"Trans Criminals are not Women" says Priti Patel

It's a sad day when Women can't even discuss their current rights under the Equality Act, without fear of abuse, loss of livelihoods, etc.

And for it to be sanctioned by men and women who hope to lead our country, is even more shocking.

Asking, I suspect the mods will delete your post.

I personally don't think the Tories are "anti-trans". There is a range of views within the Tory party that perhaps reflects the views within the country as a whole. Several prominent MPs including Penny Mordaunt and Maria Miller are clearly not GC, and indeed some prominent transgender activists have been Conservative Party members including Christine Burns and someone else, (from Yorkshire?) whose name I forget but who used to be vocal.

My own sense is that the main difference is that the Tories seem more sensitive to the need to protect women's spaces, whilst other parties place greater emphasis on the needs of a community they consider very marginalised.

And we get to vote....

Maybe Labour had been desperately seeking about for a minority to champion and be the natural home for, and finding that all the parties were ok with women, ethnic minorities, homosexuals and the disabled, had to settle for paedophiles and transsexuals....

I did not know that either. However I am aware of the significant number of senior women, and black and ethnic minority figures both within Government and within the senior ranks of the Tory party, without any great fuss being made, and despite Labour considering itself the natural home for minorities.

From memory it was John Major who relaxed rules on male homosexuals in the army and Foreign Office, seemingly because he felt it was the natural thing to do, and without any apparent push back from his MPs or the party.

Thanks for posting that.

(Whereas 11% of us said anyone else's sexuality was nobody's business at all.)

Strangely, Conservatives were more liberal than Labour about the right of gays to exist, back in the early eighties; 61% of Tory voters said that homosexuality could never be right, against 67% of Labour voters, in a poll in about 1983. But then came AIDs, and a lot of people became very frightened and because they were frightened, very cruel.

The Tories are crap with their incremental fights and lies. But my identity as a woman comes first, before Universal Credit, etc.

Why would I vote for a Labour Party, that can't even uphold Female Labour Rights? Look at how they've treated Kathleen Stock?

Yes, Politics is a numbers game, and based on outcomes, and if you vote Labour at the next election, you will get Taiwo Owatemi as your Equalities Secrecretary and Self ID will become a reality.

At which point, the base point to start fighting the rollback of Women's Rights takes 100 steps backwards. Look how long it took to get rid of section 28.

It would be great if we could get some sort of investigation/apology for that Home Office response to that petition. It read as if it had been written by the work experience student.

They're not going to apologise at this point as their response is based on the training they've had from Stonewall, the Stonewall-mandated policy (that they linked to in their response) and their general view that biological sex is a fiction.

They are proudly saying this stuff as it's their current view - it's quite deliberate on their part and not some random mistake.

The best thing that can happen is that this response stays up and is publicised among as widely as possible. It's a perfect example of this insanity - an utterly bizarre response to a perfectly reasonable request.

Plus, the petition's still open, so if Priti hasn't managed to keep her promise by the time it gets enough signatures, it will hopefully be debated in parliament.

What about the Tory MP who wrote the excellent article on this the other day?

What about the work that's been done by Tory members of the HOL in the past few years? Or the different posters on FWR who have reported talking to their own MPs and getting thoughtful, supportive responses?

Do you think that the women in the Conservative Party aren't as likely as any others to see what's going on, and the danger?

Maybe you can argue that the LP must really believe they are on the side of right on this, since they are willing to lose elections over it. But I don't think you can extrapolate from that and say that therefore members of the Conservative Party are just cynical and want a winning policy.

Though I also wouldn't necessarily call being responsive to the public view a cynical approach. It's part of actually governing, and in a democracy, it's generally considered a feature rather than a bug.

Like smuggling in a penis...nothing to see here, oh that, that's a woman's appendage down there.

No need to look in anyone's pants

If you are admitting someone to prison then not looking in pants would surely enable all sorts of things from drugs, to mobile phones, to weapons to be smuggled in?

I was a libdem party member, they even asked me to stand for local election a few years ago and slightly reluctantly I did.
But they don't want me in party or to vote for them, so I'm not going to.

All of you saying you'd now vote Tory. It is totally up to you and I can see why you would but their support right now is purely cynical. Tories don't care about women or women's rights. They have seen this is an issue where they can split the left and pick up votes and foster hatred of Starmer. They will - and did - swing the other way if that becomes the strategic thing to do to hold on to power.

Don't forget Maria Miller (Tory MP) first introduced the Self-ID stuff and MPs like Caroline Nokes and Penny Mordaunt quite often say TWAW and 'be kind'. They are just trying to appeal to different crowds and strategically covering all bases. Don't mistake that for being aligned with or caring about women like we do. What they have done to women in this country in the past 11 years is disgraceful (from cuts to DV refuges and to legal aid to getting rid of the Universal Credit uplift which hurt single mums the most). Nothing feminist about em.

But of course I am also glad that they now see it as benefial to them strategically to be pro-reality on this - they have the most accurate polling and it must mean that they know we are now in the majority!

@LaetitiaASD yes, The other parties have made it clear that they don't want votes from women that don't agree TWAW

I am playing devil's advocate and am not disagreeing with you outright. It is possible I will vote Tory at the next election and even 6 or 12 months back I would have described that as impossible.

I also note that comparing the loss of benefits to loss of privacy and the (relatively rare) sexual assault in changing rooms is an impossible comparison to make.

I think the person who started the petition might be able to complain about it. Theres also a Feedback link at the bottom of the page, you need to add the link to the petition.
The Feedback link gives the email address of the petitions committee.

It would be great if we could get some sort of investigation/apology for that Home Office response to that petition. It read as if it had been written by the work experience student.

I can't think where one would start the complaint? - my MP is no good.

Under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, the police now have the power to take and retain a DNA sample of any person arrested for any recordable offence, regardless of whether they are even charged or, if charged, subsequently acquitted.

This has led to the establishment and development of the National DNA Database (NDNAD, also known as the National Criminal Intelligence DNA Database), which now has DNA samples from more than 3.5 million people, including over half a million samples from children under the age of 16. There are also concerns that persons from ethnic minorities are disproportionately represented in the numbers of DNA samples held. Given the extensive powers that the police have to take and retain DNA samples from suspects (and former suspects), the NDNAD has become the largest forensic DNA database in the world.

justice.org.uk/dna-retention-police/

Its odd that the civil servant who responded to the petition didn't know about the DNA test.
Do you need a blood test? I thought a DNA test was a cheek swab. I didn't know prisoners are all DNA tested, but I'd assume they'd use a cheek swab rather than risk using a needle on an uncooperative prisoner.

Yes, that dna check should be the default for recording sex. There would have to be an additional ability for people with unusual VSDs such as CAIS to have this modified according to their proper medical diagnosis. Variations in 'gender' (including GRC) would be additional information.