Dear Lucy Powell MP,
Manchester’s trans community needs a champion in government. Can you be a much needed beacon of hope in this dark time?
I watched the House of Commons live stream yesterday in hope that the Equalities Minister would affirm Labour’s manifesto pledges to allow trans people to live in dignity, and announce that she’d be bringing forward legislation that would correct the Equality Act and restore the intention behind the act that would include trans women like myself in the definition of “woman”. This intention has been made plain both in Hansard at the time the Equality Act was passed, as well as by recent social media statements by civil servants involved in drafting the legislation.
Instead I watched with dismay as your colleague Bridget Phillipson used much of her statement to instead attack the past government and a tiny minority of protestors, rather than provide reassurance to a community in fear. It was especially troubling to hear her say that there is no change to be announced, but that the EHRC will be bringing forward updated guidance. If there is no change, why does the guidance need updating? I fear that the entire trans community is about to be gaslighted into being told “you never should have access to single sex spaces, therefore you still don’t” and being told that this is no change, in face of years of evidence of us safely accessing and using spaces in accordance with our acquired sex.
It is not sufficient to tell us we remain protected against hate crimes and other discrimination, as welcome as that is. When my partner transitioned in 2008 she was told by her manager she’d have to leave her role in the NHS as they couldn’t employ a trans person. That this remains not permitted by law is an important protection, but if she now has to go into work and is told she must use the men’s toilet, that represents a real backwards step in our ability to participate in public life.
There were many questions following the statement from both sides of the house focussing on the impact of the trans community, and several of these were specifically asking about which facilities people like myself should use. It was disingenuous to hear your colleague simultaneously talk about how the ruling gave “clarity” but refuse to give a straightforward answer to the question about whether or not we can continue to use the toilets we have always used.
I am particularly troubled by suggestions that the solution to this is that we are “othered” or “ghettoised” into existing as a third sex, with segregated facilities for trans people, not allowed to share spaces with other members of our acquired sex. Not only is it humiliating to do so, it is completely impractical for many service providers to provide these facilities, with the real world impact being loss of actual services.
Lucy, only the Labour government can end the fear and uncertainty currently terrorising the trans community by restoring the previous status quo with trans people able to access spaces according to our acquired sex, rather than our birth sex. (As an aside, I am particularly troubled by the language of biological sex introduced by the Supreme Court, as this is not a clean cut definition. Trans people who medically transition alter our sexual characteristics and it would be wrong to say that our biological sex remains identical to what it was at birth.)
We need new legislation to restore the Equality Act to its intended level of protection and correct the issues the Supreme Court identified. The Equality Act was an achievement the last Labour government should be proud of. It does not deserve to be misinterpreted and undermined.
As an MP with a key role in government, will you do what you can to bring forward this urgent and crucial legislation, and uphold Labour’s manifesto pledges to the trans community? Trans people like myself in Manchester Central are depending on you.
Yours sincerely,
Councillor Chris Northwood