Webchat with Ed Davey, Lib Dem leadership candidate, on Tuesday 18 June at 1.30pm

[BojanaMumsnet]

Hello

We’re pleased to announce a webchat with Ed Davey MP - one of the Lib Dem leadership candidates, along with Jo Swinson MP. Ed will be joining us on Tuesday 18 June at 1.30pm.

Ed worked as an economics adviser to Paddy Ashdown, before winning his seat of Kingston and Surbiton in 1997.

In the Coalition Government, Ed began as a Business Minister, laying the groundwork for Shared Parental Leave under Vince Cable. Ed then became the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change in 2012 under the Coalition Government, where he says he quadrupled renewable power and made the UK the world leader in offshore wind. After losing his seat in 2015, Ed campaigned for Remain in the EU referendum, and re-gained his seat in 2017.

Since then, Ed says he “has been fighting for us to keep our place in Europe, pushing for a proper response to the Climate Emergency, and helping Liberal Democrats get elected across the country”. For more information about his leadership, please take a look at his campaign website.

Please do join us on Tuesday at 1.30pm, but if you can’t make it on the day, leave your question for Ed on this thread in advance.

As always, please remember our webchat guidelines - one question per user, follow-ups only if there’s time and most questions have been answered and please keep it civil. Also if one topic is overwhelmingly dominating a discussion with a guest, mods might request that people don't continue to post what's effectively the same question or point. Rest assured we will ALWAYS let the guest know that it's an area of concern to multiple users and will encourage them to engage with those questions.

And finally, we’re hoping to confirm a date with Jo Swinson for a webchat too - we’ll let you know when we do.

Many thanks
MNHQ

Hi Ed,

Do you agree that sex and violence crimes should be recorded as female crimes if the perpetrator self identifies as a woman? How does this improve crime statistics?
Thanks

Now that Scotland is moving ahead with it, and the report on the Westminster consultation is due soon, reform of the Gender Recognition Act is now a question of time

Given that, the next question on peoples' minds is "What's the next big steps that any Government or party will address in to ensure that trans people in the UK get a fair roll of the dice?"

Right now a number of issues remain outstanding, including;

• Having to entirely overhaul the whole Gender Identity/Transition services provided by the NHS so trans patients can access the necessary medical services in a timely and dignified manner, as opposed to the waiting times for first treatment that now range from 2 years at an absolute minimum, all the way up to 5+ years because of chronic under-provisioning of services. Although all the various NHS bodies are aware of the need to do this, they've each refused to do so, instead remaining with a failing model that's rapidly getting worse

• Examining why NHS and Social gender transition and support services are completely failing trans and gender questioning children and young trans people. There are an estimated 115, 000 binary and non-binary trans children and young people in the UK between the ages of 5 to 19, and yet nowhere near that number of young trans people are accessing NHS and/or Social support. There are very good reasons as to why that is, and yet the past two Governments have flatly refused to address this issue and find out why so few trans children and young trans people feel so disempowered by the current system that they refuse to engage with it

• As was prior to the situation in 2004, trans people once more exist in a grey area in law. If a trans person does not have a GRC then for some purposes of law they are considered their birth sex, but for other, and increasing, areas, they are treated (correctly) as their expressed gender identity. In 2016 the Womens and Equality Committee released a report addressing the issues that trans people faced, and one aspect of that was to change the Equality Act 2010 so that Sex and Gender Reassignment would become Gender Identity, once more affording trans people transparancey and certainty within the law.

• An ever increasingly hostile UK print press has, and is, producing an almost continuous stream of anti-trans, trans-hostile, and transphobic articles, including articles by Rod Liddle. Given the previous tragedy of Lucy Meadows, a return to the worst type of press reporting on LGBT+ issues last seen in the 80s, as well as other issues, the immediate and obvious solution is full implementation of the results of the Leveson Enquiry

If you became Leader of the Liberal Democrats would you pursue any of these issues to solve the problems inherent in them and, if so, which specific issues would you seek to address?

I'd like to stress my concerns about differing opinions and a toxic culture are not restricted to one subject.

I don't want to get involved with any party (I have been previously) because of this climate where those who have the most mates and loudest voices are the only ones which are listened to or respected.

It was the Lib Dem part of the Coalition Govt that brought in the legislation that has meant a growing number of employees own the company in which they work and I know you were instrumental in that as Business Minister. Since 2014, focus has dropped from the promotion of fairer business. What plans do you have to address the inequality caused by toxic corporate exploitation and short termism?

Ed, when the LibDems were in coalition there were many policies that members put up with through gritted teeth such as the awful bedroom tax in exchange for good policies such as shared parental leave, same sex marriage and the first round of tax cuts to those in low paid jobs.

But when you were Secretary of State you had the choice about supporting nuclear power, fracking and airport expansion.

Earlier this week I heard you on the radio defending your support for nuclear power and the ridiculous support for Hinckley C which will probably never operate. It rang pretty hollow to me.

I’ve spoken to many LibDems who were disappointed at what you did when you had the chance to change things. (My initials aren’t GE by the way. )

How can you present yourself as the green candidate when you chose to make these decisions?

While I’m here, just a plea to ignore the so-called ‘gender critical’ obsessives here. Whilst they flourish in the dark corners of Mumsnet they don’t represent the views of all of Mumsnet.

Like many other Labour voters, I voted Lib Dem for the first time in the EU elections because of your stance on Brexit. I won't vote Labour again while it's in its current state and will never vote Conservative.

However, you've completely lost me on the trans issue. I feel there is nobody prepared to stand up and represent the view of women in the UK - when you read about people like Karen White in a women's prison do you really think it's fair for women? What about that guy who won the Woman of the Year award? What about women only shortlists? What about women in sport? Do you really think your party's doing the right thing there?

Those of us with any concerns about aspects of Lib Dem policy have as much right as anyone else to raise them with a leadership candidate.

Ed, please ignore anyone who says gender issues are peripheral and most on mumsnet support the GRA. They don't. Traffic to the feminist board has grown 10 fold as women become aware of the issue. Ignore them at your peril.

Absolutely Born and Apollo

Will the LibDems uphold The Equality Act and human rights legislation?
If not how do you plan to change them?

While I’m here, just a plea to ignore the so-called ‘gender critical’ obsessives here. Whilst they flourish in the dark corners of Mumsnet they don’t represent the views of all of Mumsnet.

Nobody represents the views of all of Mumsnet, we are not a homogenous blob.

Pretty dismissive though to describe the feminism section of a (mostly female) parenting board as a 'dark corner.' If it wasn't for the feminist movement spanning the last century this website wouldn't even exist.

Hi just arrived at Mumsnet - really looking forward to answering your questions - thanks so much for sending so many in!

As a long term user of Mumsnet I find the 'feminist' boards full of a bunch of bullies who pile in on anyone who dares challenge their 'wisdom'.

I've tried to have rational conversation many times but virtually every time have been rounded on by insults such as 'drank the kool-aid' and 'handmaiden'.

It's a pretty dark place to be if you dissent from the prevailing view.

Harunosakura I can answer your issues about the lack of GIC services and the appalling wait times for people needing to access trans services.

The spike in referrals has bee far faster than we can train specialists, and as there are no objective tests or scans which could speed up diagnosis you need a great deal of skill to be able to differentiate between a child who has a gender dysphoria or one who is struggling with issues stemming from sexuality or neurodiversity.

Increasing training budgets to fast track training the staff would help - but, the challenge is attracting people to specialise in a field where the evidence suggests that puberty blockers and hormonal medication cause harm, and surgical interventions do not reduce self harm behaviour in the long term and have unacceptably high complication and revision rates. Plus, there's the issue of behaviour of medics like the Webberly's, the resignations of the staff from Tavi, the political pussy footing around the gender/sex issues and the perception of GICs amongst trans people is poor in that they are seen as "gate keeping" rather than "objective" if hormones are denied - and the patients will buy hormones online, travel abroad for surgery even with the risk of serious harm rather than accept the "no" from the medic.

So, yes, there are many problems - but, it's not all about a waiting list and I would love to see what the Lib Dems are doing about the wider issues too.

Do you think political parties and ideologies serve any purpose in today’s political climate? I personally think they’re mostly a force for bad and we should move to evidence based policy making by people with no interest in power, or with the distractions of political party power grabs.

@onalongsabbatical

Centre ground parties let the electorate down by making more of their differences than their common ground. I'm fed up with the lot of you. When when when when when will you and TIG and Greens and moderate Labs and possibly even moderate Cons put your differences aside and create one coherent but diverse party that can oppose the two extremes instead of being all these silly little groups in the middle none of which ever command enough support to get into power? I speak as an actual paid-up LibDem, by the way. But very very fed up with this country. The future of politics is co-operation, not bloody in-fighting.

Actually many of us try to work with friends and colleagues in other parties. We are doing it all the time in Parliament if you're a Remain MP and want to stop Brexit, as I fervently do.

