Tag Archives: transgender

Tanya Park

You can’t cite Cass and cancel the trial

By Tanya Park | Wed 25th March 2026 - 10:55 am

Somewhere in England right now, a teenager and their family are waiting. They have been waiting, in many cases, for more than five years just to see a specialist. Not for a diagnosis of cancer or a referral for surgery. For someone to talk to about their gender. While they wait, puberty continues. For some of them, that process is a cause of profound, daily distress.

That is what this debate is actually about. Earlier this week, Westminster Hall debated a petition calling for the cancellation of the PATHWAYS clinical trial into puberty blockers for children with gender dysphoria. The trial had already been paused in February after the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency raised concerns about the trial design. Many MPs, drawn from Labour, the Conservatives, Reform and the DUP, used the debate not to call for those concerns to be resolved, but to demand the trial be scrapped altogether.

Their arguments were passionate, often sincere, and in some cases carefully researched. They also contained a contradiction so fundamental it deserves to be named plainly.

Many of those MPs, when the Cass review was published in 2024, demanded it be implemented in full. Several cited Hilary Cass’s authority in the debate itself to justify their opposition to the trial. What they appear not to have noticed, or to have chosen to overlook, is that the Cass review explicitly recommended a clinical trial. That trial was meant to be the mechanism for building the evidence base they say is lacking.

A point of precision matters here. Cass did not personally endorse the PATHWAYS design in every detail. But she did recommend a trial, and when the MHRA paused recruitment she said publicly that no new research findings justified the change, and that the decision felt like a response to political pressure rather than science. The scientist those MPs invoke to close down the research is concerned it is being closed down for the wrong reasons. That is not a minor irony. It is the entire argument.

Puberty blockers are not new drugs. They have been used for decades to treat precocious puberty, where children as young as six or seven begin puberty far too early. In those cases, the same drugs, in the same doses, are prescribed to comparable or even younger children, frequently for longer periods of time. Nobody in Westminster Hall called for that use to be reviewed. Nobody described those children as being experimented on.

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The first freedom: Autonomy of the Body

By Esther Foulsham | Wed 17th September 2025 - 10:25 am

The First Freedom: Autonomy of the Body

If you cannot respect another person’s right to do with their body as they please, liberalism has no place for you.

Most people who consider themselves liberals will consider a (usually unspoken) list of rights they hold sacred.  Freedom of speech is usually the first to come to mind.  But what about the others?  The right to a fair trial?  The right to privacy?  The right to own property?

While often rarely cited, we passionately believe bodily autonomy is the right that is foundational to all others, thus we, as liberals, have a duty to defend it.  Although we must defend a wide plethora of human rights, including a core commitment to freedom of expression, we must, however, be clear: free speech should never be used as a justification to undermine other fundamental liberal values.  This includes, above all else, our right to bodily autonomy and the freedom to define our own identities.  But rights don’t exist in isolation; they are always tested in the tension between individual freedom and state control.

To understand the liberal commitment to bodily autonomy, we can contrast it with a more conservative principle: paternalism.  Paternalists claim that the State should determine what people can and cannot do with their bodies.  This is most glaring in the United States, where attacks on abortion rights are justified under the guise of ‘protecting the rights of the unborn’, and gender-affirming care for minors is (being increasingly restricted) in state legislatures across the country, reflecting an increasing desire of the State to exert control and insist that kids and their parents do not know best.

In the UK, paternalism takes subtler forms—often cloaked in the rhetoric of so-called “gender critical” activism, found across all political parties, including our own.  It also manifests in outdated legal structures: for example, many are unaware that under current UK law, even with the decriminalisation of abortion, a pregnant woman must still obtain the approval of two doctors in order to access a safe and sanitary abortion.   This is control wearing a convenient freedom-shaped disguise.

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Nell Jerram

The Cass Review is biased and flawed and Lib Dems should not support it

By Nell Jerram | Sat 21st September 2024 - 10:30 am

The UK trans community is concerned and dismayed that some Lib Dem parliamentarians seem to be excessively supporting the Cass review.

