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'Prominant' campaigning role of Tara Hewitt: NHS, TELI, Social work, universities etc

109 replies

R0wantrees · 05/10/2018 13:37

James Kirkup in yesterday's Spectator article wrote:
(extract)
"What explains the disproportionate number of girls (child ‘assigned female at birth’, to use the approved term) who are starting a journey that can lead to hormone treatment, then binding and ultimately removing their breasts? Is it possible that this is simply part of a wider crisis of mental health among girls?

I don’t know, and neither do the doctors and scientists who study this issue. If you talk to the clinicians at the Tavistock Clinic in London, the NHS centre for the treatment of gender-variant children, they’ll tell you that all the factors I mentioned may be at work, but the evidence base is still incomplete, that they need more time and data before offering explanations. (They’ll also tell you that quite a lot of the children referred to them as ‘transgender’ will in time ‘desist’ and decide to live in their original gender.)

The government now intends to commission research into all this. You might think that sounds sensible and mundane. You would be wrong.

According to Tara Hewitt, founder of the Trans Equality Legal Initiative (TELI), prominent campaigner for transgender rights and an adviser to numerous public bodies including the NHS, the proposed research is ‘absurd and offensive’. The project should be ‘dropped in the bin — it’s simply not an inquiry that needs to happen,’ Hewitt reckons.

This is the quintessential trans-rights response to scrutiny: even looking for facts about children’s welfare is transphobic. Just accept that trans girls are girls and trans women are women. End of debate.

If you haven’t heard that mantra ‘trans women are women’, you will soon, for it is the orthodoxy of the moment, a phrase even politicians are expected to repeat as proof of their embrace of trans-equality. And woe betide anyone who suggests that donning a dress and a new name doesn’t magically render a male body female. Biology is transphobic too."

Im aware that Tara Hewitt co-founded TELIUK and the NHS Trust she was working for at the time UHSM is associated with the group.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3374926-What-influence-does-TELI-have-on-government-public-services-and-charities-policies-Co-founders-include-Jess-Bradley-Tara-Hewitt-and-Michelle-Hudson

At UHSM Tara Hewitt ammended the same sex ward policy to include a new transgender policy (gender self-id)

Also that Tara Hewitt has recently been working with Salford University on their Diversity and Inclusion policies etc

Last weekend, Tara Hewitt gave a keynote speech for social workers, foster carers and those involved wih adopting children at the The Adoption and Fostering Alliance (AFA) Scotland Health Group Conference (they wrote) :

"We are pleased to confirm that Tara Hewitt will be joining colleagues from Three Circles Fostering at this conference. They will be addressing issues of gender identity, about which many professionals feel ill-equipped when required to advise and support looked after young people and their carers.

Tara has provided input and support to staff from over 20 different NHS organisations covering Mental Health, CAMHs, Forensic Services, Acute Trusts and Clinical Commissioning Groups in relation to supporting trans service users and staff.

She has previously been invited as a guest lecturer on LGBT+ issues to social work students at Liverpool John Moore's University and Nursing Students at University of Salford.

Outside of her time spent as a Leadership & Inclusion consultant, Tara has worked for over 8 years as an Equality & Diversity Professional within the NHS. Tara specialises in bringing a creative edge to discussions around the complex topic of gender and health inequalities and helping professionals navigate solutions to challenges within an intersectional context, including young people in care."

Tara Hewitt & ThreeCircles created resources for children and young people in the care system & a toolkit for foster carers and social care professionals supporting them, These were promoted at the conference:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3324578-Vunerabilities-of-Looked-After-Children-Social-Work-CP-restricted-by-affirmation-requirement-Trans-Youth-in-Care-Toolkit

Tara Hewitt training for health care professionals:

Interview 2016
www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/what-its-like-transgender-catholic-10810323

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Original poster
R0wantrees · 08/04/2019 19:00

I find this baffling. Why? Who is paying this person? I find it incomprehensible that this person somehow remains influential when they’re parading their sexual fetishes all over. I get the whole “we shouldn’t be ashamed” vibe, but at work???

Tara Hewitt worked for UHSM (Manchester hospital)
UHSM was (rather bizarrely) also one of the 'founders' of TELI with Jess Bradley, Tara Hewitt & MIchelle Hudson
Whilst at UHSM TH won an award for diversity. Someone once suggested that TH nominanted themselves for this but I haven't seen that confirmed anywhere.

I think TH also runs various private consultancy & so may be employed for specific NHS / Social Care training days, no doubt the points above are useful in securing

I think TH is supported/encouraged by Stephen Whittle (Press For Change/Proud Trust)

There's a lot of prominant & influential TRAs based in Greater Manchester.

Greater Manchester Health & Social Care is in a unique situation of having devolved funding.

Having watched the training video many times which Fermat recommends & being aware of cancer treatment issues (from a patient perspective) then I am also stumped as to how TH continues to be rewarded & granted a platform with influence.

OP posts:
AnyOldPrion · 08/04/2019 18:13

RealGhouls:

Tara goes to Macmillan cancer meetings to endorse BDSM for cancer patients (no, really). Also at nursing conferences to preach BDSM for nurses.

