Owen Blacker

Writing to the Women and Equalities Select Committee about trans rights

LGBTQ+open letterUK politics

Subject: Pre-appointment scrutiny for Dr Mary-Ann Stephenson

Dear members of the Women and Equalities Committee and the Joint Committee on Human Rights,

We are writing to express our great concern about Dr Mary-Ann Stephenson having been announced as the government’s preferred candidate to succeed Baroness Falkner as chair of the Equalities and Human Rights Commission. Our explicit request of the Committees for the scrutiny hearings is to:

Background

We are sure you are aware that the issue of trans rights has been prominent in media discourse for several years and that, over the last few years the atmosphere has become increasingly hostile towards LGBTQ+ people in general and trans people in particular. After decades of progressive change — with Owen’s relationship at the time having become legal when the unequal age of consent for men was reduced from 21 to 18 when the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 came into force shortly before his 19th birthday — we have seen inaction on a conversion therapy ban promised by both leading Westminster parties, we have seen several reports into trans issues be commissioned from authors with established anti-trans positions, including the reports from Dr Hilary Cass and Professor Alice Sullivan, and multiple anti-trans comments from EHRC commissioners, including Baroness Falkner and Akua Reindorf KC. The result of these reports has been an effective moratorium on gender related healthcare for trans people (children and adults alike) across the United Kingdom, with the devolved nations largely following the English lead.

Under Baroness Falkner’s leadership, the LGBTQ+ community has lost all faith in the EHRC as a protector of our rights. We saw half a dozen staff resign 3 years ago citing “an anti LGBT culture” and “building links to anti-trans groups” and a year later 7 senior officials left “due to the transphobic direction of the organisation”. Former staff have described the EHRC as politicised, transphobic and an “enemy of human rights” during Baroness Falkner’s tenure, under which EHRC has repeatedly intervened *against* trans rights, including in court cases and the UN, and the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions have been asked to review the EHRC’s “A-status”, both 18 months ago and in the last few days.

After the Supreme Court ruled in For Women Scotland v The Scottish Ministers that trans women are not protected from sexism by the Equality Act — a judgment that brings considerable uncertainty to the law and which has been described by the BMA as “biologically nonsensical” and “scientifically illiterate” and by Human Rights Watch as “severely regressive” — the EHRC published “interim advice” to recommend segregation of trans people from gendered spaces, some of which the Commission has since been forced to withdraw after the Good Law Project threatened the Commission with action, saying that the interim advice “authorises and approves unlawful discrimination”. The ruling and the EHRC’s “interim advice” lead to 18 independent experts for the United Nations expressing their concern and reminding us that the UK had previously been found in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights in Goodwin v United Kingdom, a situation we obviously do not wish to see repeated. The consultation launched by the EHRC in its wake has been criticised for an unreasonable timeframe, as well as bias and leading respondents to endorsing the EHRC’s segregationist viewpoint.

ILGA, the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association, publishes an annual Rainbow Map, ranking the legal and policy landscape for LGBTQ+ people across Europe. In 2010 the UK topped the list; last month we fell to 22nd out of 49, an all time low, below Slovenia, Croatia and Estonia and every country west of the former Iron Curtain except for Italy, which is currently governed by a prime minister from the far right.

Concerns about Dr Stephenson

It is in this context that we raise our alarm at Dr Stephenson having been proposed as the government’s preferred candidate, as she has demonstrated concerning bias on the subject of trans rights. Her nomination threatens to continue the anti-trans trajectory that we have seen from the EHRC over the last five years or so, which puts at risk not only every trans person in the UK but also visibly queer people of any gender history and cisgender (non-trans) women who do not adequately perform femininity. As well as our empathy with trans people, this raises an especial concern for us because, on ██████’s part, as a queer cis woman who does not always conform to stereotypical expectations of femininity, the For Women Scotland ruling and the anti-trans environment in general leaves her less safe and emboldens violent bigots potentially to assault her because of physical features which might not meet their definition of womanhood. As a queer cis man, this ruling leaves Owen worrying for female friends and family — both cis and trans — who are less safe now than they were a few years ago.

Some of Dr Stephenson’s actions over the last few years raise particular concern and suggest a pattern of anti-trans bias, including speaking at the conference of the anti-trans organisation Woman’s Place UK, alongside prominent transphobic “gender critical” figures Dr Kathleen Stock and Helen Joyce and writing on behalf of the Women’s Budget Group to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster to endorse the Sullivan Review’s dangerous and misguided call for “disaggregation of sex data”, based on anti-scientific ideas of “biological sex” as a category, in a way which increases the risk of outing, harassment and discrimination against trans people in everyday life. Professor Alice Sullivan, who led this review, is a member of the advisory group for anti-trans campaign group Sex Matters. Dr Stephenson also donated to the legal case against LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall led by Allison Bailey, the founder of LGB Alliance, a trans-exclusionary organisation who intervened in the Supreme Court case.

It is also notable that Dr Stephenson follows a disproportionate number of anti-trans, gender-critical figures on social media, but no prominent people or organisations who are trans or trans-inclusive. There is no record of Dr Stephenson meeting with trans organisations or trans-inclusive LGBTQ+ organisations, nor of her making public statements in support of trans inclusion or of LGBTQ+ communities.

The need to rebuild trust

The LGBTQ+ community — and trans people in particular — have become disillusioned with the Equality and Human Rights Commission; it is no longer seen as an ally, working towards *our* equality and *our* human rights, despite that being their statutory duty under the Equality Act 2006. In this context, it is important that the next chair of the Commission be someone who can rebuild that trust and advocate for *all* minoritised and disadvantaged communities across the United Kingdom, someone who can reopen communications with LGBTQ+ communities and organisations and demonstrate that we are heard and valued by the Commission.

By contrast, Dr Stephenson’s clear bias on trans issues makes her entirely unsuitable as a candidate for this office. Dr Stephenson endorses groups and viewpoints who seek to rollback LGBTQ+ rights and this must be incompatible with being the figurehead of the organisation responsible for promoting and enforcing quality and non-discrimination laws across Great Britain. Frankly, we would suggest that her position suggests systematic misalignment with the Nolan Principle of objectivity.

To reiterate our request at the head of this email, we ask that, at today’s scrutiny hearings, you:

Thank you for your time and consideration. Please do not hesitate to reply by email if you would like to discuss this matter further.

Yours faithfully,

Owen and ██████ Blacker

Incidentially, I received an immediate autoresponse that suggests the committees might be getting the point:

Thank you for contacting the Joint Committee on Human Rights. We will respond to your email as soon as possible.

If your email concerns the EHRC pre-appointment hearing taking place on Tuesday 1 July, please note that we have received your email. Any concerns raised have been noted.

Please note, the Committee cannot consider any individual cases. It also cannot look into matters which are outside the responsibility of the UK Government.

If you would like information on the Committee’s work, including inquiries, evidence sessions and publications, please consult the Committee’s website: Human Rights (Joint Committee) - Summary - Committees - UK Parliament

The image shows a Trans Pride flag flowing down a pillar of the Casa de Nariño and was published ad released to the public domain by the official photographer of the Colombian Presidency, via the Wikimedia Commons: 20240627 Conmemoracion mes LGBTIQ-Juan Diego Cano05467 (53820721143).jpg