The Cass review might superficially appear to be reasonable and balanced, and few of us will closely read all 388 pages in order to form a different view than we are hearing from our broadly anti-trans media. But from a transgender perspective the signs of subtly biased language are clear from the start. Firstly, in the Chair’s Foreword:

“I have faced criticism for engaging with groups and individuals who take a social justice approach and advocate for gender affirmation, and have equally been criticised for involving groups and individuals who urge more caution.”

Why is caution ascribed only to the anti-trans side? In fact, caution is a major motivation for the pro-trans side, given the levels of anxiety and depression that can be experienced by those with gender dysphoria, reaching in some cases to suicidal thoughts.

The Foreword also introduces transition and detransition on an apparently equal footing. Yet in reality, all my experience points to detransition cases being a tiny fraction, with the vast majority of transitioners feeling happier as a result. Data backs this up with <1% of those regretting undergoing Gender Affirming Surgeries, making it among the least regretted surgeries carried out.

Another surprising note, from very early on in the review, is how it bemoans the “culture war” context and “toxicity” and exhorts for this to stop. Certainly we are in the midst of a culture war, and on more fronts than just transgender awareness, and that is sad and unfortunate, but why would this affect a scientific process such as the Cass review purports to describe? Surely, a scientific process would only accept input from experts presenting their views on the basis of evidence, and would simply discount anyone arguing a culture war point of view or exhibiting toxicity?

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It’s a woke leadership election. That is damaging

By Andy Boddington | Thu 14th July 2022 - 5:39 pm

It’s one of the most contentious topics of our times but hardly the stuff of debate on the top of the Clapham Omnibus and in the snug of your neighbourhood pub. Many people have never heard of “woke” and a third don’t know what it means.

Yet it features strongly in the Tory leadership campaign, mainly in respect of transgender issues. Why?

The anti-woke momentum in the leadership contest is partly driven by the rise of populism on the Tory right. The right wing media have been gunning against woke, especially transgender issues, for months. Searches for “woke” on Google have accelerated since the leadership contest got underway. Candidates have felt obliged to give a statement of their position on woke. Second runner Penny Mordant had been quite relaxed on transgender but toughened her stance yesterday quoting Margaret Thatcher:

“It was Margaret Thatcher who said that ‘every Prime Minister needs a Willie’. A woman like me doesn’t have one.”

This posturing by the Tory candidates in order to get approval from the right wing press is damaging. Discussions on matters such as colonialism and slavery and the transgender debate need space and time to move towards a consensus. Efforts to achieve a degree of understanding, even if a consensus is impossible, should not be wrecked by the ambitions of wannabe prime ministers.

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NewsHound

Newshound: Lib Dem peer Baroness Barker challenges the Lords on transgender issues

By NewsHound | Fri 26th February 2021 - 11:50 am

Yesterday afternoon, Baroness Barker spoke on the Ministerial and other Maternity Allowances Bill.

It was a short and powerful statement on how minority groups have been discriminated against, ignored and marginalised in past decades. That was “what happened to migrant communities in the UK in the 1970s and, in the 1980s, it was lesbians and gay men.” Today, she said, it is the turn of trans people.

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Jasmine Joséphine Sakura-Rose

Time for acceptance and respect: Trans Rights at Conference

By Jasmine Joséphine Sakura-Rose | Sat 26th September 2020 - 7:15 pm

I am trans and about as out as it gets. I’m not ashamed to be trans and I’m not ashamed to be out.

But I am afraid to be out.

Perhaps there are trans or non-binary people in the UK who are not afraid to be out at the moment, but I don’t know any. Being trans or non-binary and out in the UK is a scary thing as attacks on who we are (as well as attacks on us for who we are) have skyrocketed.

Trans and non-binary people in the UK live in a country where the media is, for the greater part, hostile to us—hostile to the very idea that trans and non-binary people should exist without being questioned about our right to simply be ourselves.

The older LGBTQ+ community in the UK have seen this all before, of course. Hit pieces that depicted queer people as being dangerous to “normal” people. For the most part such attack lines in the mainstream press have all but gone.