I find this baffling. Why? Who is paying this person? I find it incomprehensible that this person somehow remains influential when they’re parading their sexual fetishes all over. I get the whole “we shouldn’t be ashamed” vibe, but at work???

Wants to destroy the Tavistock for being insufficiently affirming, and replace it with some sort of TRA-run body

Wasn’t it announced the other day that a new NHS place was being set up which was indeed to be run by transactivists? How is this all being pushed forwards despite the growing unrest? It’s like a steamroller.

hackmum · 08/04/2019 17:40

Loved this from James's article:

"Here is my suggestion to Mr Doughty, and other MPs following this debate: do your job properly. Instead of adding to the sum total of the dumb anger in the world, do your job and try to reduce it."

FermatsTheorem · 08/04/2019 17:33

I'd just like to invite everyone to watch the video clip in the opening post. Note in particular, the section from 4.30 on, where Tara talks about the trans umbrella, and the section from 5.30 on, where Tara explicitly explains that the trans umbrella encompasses fetishistic cross dressers, who cross-dress for sexual motivations.

There it is, straight from the mouth of someone trans themselves, who is delivering a lecture to healthcare professionals on how to deal with trans people in health care settings.

I think it's important to remember this when people discuss what were formerly single-sex environments, like open plan changing rooms, and hospital wards, and youth hostel dormitories, and women's homeless and domestic violence shelters - which the trans juggernaut wants to repurpose as single-gender. The trans umbrella, according to one leading and highly feted proponent of it, a proponent taking a leading role in training and drawing up guidelines, explicitly includes male bodied cross dressers who cross dress because of sexual fetishes.

Original poster
R0wantrees · 08/04/2019 17:06

James Kirkup Spectator today, 'It is now ‘transphobic’ to report doctors’ fears about trans’ children’s health'

concludes:
"Mr Doughty and other MPs should start putting that right by showing some actual leadership and convening a serious, evidence-based debate about this subject. Listen to the clinicians, the academics, the experts. Listen to the parents and families, on all sides of this conversation. Sort fact from fiction. Distinguish lobbying from expertise. Delineate personal anecdotes from objective data.

A comprehensive parliamentary review of children, gender and healthcare services is long overdue. The proper body for that review is the Health and Social Care Select Committee, which should urgently undertake a report into the wider issue of growing GIDS referral numbers and the narrower questions of how the NHS is responding to the young people concerned.

The gender debate is an angry mess of misunderstanding, misinformation and harm for many reasons, but one of them is that politicians have not done their jobs properly. The GIDS story is the gender debate in microcosm: politicians have neglected this issue, allowing vocal lobbying interests to set the agenda; when that leads to problems and people try to raise concerns, those people are shouted down with cries of “transphobia.” And the underlying problems persist, with real human costs."

blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/04/it-is-now-transphobic-to-report-doctors-fears-about-trans-childrens-health/

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Original poster
R0wantrees · 08/04/2019 16:58

Tara Hewitt's response to Times' important articles with detailed serious Safeguarding & Duty of Care concerns about the treatment of children & vulnerable young people raised by NHS medical professionals is to dismiss as 'transphobic'.

It is not clear if TH has actually read & considered the content of the articles which would be the appropriate response of someone with managerial/advisory NHS influence.

TH instead says they "could cry" although not apparently for the possible damage done to children & young people which has motivated whistle blowers from Tavistock GIDS & the lead professor of Evidence Based Medicine at Oxford to speak out with Safeguarding & Duty of Care concerns.

twitter.com/Tara_Hewitt/status/1115129452684558336

The Transgender Inquiry (headed by Maria Miller MP) that Tara Hewitt cites as 'expert source' was critiqued last year by Professor Kathleen Stock at WPUK House of Lords meeting. She identified many fundamental flaws:
(extract)
"You are also going to get a lot of confusion for questioning, gender-non-conforming, children, working out who they are in a world in which ‘changing sex’ is now apparently easy.

So the question for all of us is: how to balance these competing interests?

I want to talk about how, in attempting to answer that question, public organisations are being misleadingly advised, sometimes with harmful results.

I take it that the selection of advisors on a particular issue should follow four basic and commonsensical principles:

· All groups affected should be represented

· Advisors should have relevant expertise, and should advise only on areas where they have expertise.

· Advisors shouldn’t have backgrounds which undermine their credibility.

· Advisors should, where possible, appeal to independently verified evidence to back up their views." (continues)

medium.com/@kathleenstock/womens-place-talk-full-text-house-of-lords-oct-10th-2018-b1f3d70c4559

thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3553935-Times-article-calls-to-end-transgender-experiment-on-children

'Prominant' campaigning role of Tara Hewitt: NHS, TELI, Social work, universities etc
'Prominant' campaigning role of Tara Hewitt: NHS, TELI, Social work, universities etc
'Prominant' campaigning role of Tara Hewitt: NHS, TELI, Social work, universities etc
OP posts:
WrathofRancidKlopp · 02/02/2019 14:44

Thanks to ROhan
Useful information as always.
People need to watch Tara Hewitt in action on YouTube. It is very useful to see.
I like to observe the reaction of the audiences, they sit there looking incredulous and meek.
I watch the speeches and I am incredulous knowing that Hewit is pulling the wool over our eyes.
We mustn't be meek at these meetings.

