Welsh Government hires sex offender to research sexuality and gender issue

The changes to the number of seats and the consequent boundary changes introduced for the latest UK Parliament elections were a Conservative party UK Government proposal.

The Conservatives did not bring in those changes to get rid of Conservative seats. The changes were ostensibly proposed to ensure that every constituency had a similar number of voters, with the effect of reducing the number of MPs in more rural areas - “coincidentally” that disproportionately affected Wales and Scotland and reduced the number of (and therefore the influence of historically less likely to be Conservative) Welsh MPs and Scottish MPs in Parliament.

The Conservatives didn’t lose all those seats in the last election because of boundary changes, they lost them because of their track record in office and because they lost votes to Reform.

I despair

All the Celts are in competition over this: over here in Ireland our politicians on both sides of the border are just as daft on these issues 🙄

Although, just to mix things up a bit, we also like to include the odd bit of cronyism and reckless spending of public monies:

https://www.thesun.ie/news/13738725/eamon-ryan-expensive-leinster-house-bike-shed-opw-answers/

They moved the boundaries at the election to turf out the few conservatives left. Now they've moved the boundaries for the senedd elections to boot out the assembly members. It's so transparent and odious

If only, it's boot licking media here 😡

Might be worth writing to her again Rita and asking for a copy of the “further work”, and also for the EIAs as you’d like to see what they’ve said about how they are “balancing rights” in pressing forward with their policy position.

It’s a while ago. I wonder if the position has changed?

Wtf does that actually mean 'non binary identities are valid?’

It’s copied and pasted from Stonewall’s sloganeering campaign materials, isn’t it?

That whole “TWAW, TMAM, NBIAV” spiel reminds me of reciting a prayer.

I imagine that if you asked them “what do you mean by valid in this context” you’d get a lot of platitudes in response. And wouldn’t get a definition.

Wtf does that actually mean 'non binary identities are valid'?

What do they mean by valid in this context? I bet they couldn't tell you.

And what has the 'validity' or otherwise of niche identities got to do with them handing taxpayers money to wrong uns for dubious research?

Ah maybe.

Still, you'd think they'd be on the case given that.

The kink stuff was Creative Scotland / Arts Council England funded projects wasn’t it?

“We support the thorough implementation of the Equality Act 2010, balancing the rights of all.”

If this is true, then WG will have produced an Equality Impact Assessment for each of their policy documents, external or internal, relating to a protected characteristic, and would have no difficulty producing those EIAs in response to an FOI request. Has an EIA been published for the LGBTQ plan or for the gender equality plan?

Do the Welsh government only give money to paedos or porn movie production?

Seems to be a theme in not checking who they hand cash to.

Thanks Rita.

“We support the thorough implementation of the Equality Act 2010, balancing the rights of all. The Welsh Government is carrying out further work to understand the legal context and implications of the Act.“

So they declared a Welsh Labour political belief/ Welsh Gov policy position first and then decided to carry out work to understand whether their political position is compatible with UK law afterwards?

What was the date of that reply? Recent? Or enough time since then for them to carried out the “further work”?

I have no faith in the Welsh Government.

Men are women (paraphrasing) and "We are also committed to ensuring that we tackle the entrenched and long-standing injustices and institutionalised sexism women face."

Did they not read that back, or is this what actually they meant? Poor menz?

Dear RS&B29,

Thank you for your email. Both the Welsh Labour Government and Welsh Labour party is committed to advancing equality for all and is clear this means taking account of intersecting forms of discrimination, disadvantage and striving to achieve equality of outcome for everyone.

We have made clear our stance that trans women are women, trans men are men and non-binary identities are valid. We restate our support for trans people’s right to self-identification. We are also committed to ensuring that we tackle the entrenched and long-standing injustices and institutionalised sexism women face.

We support the thorough implementation of the Equality Act 2010, balancing the rights of all. The Welsh Government is carrying out further work to understand the legal context and implications of the Act.

We will continue our work to stamp out all forms of discrimination

Yours Sincerely,

Eluned Morgan AS/MS
Mid and West Wales

Not helped by the BBC’s limited interest in / coverage of Welsh politics and democracy.

This news item attracted loads of comments yesterday but has already been ditched from BBC Wales front page, presumably having been deemed of lesser importance and news value than Richard Burton’s bench which is still up top.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c05jvl65meno

Do you have a link to where she’s said that?

The allocation of this contract to an unqualified sex offender is distracting from the fundamental point of 'what the hell are they doing commissioning this 'research' in the first bloody place?' You don't decide on a policy, then spend public money commissioning someone to go and find some evidence that there's a problem that it will solve. Especially when the UK government has already commissioned someone to look, and they found almost none.

Gender identity - it's like brain kryptonite.

Unfortunately nobody's paying any attention to the 'Troughers down the Bay', the turn out for the last election was 45% (if you round it up), that's why they get away with the things the do. 😒

Awaiting the klaxon and influx of
'Why are all you total haterz completely OBSESSED!! with this guy's past?!!
It's so mean!! Why are you all judging him!?'
🤨

does anyone think the welch are in some sort of competition with the Scots to produce the most "No way! fucking hell!" headlines in the papers?

There needs to be more press scrutiny of Welsh politics and organisations.

I am sure that a thorough report will be done and won't get lost. The Welsh Government have never lost anything, certainly not an Equality Impact Assessment