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Paul Walter

Jo Swinson on brilliant form on transgender rights

By Paul Walter | Mon 9th December 2019 - 10:57 am

If you haven’t seen this clip, it’s worth watching. Jo is on brilliant form as she responds to an LBC caller who criticised boys wearing skirts. As Nick Ferrari wades in about “national security” and risks for British citizens in Saudi Arabia, Jo is passionate and concludes:

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Caron Lindsay

MP slams Government for failure to improve health services for trans people

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 4th January 2019 - 10:25 am

Maria Miller, the Chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, has slammed the Government for failing to improve health services for transgender people. And there’s a particular Liberal Democrat dimension to this as senior Liberal Democrats actually helped to collect the evidence on this in the first place.

Ms Miller said yesterday that basic healthcare taken for granted by the general public is “out of reach” for trans people.

From The Independent:

The committee is due to publish a new report on the care of LGBT+ people in the coming weeks but Ms Miller has already warned services are “going backwards quickly” – with trans people among the worst affected.

“Many trans people simply don’t have access to the basic healthcare that the rest of us take for granted – things like cervical smears are often things that trans men are not able to access,” Ms Miller told the Press Association.Theresa May did commit to reforming the Gender Recognition Act 2004 to remove intrusive red tape for those legally changing gender, and launched a £1m LGBT+ health and social care fund in November.

However, Ms Miller said the focus on legal reforms has “eclipsed” efforts to improve trans people’s experiences.

“As a result there has been a debate focusing in on things that really are not as important as making sure that trans people have access to public services, and the debate has been focused in on issues that are much less important to trans people’s lives,” she said.


And that Liberal Democrat dimension? Well, almost three years ago, Ms Miller’s Committee published a report  on transgender equality. A fair bit of the evidence for the health section of that report was gathered thanks to our Sarah Brown and Zoe O’Connell, who asked for it using #transdocfail on Twitter. Zoe wrote about it on her blog in 2013:

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Caron Lindsay

Five days left to support trans and non binary people in England and Wales

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 14th October 2018 - 3:53 pm

One of my personal highlights of Lib Dem Conference in Brighton was the LDV fringe meeting on introducing some light and kindness into the currently toxic media atmosphere surrounding transgender and non binary people.

In Scotland the atmosphere is much more inclusive. Scotland’s feminist organisations are open to self identified women who are feminists. There has been an enduring, healthy and respectful dialogue between all equality organisations. That’s why I invited Emma Ritch, the Director of Engender  along with James Morton from the Scottish Transgender Alliance to tell us more. Sarah Brown from LGBT+ Lib Dems was there to outline the current battleground – the ill-informed, scapegoating, fear-mongering in the media and Sal Brinton emphasised the party’s commitment to transgender rights. Sal talked about meeting a young actor who was trans early in her career and being horrified by the discrimination they faced.

Emma spoke about how a comparatively well-funded voluntary sector and a Government determined to make sure services were trans-inclusive helped. She said that there had been some difficult conversations and questions, but that what she called the “institutional kindness” of the Scottish Transgender Alliance had done so much to foster knowledge and understanding. She said that “radical kindness” was a key element in bringing people together.

James talked about the proposed reforms to the GRA and how they would make the process much easier for transgender people to amend their birth certificates. He pointed out that a statutory declaration was a very serious legal document and the penalty for making a false one is two years in prison.

It was a well attended meeting with some excellent canapés (I will dream about the mini Tiramisu things for a long time) and some warm and thoughtful discussion. Paul Walter wrote his account of it here.

One person who was there emailed me with some reflections:

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Aimee Challenor

Why the National Autistic Society were right to reverse their decision on award winning charity Mermaids

By Aimee Challenor | Sun 7th October 2018 - 8:55 am

This week, in a move described as “worrying” by LGBT+ Lib Dems, the National Autistic Society removed all links to the trans youth charity Mermaids from their Gender page. Yesterday they reversed their decision and apologised. As a trans person with autism myself, I know it’s crucial that signposting to proper support is essential.

I was diagnosed with autism at 4 years old. It’s a diagnosis that has been constantly rechecked throughout my life.

