Webchat with Sophie Walker, leader of the Women's Equality Party and London Mayor candidate, Tuesday 19 April at noon

[BojanaMumsnet]

Hello

We’re pleased to welcome Sophie Walker, leader of the Women’s Equality Party, ahead of the London Mayoral elections, on Tuesday 19 April at 12 noon.

The Women’s Equality Party was set up in 2015 “to unite people of all genders, diverse ages, backgrounds, ethnicities, beliefs and experiences in the shared determination to see women enjoy the same rights and opportunities as men so that all can flourish.”

Sophie was elected leader of the Women's Equality Party in July 2015, and in January 2016 was voted to represent the party in the London Mayoral election. She says she is campaigning for “work that works, affordable housing, equal caregiving, equal enterprise, transport that works, affordable housing and an end to violence against women and girls.”

She worked as an international news agency journalist for nearly twenty years and is an ambassador for the National Autistic Society, campaigning for better support and understanding of autism, particularly in women and girls.

Please do join us on Tuesday at 12 noon if you can, or post a question for Sophie here in advance. And, as ever, please do remember our webchat guidelines and do be polite.

The London mayoral election will be held on 5 May and you’ll need to register to vote by 18 April, today. (Keep your eyes peeled for more mayoral candidate webchats in the next few weeks.)

Thanks
MNHQ

[MovingOnUpMovingOnOut]

Hi Sophie, I understand one of the party's key objectives is to have fathers on postnatal wards and I wanted to ask about what provisions will there be to protect vulnerable women or those who have been abused? There have been many long threads on Mumsnet about this and the consensus appears to be "while it might be nice idea to have my partner on the ward it cannot trump the needs of another woman not to have him on the ward".

Surely the real issue on postnatal wards is not lack of fathers, it's lack of skilled and empathetic midwives with the time to give excellent postnatal care?

Apologies I can't look up the exact details of your policy and past threads but I'm working and only have two minutes. However I wanted to get this in because I know it's been much discussed on here and my emails and other comms have gone unreplied to on this point. I am a founder member btw :)

[glenthebattleostrich]

Hi Sophie,

You seem to have managed to alienate a large number of former or potential supporters in the past. For example, your blind support of trans issues without considering the implications for women. What are you going to do to bring us back to the party?

[ArcheryAnnie]

Hello - and thanks for staying around for a webchat.

Last year, you said in the comments to a guest post here that you support the right of someone with a male body (including a working penis) to be placed into a women's prison. Is the official policy of the WEP to prioritise trans women's wishes to be validated as female, even when it puts women in danger, or excludes them from services? For example, would you support the right of someone with a working male body to enter a women's refuge, even though their presence there will make that refuge completely inaccessible to a lot of vulnerable women? Is the sole criteria that someone "identifies" as a woman, even if they have a male body? Do you acknowledge there are any boundaries to the oppressed sex category "woman" at all?

This is important because there is no point at all in having a party dedicated to equality for women, if you don't have any deliniations of what a woman actually is.

[CoteDAzur]

Hi Sophie - I also feel that it is important for Women's Equality Party to be clear on who women are.

Please take a look at MumsNet's Feminism & Women's Rights board and read through the threads there to see the issues where we would like to see WEP take a stand in.

[PalmerViolet]

Hi Sophie, you're going to get a rough ride here I feel, so an easy one to start you off.

Will you be considering changing the party's name to the Non-Male's Equality Party, or do you think that woman has a definition?

[OTheHugeManatee]

Watching with interest for a reply to ArcheryAnnie's post.

[EmpressOfTheSevenOceans]

Thanks for coming back, Sophie.

There are a lot of angry & disappointed women on these boards because of your history on trans issues - many of us ex-WE members /supporters. I really hope you've come back in order to resolve that issue.

What's your view on Maria Miller's recommendation of self-declaration on Gender Recognition Certificates - which would in effect mean that any man could go into any women's changing room / rape shelter etc, merely by declaring himself female?
I have heard the argument that women would still have recourse to the law if attacked, but a) it's a bit late by then and b) non-gender-conforming biological males using the men's changing room etc have recourse to the law if attacked, too.

[RortyCrankle]

On the last three occasions WEP representatives posted on this forum, they ALL failed to return to answer our questions.

I will never vote for your party because you do not represent and support mainstream women who do NOT want trans men with a penis to be placed in female prisons, allowed to use women's dressing rooms, women's shelters or have access to any women-only areas.

WEP appears to represent only an extreme minority and while you do so your chance of attaining any power in the political arena is fortunately likely to be non existent.

I would like to ask how you would change my opinion?

[MovingOnUpMovingOnOut]

Thanks Buffy I agree with everything you have said and you've said it very well.

I do think this policy is being presented as a solution to the problem of poor postnatal care and it's a piss poor solution because it doesn't tackle the catastrophic problem of inadequate care for women in labour and postmatally.

