International Women’s Day Q&A with Penny Mordaunt MP, Secretary of State for International Development NOW CLOSED TO NEW QUESTIONS

[JustineMumsnet]

[EDITED BY MNHQ: Questions have now been collated and sent over - new questions may not be answered]

Hello all,

We’re very pleased to announce a Q&A with Penny Mordaunt MP, Secretary of State for International Development and Minister for Women and Equalities.

Please post your questions on this thread by lunchtime on Wednesday March 6. We’ll send on a selection to the Minister and we will post up written answers from Penny on this thread this coming Friday (March 8), International Women’s Day.

In her role as Secretary of State for International Development, Penny Mordaunt oversees DFID’s work ending extreme poverty overseas, including programmes focused on girls’ education and women’s health. DFID has been in the news recently, facing calls for its budget to be spent partly on encouraging projects that would aid British business overseas, and for it to be folded into the Foreign Office instead of being a standalone department.

In her role as Minister for Women and Equalities, Penny is also responsible for work including gender pay gap reporting and possible changes to the law concerning gender recognition.

Penny campaigned for Brexit in the run-up to the 2016 EU referendum and is a Royal Naval Reservist. She has previously been Minister of State for Disabled People and Minister of State for the Armed Forces.

Please add your questions for Penny here by Wednesday lunchtime. And although it’s not a live webchat please stick to the spirit of our webchat guidelines and keep it civil.

If one topic is overwhelmingly dominating responses we might request that people don't continue to post what's effectively the same question or point. Rest assured we will ALWAYS make the recipient aware that it's an area of concern to multiple users and will encourage them to engage with those questions.

Thanks
Justine

Nb existing members will be able to post on this thread. Thanks.

Ripping the rug from right under us!!! Wtaf!!!

Ignored,completely ignored for my expexperience. Not supporting women in refuges,supporting terrifying women in refuge.

Ignored completely, utterly utterly devastating.

My question was really early on. Ignored.
Ignored and shut down, get her out as she's not doing her job!!!

Either Penny, or Penny's SPADs are not up to par on the reports coming out of the Tavistock.

It is not Ok that children of "about 12" are experimentally given puberty blockers.

It is also not ok that Helen Webberley's practice is still providing UK children this medication via Madrid or Glasgow - on (reportedly) little more than a 45 min online consultation.

It is not ok that you consider Karen White's victims on a par (or possibly even secondary!) to a male bodied person's "self identity".

Women,know your place, under the bus you go.

So,if that's the basis of further talks with JustineMumsnet what hope.

In all fairness I thought this was actually a really good answer to this question:

Q. If The House of Commons was 50% men and 50% transwomen is that equality?

Answer:
When the chamber of the House of Commons looks like the country it serves then I think we’ll know we are getting there.

So that's a no. Isn't it because the country isn't 50% trans women and 50% men

I didn't atall, what I thought was, what a dodge

We have statutory safeguarding duties in this country you govern, Penny. And when the inevitable shit finally hits the fan, the resulting fall out will have a clear record of who drove the coach and horses straight through it.

It's a ridiculous answer. It's underhand and side-stepping the point of the question.

Mine was ignored too. Apparently safeguarding of girls and their right to boundaries isn't of interest. Well we knew it wasn't, but it's nice to have it officially confirmed.

Who is this person who's representing women, but not, what's her qualification for this role, as she's just failed her exam abysmally

I mean I can be a bit slow on the uptake, but did anyone actually feel that their question was answered?

Well my question was whether she had moved on her initial consultation starting point of TWAW and I think she answered that quite clearly. What is less clear is whether she actually knows what a woman is. Which renders all her other answers about sex based rights rather moot.

Yes Knicknack despite unanswered and ignored requests, we now have a lot of information.

It's despicable.

It really hasn't taken all this time to put throw those few answers together.

I genuinely had high hopes. Shattered. TRA soundbytes all over and questions avoided with a load of waffle.

Oh, and changing sex on birth certificates is insane. You are the sex you were born as, you cannot change and even if you did, a birth certificate is a historical document. Lets say 'changing sex' was actually possible. A male would still have been BORN a male, which is what birth certificates are for..

Ugh. I am seriously annoyed with these answers, should have known better than to think someone in government would acknowledge the huge problems with transactivism as it stands today.

And no clear answer on Karen White either..

So much time to write such non-answers

Women are not men, that's all.

What does science have to say about this?

All our stats are useless. Women's services undermined, safeguarding, not even an apology for the obscene deadline slippage.

Well my question was whether she had moved on her initial consultation starting point of TWAW and I think she answered that quite clearly. What is less clear is whether she actually knows what a woman is. Which renders all her other answers about sex based rights rather moot.

Yes indeed. How can we have a meaningful webchat or any communication with the Minister for Women if they won’t even clearly state whether their meaning of the word ‘sex’ is the same as ours?!?

Not impressed with the answer to my question about KW. Women aren't human shields for transwomen who may be distressed at being in a men's prison. And KW doesn't even have a GRC, there was no obligation house in a women's prison in the first place but it happened because nobody gave a second thought to the basic human rights of the female prisoners.

That whole thing can be summed up as ‘Aw, shame, but trans rights are more important.’

Indeed.

Penny cares not a bit about actual women it seems. Defintely not the right person for the job. LGBT rights are impotant yes, but so are womens, and giving womens rights (and even the name woman ffs...) to male people, means womens rights don't exist at all.

She hasnt in any reasonable way conformed to the remit of 'doing a webchat for IWD', not least because all webchats allow one further comment to be responded to, never mind the complete overshoot of the deadline and cherry-picking of the questions, none in any order.

I am.assuming she will absolutely not be back for any follow up?

These things don't apply to her

Let's not be too disheartened - things are changing, people are becoming more aware.

The trans prison blocks are a good thing - that would have kept women safe from the likes of Karen White.

The sportswomen and men speaking up for women's sports.

The information coming out about the Tavistock - and the BBC panorama.

It's all shining a light on it now.

I say again, men are not women
Women are not men

It's science that is

I am tempted to print it out, annotate it and send a copy to her. I am often tempted to that!