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Caron Lindsay

WATCH: “I feel as though the media portrays us like we’re not human beings”

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 4th October 2018 - 2:59 pm

In many newspapers, on many radio and tv programmes at the moment, transgender people are attacked and marginalised. So called “gender critical feminists” take to the biggest media outlets in the land to complain that “debate” is being shut down and their “legitimate concerns” are not being listened to.

The thing is, these actions are not consequence free. A report earlier this year by Stonewall found that 41% of transgender people had experienced a hate crime in the last year. That is not far off being half.

I often hear parents of transgender children say that there are two things that scare them most when their children come out to them. The first is the hate crime figures. The second is the suicide rate. Another Stonewall report found that over a quarter of young trans people have attempted suicide and almost nine out of ten had contemplated it. In a climate where over 4 in 5 young trans people experience verbal assault and 3 in 10 are actually physically assaulted, you might say that this is hardly surprising.

Equally not rocket science is the evidence that where trans people are supprted and called by their chosen name, they do a lot better.

So irresponsible media coverage actively harms trans people by fuelling hostility towards them. Stop Funding Hate, an organisation which aims to encourage suppliers not to advertise in newspapers which exacerbate hatred towards particular groups of people has done something to try to counteract this hostile environment for trans people.

Working with Mermaids, an award winning charity which supports transgender young people and their families, Stop Funding Hate has produced this video which illustrates the harm that media coverage can do.

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Checking my underwear

By Jean Johnson | Sun 23rd September 2018 - 10:54 am

Dateline: Brighton, September 2018

Wandering into Conference a leaflet is thrust into my hands. It touches on current Government consultation on the Gender Recognition Act.

One paragraph of the leaflet sets the tone “sex self-ID that would allow any man to get his birth certificate reissues in the opposite sex. Just like that. On demand. With no change to his body and no medical supervision.”

The rest of the leaflet is a list of scenarios each more prurient than the last. None of these scenarios are evidenced as ever having happened, no evidence that a trans woman has ever abused the trust of other women in these sensationalist and inflammatory ways. Just a list of “what if”.

Leaving aside the paucity of the author’s hypothesis there is another consideration, if not sex self-ID then what?

The author suggests “changes to his body” and “medical supervision”.

While this article is not a treatise on the NHS most people recognise that for anything beyond measles that means triage, waiting times, a postcode lottery, financial limits and gatekeepers.

In the context of the current gender recognition process (leading to a Gender Recognition Certificate and a new Birth Certificate) that means two medical practitioners from suitable disciplines with experience in treating gender dysphoria.

Let me tell you about my gatekeepers.

My third psychiatrist was a sincere doctor from Iran. They cared about their patients, understood the genuine and immediate health care implications of gender dysphoria – depression, stress, frustration, anger, self-harm, self-loathing and suicide. They wanted to help not just by treating the symptoms, but the root cause as well. Everything a good doctor should be.

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Paul Walter

Liberal Democrat Voice fringe meeting: Trans rights are human rights

By Paul Walter | Thu 20th September 2018 - 11:55 am

The panel at our fringe: from left to right: Back row: Caron Lindsay, Liberal Democrat Voice editor (Chair), Sarah Brown, LGBT+ Lib Dems, James Morton, Scottish Transgender Alliance, Emma Ritch, Engender and, front row, Sal Brinton, Liberal Democrat President.

Most of you may notice the odd advert on Liberal Democrat Voice. These help LDV to contribute to the Conference Access Fund, making it easier for those of modest means to attend Lib Dem conferences. With the advert funds, we also sponsor or host fringe meetings at conference.

At Brighton on Saturday, we hosted a fringe meeting in the Hilton hotel entitled: “Transgender and intersex rights – spotlight on the media”. This fringe meeting reflected something we feel very strongly about at LDV Towers: that when people come to our fringe meetings they should be well fed and have good drinks! There were some very good nibbles and drinks at the back of the room.

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Caron Lindsay

Lib Dem, Green and Labour LGBT organisations condemn transphobic protest at Pride

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 7th July 2018 - 9:39 pm

This morning I said I was excited about Pride in London today. Unfortunately, it has hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons after a small number of transphobic protesters were allowed to march at the front and hand out transphobic literature to the people lining the streets. From the Huffington Post:

Organisers of the most “diverse” Pride event in London have hit back at accusations it allowed a group of anti-transgender activists to lead the parade through the capital on Saturday.