RepealTheGRA · 02/02/2019 14:13

Keep going Tara, you’re doing more to peak trans the nation than this board ever could.

Thanks as always for the links R0wan

Original poster
R0wantrees · 02/02/2019 14:07

Current case re the assault of two young girls in Scotland by a 17 year male who identifies as transgender and has had care system involvement from a very young age.

The influence of 'affirmation' policies as promoted by Tara Hewitt and other TRAs in both Social Services and Mental Health (Memorandum of Understanding) are relevent to the circumstances of the sexual assault, as well as possibly the management of the risk presented by the offender.

current thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3496984-Article-in-Dundee-Courier-about-assault-of-10-year-old-girl-in-supermarket-toilets

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Original poster
R0wantrees · 02/02/2019 14:01

Tara Hewitt's response re Greater Manchester Police apology and investigation for an officer's defending of the term 'terf'.

current thread:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3496353-Greater-Manchester-Police-claim-terf-is-not-a-slur

'Prominant' campaigning role of Tara Hewitt: NHS, TELI, Social work, universities etc
OP posts:
Original poster
R0wantrees · 03/01/2019 13:32

current thread, OP starcrossedseahorse wrote:
"Anyone listening to Nick Ferrari this morning? Tara Hewitt was on claiming that trans people are unable to access basic healthcare due to NHS staff being mean to them. Some spurious statistics were dragged out ( as usual) and Nick Ferrari mixed up gender and sex which made it difficult to follow if you are not clued up.

Dr Nic Williams was given less air time but did a good job focusing on the issues in hand and pointing out (again) the issues with reform to the GRA.

I have a really good feeling that Maria Miller is on the back foot and has been told to refocus the debate on to health matters and to kick the GRA reforms in to the long grass.

It feels like the start of it and for the first time in ages I feel hopeful."

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3467959-LBC-this-morning

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Original poster
R0wantrees · 17/10/2018 00:08

Important thread and article detailing the lie that NHS wards were ever same-sex:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3396859-Weve-been-lied-to-about-Single-SEX-wards-since-2010

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Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 23:29

Are there any evidentiary grounds to put up a challenge to the work Tara Hewitt and ask for a review

The issues with Allsorts Schools' toolkit would apply to the Toolkit for Social Workers

There's an early Diversity Document authored by TH for UHSM which uses the protected characteristics as the guide and drops 'sex' replacing it with gender.

It may be the case that since that point, UHSM Equality and Diversity stategies and recordings have failed to measure sex as a protected characteristic.

Quite a lot to take issue with in the training video for HCPs

OP posts:
Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 23:24

Does Tara have links with the Greater Manchester Police

There are a lot of prominent TRAs associated with Greater Manchester.

Jess Bradley, Rob Noon (NUS TRans officers), Proud Trust (Christine Burns & Stephen Whittle press for Change) etc

Also previous thread:
OP RadicalFern wrote:
'Andy Burnham, Mayr of Greater Manchester, has hired an advisor, Carl Austin-Behan, to help him think of what to do about "the row" over All-Women shortlists. Austin-Behan's solution? Party members who campaign against trans women being fully accepted as women should no longer be allowed in the party.

Austin-Behan described opposition as "Utter rubbish; if people are trans women, then they are women.”'

www.buzzfeed.com/patrickstrudwick/people-who-oppose-trans-rights-have-no-place-in-labour-says?utm_term=.mdWBWxEelr&bftwuk#.mkdLwq18nP

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3329447-People-Who-Oppose-Trans-Rights-Have-No-Place-In-Labour-Says-The-First-LGBT-Mayoral-Adviser

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InfidelForever · 07/10/2018 22:56

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

arranfan · 07/10/2018 22:23

Are there any evidentiary grounds to put up a challenge to the work Tara Hewitt and ask for a review?

ChrysanthemumsAreMums · 07/10/2018 22:20

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3387573-Greater-Manchester-Police-Pride-Network-supports-No-T-on-our-turf

Does Tara have links with the Greater Manchester Police?

Ereshkigal · 07/10/2018 22:15

Yes I saw that too.

Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 22:03

Twitter comments

OP posts:
Charliethefeminist · 07/10/2018 21:16

How so?

Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 21:10

I think Tara Hewitt is due to take up a new post with Salford NHS TRust.

OP posts:
TreborSoftmint · 07/10/2018 18:46

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 18:43

TreborSoftmint

Tara seems to have incredible influence though in NHS / Social Care.

Its difficult to reconcile with what seems to be the realities of Tara's capabilities etc.

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RealGhouls · 07/10/2018 18:41

AIR Caroline did embarrass herself somewhat with Tara. But I think she learned a lesson.

Original poster
R0wantrees · 07/10/2018 18:41

I think Tara is quite influenced (mentored?) by Stephen Whittle / Press For Change.

OP posts: