After listening to the Women's Hour debate today, it was quite clear that Michelle Moore and Layla Moran had very different ideas about what safeguarding is. I have heard this difference in understanding before with some people agreeing with Layla that is about almost entirely about protecting children from abuse or harassment that is occurring or is likely to occur. I know that the explanation of safeguarding that the government uses is:
"Safeguarding is the action that is taken to promote the welfare of children and protect them from harm.
Safeguarding means:
a)protecting children from abuse and maltreatment
b)preventing harm to children’s health or development
c)ensuring children grow up with the provision of safe and effective care
d)taking action to enable all children and young people to have the best outcomes.
Child protection is part of the safeguarding process. It focuses on protecting individual children identified as suffering or likely to suffer significant harm. This includes child protection procedures which detail how to respond to concerns about a child."
To my mind this seems a far broader understanding of safeguarding than the one offered by Layla Moran. My personal concern is how certain trans inclusive policies and teaching, in schools and Girlguiding for example, impact of the very considerable number of sexually abused girls (both those known about and also the very many who are hidden) within these organisations. I think that many or most sexually abused girls will recognise and have a response to someone based on their sex as opposed to their gender identity. Therefore I am particularly concerned about the effect of being forced to share spaces with someone with a male-body which might not only cause significant psychological distress and upsetting trauma responses but also reinforces the message to a previously groomed and vulnerable girl that her boundaries are not hers to define. I am equally concerned about the damage that can be caused to sexually abused girls (and indeed all girls) by teaching them that 'a person is who they identify themselves as' as opposed to who you recognise them to be. I am also concerned about the lack of recognition of the impact grooming, sexual abuse and the fear and shame that it causes will have had on a girl and her subsequent ability to speak up and assert her needs. So if I applied the broader understanding of safeguarding to the impact of trans inclusive policies on sexually abused girls, am I right in believing that there are concerns with regards to preventing harm to their health and development, promoting their welfare, as well as ensuring that they have the best outcomes? Or am I completely wrong in thinking that this is a safeguarding issue?