The small group, which reportedly only consisted of about 10 people, are believed to have carried signs with slogans such as “trans activists erase lesbians” and distributed leaflets stating “a male can never be lesbian”.

And here’s some more reports from Twitter:

The idea that someone’s rights must be the expense of someone else’s comes straight from the divisive rhetoric of the likes of Nigel Farage. And like Nigel Farage, a relatively small group of trans-exclusionary radical feminists are getting a disproportionate amount of air time, much of it complaining that they are being cut out of the “debate.” There’s a lot of their rhetoric which puts me in mind of the horrid homophobia I came across in the 80s.

A recent Stonewall report into trans people’s lives found that 40% had suffered hate crime in the last year and a third had suffered discrimination in their daily lives. These figures should worry liberals and we should be doing our best to stand up against it.

There is no conflict between women’s rights and transgender rights for the very obvious reason that women can be any combination of cis, trans, lesbian, heterosexual, of all races and religions (or none of the latter). Most women just work together for the good of everyone but there are a few who want to spread hate and there should be no place for that in any organisation which advocates equality.

LGBT+ Liberal Democrats condemned the protest and Pride in London’s reaction to it:

And there was a bit of cross-party consensus:

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Lord Navnit Dholakia

How transgender people are treated in prison

By Lord Navnit Dholakia | Fri 29th June 2018 - 10:25 am

One of the questions that has been voiced on Twitter recently in the debate about trans women has been the case of the Soham murderer, who in 2002 as Ian Huntley murdered two ten year old school girls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman and was jailed for 40 years. A number of tabloid newspapers have reported that Huntley is transitioning, and wishes to be called Lian. Incidentally, the prison service has said several times that Huntley is not planning transition.

There are those who say that giving any trans prisoner with a violent past the rights to move to a woman’s prison and mix with women puts women prisoners at risk. They have even tried to say that the Liberal Democrats in supporting trans rights, do not care about women’s rights in prison.

I see that Sal Brinton has written about the Liberal Democrat policies on trans matters, and I wanted to write about the formal process that the National Offender Management Service insists on for the care and management of transgender offenders, designed to both recognise the rights of trans people in prison, but also ensuring the safety of other prisoners and staff. Their policy can be found here,

Pages 12-13 sets out the protocol relating to sentenced prisoners. It says that there will be an initial Local Transgender Case Board after a prisoner declares, and can provide evidence, that they are living in the gender the offender identifies with, and will, as appropriate, make arrangements for transfers to other parts of the prison estate.

With prisoners who might also be deemed a risk to other prisoners, there then has to be a Complex Case Board called for Transgender Offenders, which will look at the complexity and specifically assess the risk of harm prior to making decisions about prison location. The views of the offender must be presented to the Board, but there are a number of healthcare and psychology leads there to ensure that any move to a women’s prison would be safe.

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Sal Brinton

Lib Dems are very clear about the rights of transgender people

By Sal Brinton | Thu 21st June 2018 - 4:05 pm

Embed from Getty Images

Once again transgender issues are making media headlines – sadly for all the wrong reasons. Arguments are being made that are based on misunderstanding and fear, rather than facts and tolerance.

As a party the Liberal Democrats are very clear about the rights of transgender people. We had a debate, and passed party policy on this, at conference in September 2015. The motion starts:

“The transgender and intersex communities are too often marginalised, with little or no emphasis on their needs from government or third sector organisations. Transgender and intersex individuals experience similar levels and types of discrimination within society, including but not limited to hate crime, health discrimination, and difficulty obtaining documents in the correct gender.

Legislation concerning the transgender population often does not fully advance – and sometimes actively hinders – transgender equality. Transgender and intersex people are at a higher risk of mental health issues and suicidal ideation than the general population and the rest of the LGBT+ population, especially among BME transgender and intersex people.”