I've also argued for a Goverment of national unity, if that's the only way to stop Brexit. That would mean a vote of no confidence in the Government and a backbencher MP, probably from the Labour party, forming a cross-party Government. This would require many people to put their tribal politics aside. For Lib Dems, that's generally easier because we are not very tribal in our politics. There's another part of this question, though, which is how do you organise at general elections. In the first past the post election system - which we really need to get rid of - electoral alliances can be very difficult to bring about. But not impossible. The best example in my lifetime has been tactical voting which we saw on a grand scale in 1997 and 2001. And I think there are lessons there.

Hi Ed
Can I just check that you've come here to answer questions and engage with us in good faith.
I noticed you liked this tweet earlier. Please can you draw our attention to the content in the questions that you feel is transphobic.

It is transphobic to ask questions

@Peregrina

Do you now regret going into Coalition with the Tories, instead of going for a Confidence and Supply arrangment as the DUP have done?

No. The country was looking over a precipice in 2010. Borrowing over £400m a day. Alistair Darling's proposed Labour Budget cuts were very similar to what the Coalition actually did in order to restore financial stability. By being in Coalition and not in a confidence and supply arrangement, we were able to protect at least some parts of the Budget that the Tories would otherwise have cut. Moreover, we were able to stop them cutting much deeper, for example, we prevented cuts to school budgets. Health spending continued to rise. We stopped Osborne slashing benefits for the poorest, in the deep way he wanted. Looking forward, austerity has to stop. The country's finances are much better. And we now have to invest in key public services and stop the Conservatives' attack on the poor.

@Chocalatecappuccino

Hello Ed,

Good law requires clear definitions of words. Define woman.

I support the proposed reform of the Gender Recognition Act to allow self-certification - both for philosophical reasons and for practical reasons.

Philosophically, I believe in the freedom of the individual to be who they want to be - and not to be told who they are by society. When society dictates to individuals, unhappiness and discrimination are not far behind. So for me, a trans woman is a woman, and a trans man is a man. For me, that's not a policy position, it's their reality and I respect it.

Practically, I'm alarmed at the amount of discrimination against trans people. The bullying and the violence faced by trans people should concern everyone, not least because the suicide rate amongst trans people is significantly higher than the general population. And as someone who believes everyone is equal and everyone deserves equal respect, I strongly believe we must tackle such discrimination - just as we still must do more to win full equality for the wider LGBT+ community, for women, ethnic minorities, the disabled and other groups who can face discrimination.

Lets face it women continue to suffer discrimination - dismissal due to pregnancy, low conviction rates of rape, period poverty, forced marriage, FGM. Surely we need to unite not divide in the face of inequality?

While I don't pretend to be an expert, I do find the different arguments and evidence that trans women are somehow a danger to other women totally unconvincing. Like all bad arguments, they take one or two rare incidents, and try to hang a full-blown thesis on them. These are not "legitimate concerns' and I don't believe we should engage with them.

So while I know my views will not find favour with everyone on Mumsnet, that's what they are. I've had this debate at length with a number of people on both sides and I realise feelings run high. Yet I'm 100% clear of my position.

You have completely missed the point Ed. Women are in danger from MEN. And you are using discredited statistics.

@BicycleDynamo

Why should I vote for you when I don't think you'll ever get into power on your own, and the one time you went into coalition it was fairly awful (and enabled the conservatives to impose a great many policies I dislike).

First, the chances of Lib Dems being the largest party, or even a majority party, at the next election, haven't been so high in over a generation. Just last month we beat both the Labour Party and Conservative Party in a UK-wide election for the first time in over 100 years. Our clear and principled position to stop Brexit is persuading lifelong Conservative voters and lifelong Labour voters to back us. I'm also proud of what we achieved in Coalition, taking millions of low-paid people, the majority of whom were women, out of tax. Our state pension reforms helped women more than any other group. I was personally responsible for policies that nearly quadrupled renewable power, often in the teeth of opposition from the Conservatives. Norman Lamb's achievements on mental health, Lynne Featherstone's achievements on same-sex marriage. The Party's achievements on the Pupil Premium, getting more resources to the most disadvantaged children in our schools. These were just some of what we achieved. They weren't awful, they were brilliant.

Oh what a shame. You seemed much more open minded a year or so ago.

You seem a lovely man and wish you well, but despite voting LD in every election that I have to vote to cast in the twenty years since I turned 18, I will now not vote for you again.

That tweet was by the Radical Association, a group that shares several key players with the LibDem LGBT group. Same people whose bullying of GC feminists was covered by The Times last year.