I don't want Dave, Tom, Jeremy or whoever just behind the gappy curtain while I explain to a nurse that I need clear sheets because I've bled or worse on the bed.

I don't want it to be expected that my husband will be keeping an eye on me post birth to make sure I'm well when he's not slept for 36 hours when the most medical training he's ever had is checking the medical box at work to make sure the contents is in date.

This is a classic example of asking people about something seen only from their personal point of view and failing to take account of the wider and more significant issues.

[MovingOnUpMovingOnOut]

Postnatally. My iPhone has decided postmatally is a word

[HowBadIsThisPlease]

Hi Sophie,

My question is: why do you think we need a WEP, and how do your policies relate to that?

Here is the background to my question:
I think we desperately need equality for women, and the reason is because we live in a patriarchal society in which men are privileged to use women's personal resources, primarily their bodies and labour, for free.

It seems to me that your policies don't address the fact that the issues women face are at the hands of men. It feels as if you think that men can be asked or persuaded to be fair, and to this end you have constructed all policies to be friendly to men - which, when it comes down to it, retains the status quo and renders them useless to change anything for women.

Rather than go into each policy in detail and ask about it, as I only have one question, here's the question again: what is it about the world we live in that causes us to need a WEP? And how do your policies address that?

[mollie123]

The Women’s Equality Party was set up in 2015 “to unite people of all genders, diverse ages, backgrounds, ethnicities, beliefs and experiences in the shared determination to see women enjoy the same rights and opportunities as men so that all can flourish.”
very laudable objective but this seems to encompass EVERYONE who is human but the rights and opportunities that are denied to women are only defined as those which men enjoy and women do not. Can you define which rights and opportunities these are which are not already catered for in law and custom in this country.

[DrDreReturns]

How do you propose to increase the lamentable number of women working in IT, and some other STEM fields?

[OTheHugeManatee]

Now watch Sophie answer the STEM question and ignore all the others

[DrDreReturns]

It can be her 'bonus' question after she's had a go at the others!

[YouAreMyRain]

How do you define "woman"?

[EmpressOfTheSevenOceans]

Surely if Sophie's come back here - despite WEP's pretty lamentable history on MN - she must be prepared to deal with the trans question? If not then, well, what's the point?

[WilLiAmHerschel]

If the WEP think that 'woman' is an identity dependant on feelings not biology, I can't see what questions I can ask that they will be able to provide a satisfactory answer to*.

Girls in STEM, for example, is a subject that interests me greatly. But if you include boys who say they are girls in the figures it is all completely meaningless.

*That's assuming anyone bothers to come back and answer questions this time.

[APlaceOnTheCouch]

How do you hope to campaign to end 'violence against women and girls'? If anyone who chooses can decide they are a woman or a girl, then we cannot measure sex-based violence; we cannot ring-fence funds to offer support, and we cannot even offer them a safe single sex space if that is what they require. Which DV agencies have supported such an approach?

[ArcheryAnnie]

WilLiAmHerschel that's exactly it. There's a ton of questions I'd rather ask than the one I did, but they are all pointless unless I know that "woman" means something other than "anyone who calls themselves such, even - or especially - when they have male privilege".

[VertigoNun]

I am delighted to hear you are working on helping women and girls on the autistic spectrum, have you considered adding PoTS and EDS in your campaign as they too are mainly female conditions that suffer misogyny too.

www.nhs.uk/news/2014/06June/Pages/is-me-often-a-misdiagnosed-heart-rhythm-problem.aspx


I and my teen feminist daughters won't support you we wanted to as we are unhappy with you placing the needs of transwoman above the needs of women. I am not impressed at the thought of other women's male partners in maternity wards either

I admire you coming to talk here, and feel bad that you will receive a hard time.

[MrsToddsShortcut]

As the representative of a party that believes that a woman is anyone who identifies as one, what will the WEP be doing to ensure that the new changes to gender identity laws proposed by Maria Miller include a continued right to protected spaces for biological women?

To be clear, I have no problem with the trans community but as a rape survivor I find close proximity to male bodied people in confined spaces extremely triggering - I have a genuine need for female only spaces and am extremely concerned that no-one in power is defending women's rights to retain their changing rooms/shelters/rape crisis centres free from people with a penis.

In addition, what will the WEP be doing to ensure that men are not able to abuse the proposed new laws? If all a man has to do is fill out a form, pay £140 and say he identifies as female in order to obtain a legal GRC, how are women going to be protected from the predatory males who WILL take advantage of this? (Just to be clear, I'm not talking about trans people).

[0phelia]

Will the WEP refer to male members as Non-Women?

[0phelia]

I understand the WEP believe the Nordic Model on prostitution is best for women and Prostitutes. I agree with this.

Can you explain how you might lobby for this in the face of an incredibly male-led "Democracy". What are your plans to promote this?