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Caron Lindsay

Why we could all do with reading LGBT Youth Scotland’s guidance on supporting transgender young people

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 18th November 2017 - 8:36 am

This week, the excellent LGBT Scotland launched a guide offering advice to schools on supporting transgender young people. 

It’s badly needed. Some young transgender people find that their schools support them very well. For others, the story is very different. They find that their school does the minimum that they can legally get away with and no more.

They fail to recognise and protect young people from transphobic bullying. They make a massive issue about things like toilets and changing rooms. I know one transgender young person who was made to use the accessible toilet – not something that they were necessarily unhappy with if it hadn’t been presented in such a hostile way. The problem was that the accessible toilet was kept locked, so they had to ask for the key every time. That was incredibly stigmatising and distressing for that young person.  It’s hardly surprising that their attendance at school was extremely low.

The guidance covers practical, social and cultural issues – from residential trips and name changes to making the whole school an inclusive environment. So why is that important for us? 

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Caron Lindsay

Liberal Democrats react to Transgender Equality Report

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 14th January 2016 - 9:23 pm

Today’s publication of the Transgender Equality Report by the Commons Women and Equality Committee should lead to some big improvements to services and better rights for transgender people. It has some useful recommendations around health services – ensuring, for example, that GPs have sufficient training in how they should treat transgender people. The Committee certainly seems to have listened to many of the concerns put to them.

Their approach to the spousal veto question was more cautious than I would have liked. They basically said that it needed more consideration but didn’t recommend doing away with it, even though they accepted that a spouse could stand in the way of a transgender person getting their legal recognition. However, if the law is changed to abolish that cumbersome process, as the Committee. This is a big step forward:

In place of the present medicalised, quasi-judicial application process, an administrative process must be developed, centred on the wishes of the individual applicant, rather than on intensive analysis by doctors and lawyers.

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Mary Reid

LibLink: Tim Farron on LGBT rights

By Mary Reid | Mon 14th December 2015 - 8:59 am

 

As ever the Liberal Democrats are ahead of other parties when it comes to LGBT equality.

That is a quote from an article by Tim Farron in the Huffington Post titled The Tories Are Trailing Behind on Transgender Rights. 

In this post Tim argues that we still have some way to go but that public attitudes have noticably shifted in a positive direction. He refers to this poll in which 68% of respondents “say a person who was born male but has transitioned to become female should be housed in a women’s prison”.

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Caron Lindsay

Farron: Ministry of Justice need to be “dragged into 21st century” over Tara Hudson

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 29th October 2015 - 8:58 am

Tim Farron has intervened in the case of Tara Hudson, the transgender woman from Bath who has been sent to serve a 12 week prison sentence at an all male prison because, basically, of some paperwork. She’s never applied for a Gender Recognition Certificate, but she has lived as a woman for all of her adult life.

Tim expressed his fears for Tara’s safety to Pink News. He said:

The Liberal Democrats will raise this case in Parliament.

There is a clear need for a policy change in this area. It looks like the Ministry of Justice needs be dragged kicking into the 21st century.

As I understand it, Tara has lived all her adult life as a female. I worry potential risk of harm to her in a male prison which was deemed to have levels of violence ‘considerably higher than in similar prisons’ by the prisons inspectorate.

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Caron Lindsay

Jim Hume questions Scottish Government on gender identity clinic waiting times

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 7th October 2015 - 9:47 am

If you are a young transgender person still at school, struggling to come to terms with your gender identity, you need specialised help pretty quickly. You should not have to wait a minimum of 7 months to see a specialist. If you are older, you should not be told that the waiting list is a year.

Scottish Liberal Democrat health spokesman Jim Hume has highlighted this as another area in which the Scottish Government is failing to meet its 18 week target for referrals. This one will take a lot of thinking about as there are so few specialists in the gender identity field. They will have to come up with some long term plans to recruit and train more.

Kaleidoscot reports on Jim’s call for the Scottish Health Secretary to review provision for transgender people:

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Caron Lindsay

Conference Countdown 2015: Transgender and intersex health charter

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 6th September 2015 - 1:00 pm

In the run-up to Autumn Conference in Bournemouth, we’ll be looking ahead to examine the highlights in the debating hall, the fringe and training rooms. You can find the papers here. You can find all the posts in the series here.

