fine for teenagers of the opposite sex to share a room.
Today’s A level results are unprecedented, but not unexpected. On Friday, Professor Alan Smithers of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham said, ‘The early signs are that it will be another bumper year for grades.’ He went on to suggest that this might be, ‘justified as compensation for all the disruption suffered’.
Debbie Hayton