First thing on Monday morning, Conference will debate a long 122 line motion on what is billed as a health charter for transgender and intersex people, but actually is much more wide-ranging.

Trans and intersex  rights is the next major front for equality campaigners. Lynne Featherstone in government set out an ambitious transgender action plan but this was kicked into the long grass when she was moved out of the Home Office in 2012.

Certainly, there is much to be done. Figures show that waiting times for a first appointment at a gender identity clinic are more than excessive.

Gender Identity clinic waiting times

 

In Scotland, young people are now being told that they have a 7 month wait before they will get an appointment at the only Gender Identity Clinic for children and  teenagers in the country. This is a mighty chunk out of a school year for very vulnerable young people who may be at particular risk of self harm and suicide.

One issue that I don’t think the motion tackles is the lack of gender specialists being trained. Until more people can be attracted into the field, the problem is surely only going to get worse at a time when many more people are seeking help. In Scotland, referrals are steeply increasing, with 2 young people a week being added to the waiting list. The clinic has recently been extended from one half day a week to one full day a week but that is far from sufficient to cope with demand. An article in today’s Sunday Herald shows the extent of the problem:

The long wait can have a serious impact on trans people who are desperate for help, both mentally and physically.

Gerber admitted: “It can be distressing and there are reports of people committing suicide as a result of that.”

Steph Bell, from Edinburgh, said she was so desperate for treatment that she told her health board she was thinking of buying hormones online, as she couldn’t face waiting months for help.

The 29-year-old claims after she told the Lothian health board her plans they agreed to move her up the waiting list, but nine months later she has still not been seen.

Bell, who has a mild form of Asperger’s syndrome, said she avoids going out alone and struggles with anxiety, made worse by her wait for hormone therapy.

Here is the motion in full. The deadline for amendments is tomorrow at 1pm. 

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Caron Lindsay

What I did for IDAHOBiT

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 17th May 2015 - 8:54 pm

I know that some of you will know exactly what I’m talking about and others will be scratching their heads wondering. Today, 17th May, is what used to be called IDAHO Day, the International Day against homophobia. It’s now known in various ways, IDAHOT or the one I prefer IDAHOBiT, which explicitly mentions biphobia and transphobia, too.

This is the day when we celebrate those across the world who are doing their bit in their communities to make life better for lesbian, gay, bisexual, intersex and transgender people. In the UK that is relatively easy. In many countries, though, you take your life in your hands. In much of the world, homosexuality remains illegal and is punishable by long-term imprisonment or even death. Being transgender puts you at much greater risk of violence or sexual abuse or murder.

We went into Edinburgh today to see an exhibition by South African social justice activist and artist Gabrielle Le Roux, Proudly African and Transgender, which was hosted in the city’s Arts Centre by the Equality Network and the Scottish Transgender Alliance. Gabrielle was there to take us through her work and tell us how it came into being. In 2008, there was a ground-breaking gathering of transgender activists from across Africa. She painted portraits of ten of the attendees. They also wrote messages on the portraits. Julius from Uganda said:

It’s been a difficult journey but one I don’t regret taking because I can only be who I am – a unique creation

Quite a few of the participants were not able to continue living in their home countries. It wasn’t safe for Flavia to return to Burundi and she has had to seek refuge in South Africa.

Accompanying each picture is a typed A4 sheet where the activists tell their stories – and those stories are updated, making, as Le Roux said, the exhibition dynamic. It was really fantastic to have the artist there, though, telling us little anecdotes about each person.

You can look at all the pictures online here. 

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Caron Lindsay

Some personal perspectives on non binary gender identity

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 13th January 2015 - 7:00 pm

I’ve read a couple of really interesting and illuminating articles recently in which people who don’t identify as either male or female talk about what that means for them. In yesterday’s Daily Record, there was an interview with NUS Scotland’s transgender representative Drew O’Donnell.

And while Drew says they know many people may find their ever-changing gender difficult to understand, they say people need to learn to be more understanding.

Drew, 23, of Paisley, said: “I’ve been told there are 37 different types of gender – a lot more than simply male and female.

“Even I can’t remember them all but when people ask me about it, I try to explain to them that sex and gender are two different things.

“The singer Cher has a transgender son who said, ‘Gender is between your ears, not between your legs’ and for me that describes it well. Gender is what you feel – and sometimes I might feel two thirds male and only one third female while the next day, I might feel two thirds female and only one third male.

“Some days I feel absolutely gender neutral – neither more male nor more female and that is totally fine too. I have three genders – the more feminine me, the more masculine me and the gender neutral me – but I am still the same one person.

“When I am feeling more feminine I will wear more feminine clothes – not skirts or dresses but clothes that have a more feminine than masculine look to them.

“I will wear make-up – I like eye shadow, eye liner and nail polish. And I have even coached my voice to sound more feminine.

“On days where I feel more masculine, my clothes are much more boyish and I won’t wear make-up. On gender neutral days, I’m somewhere in the middle.”

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The Voice

Liz Barker leads first ever Lords debate on Lesbian, bisexual and transgender women’s health

By The Voice | Sun 7th December 2014 - 10:42 am

Last Wednesday, Baroness Liz Barker, who made one of the most fantastic speeches of the entire debate on same sex marriage,  led the first ever debate on health services for lesbians and bisexual and transgender women.

The ignorance and even ridicule LBT women have faced from health professionals in the accounts Liz and others shared during the debate is truly astonishing. There does not seem to be a widespread understanding of even the very basic issues they may face.

The Minister’s reply was a bit frustrating because he basically agreed with everything that was being said but didn’t offer any actual, concrete proposal to make things better.

You can read the whole debate here, but Liz’s speech in full is published below:

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Caron Lindsay

Welsh Liberal Democrats to hold Assembly debate on Transgender awareness

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 18th November 2014 - 7:00 pm

Transgender pride flagThis week, as well as being Anti-Bullying Week, is Transgender Awareness Week. Thursday marks the International Transgender Day of Remembrance, a memorial to all those transgender people who have been injured and killed as a result of hate crime.

Tomorrow, the Welsh Liberal Democrats are holding a debate in the Welsh Assembly that aims to make life better for Wales’ 31,300 transgender citizen. The idea is to persuade the Welsh Government to actually put some walk to the talk. For those 31,300 people, there is no Gender Clinic in Wales. While violence against transgender people is a hate crime, there’s been little done to actually make people safer.

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Jennie Kermode

The Independent View: Non-gender-specific passports – why the EDM matters

By Jennie Kermode | Thu 9th January 2014 - 5:59 pm

This week has seen the submission, by Julian Huppert, of EDM 907, LEGAL RECOGNITION FOR THOSE WHO DO NOT ASSOCIATE WITH A PARTICULAR GENDER. If it sounds familiar, that’s because a similar EDM was introduced by Simon Hughes last month but had to be withdrawn when he became a minister. The subject, of course, will be unfamiliar to most of those who come across it, and that’s why it’s so important to explain how deeply it impacts those affected.

I work for a charity called Trans Media Watch which aims to improve media understanding, and thereby social understanding, or transgender and intersex people. As it happens, I’m currently processing results from a survey about people who don’t identify as male or female (generally described as non-binary people, though personal definitions vary). The survey relates to perceptions of the media, but two things come through clearly in it that seem relevant to this situation too. The first is that this is a group of people who feel very poorly understood. The second is that they experience a great deal of distress because of that lack of understanding.

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Zoe O’Connell

Opinion: The Burchill controversy – a mixed blessing for the trans community

By Zoe O’Connell | Tue 15th January 2013 - 12:44 pm

I have followed recent mainstream media events unfolding around the transgender community with a mixture of excitement, anxiety and sadness.

Excitement, because it is rare that trans issues get coverage that isn’t designed to portray us as perpetrators of some hideous evil. Even though the stories started with biased coverage in the Guardian about a doctor under investigation by the General Medical Council, it turned into something more positive when the #TransDocFail hashtag lead to LibDem Councillor Sarah Brown discussing the issue on BBC Radio. Even the continuation of bad reporting had a silver lining, when Julie Burchill’s

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