Mermaids given £500,000 by National Lottery (Sunday Times)

[crsacre]

A transgender charity that campaigns for children to be given prohibited sex-change treatment has been awarded £500,000 by the national lottery.

The payment to Mermaids has angered MPs, feminists and women’s organisations, who accuse the charity of bullying doctors, promoting falsehoods and using “emotional blackmail” to pressure parents to support life-changing medical interventions for their children. Mermaids will use the money to create a network of 45 groups nationwide.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/child-sex-change-charity-handed-500-000-by-national-lottery-dvbt7t2kb?shareToken=cd8d6faad97cd9dd3fe3f16eb3810f45

And also letting us know so we can follow.

Careful with this. If you have used your real name on 'What do they know?', it could be linked with your MN account.

shouldn't Susie and co at Mermaids be really concerned at the unanimous disapproval of the general public? If I was Mermaids, I'd be horrified at the complete lack of support from the vast majority of people and want to hear their side.

shouldn't Susie and co at Mermaids be really concerned at the unanimous disapproval of the general public? If I was Mermaids, I'd be horrified at the complete lack of support from the vast majority of people and want to hear their side.

I don't think Susie, at least, thinks that way. I don't think she can afford to.

Big Lottery Fund has made a statement:

www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/news/press-releases/2018-12-17/big-lottery-fund-statement-on-proposed-grant-to-mermaids

We have received a range of correspondence in relation to a proposed grant to Mermaids, expressing both concern and support regarding this organisation. We’re grateful to those who have taken the time to write to us, and in light of the nature and volume of the communication we have received, we have decided to undertake a review of this grant.

the TRAs are banging the anti Mumsnet drum on twitter saying that it (Mumsnet) should be shut down, calling Justine a Terf and all the usual stuff. Why are they so afraid that this subject is discussed? They can hashtag 'no debate' it as much as they want, but you can't silence a slowly growing flood of resistance to their ideology. They've been untouchable and undebatable for too long.

Yay! Huge respect to Big Lottery Fund. Now hopefully they can help support children in an appropriate, caring way, which doesn't involve blockers, surgery and instant validation without counselling and exploring of feelings, sexuality, gender expression etc

If they have nothing to hide then what’s the issue?

Why are they so keen on children being drugged and mutilated at such an early age

None of them could ever shut me up about gaping safeguarding failures in charities or their guidance - whether it's trans guidance or any guidance. Safeguarding first. Always.

Well it’s only under review... no word on what they will actually DO yet.

Hopefully they will undertake a thorough review and take on board safeguarding concerns.

what will the Big lottery Fund review entail I wonder? I'd be really impressed if they didn't adopt the default position of bowing to societal pressure to be unquestionably woke without reason or critical thinking...if they really look at the FACTS (not opinion) they can't possibly think this is a good charity to support

Small steps...

What would the legal comeback be for anyone suing in the future?

So many organisations are facilitating the harm of children, even when the concerns have been outlined to them.

If there is ever something like a serious case review, where does liability end? The doctor actually signing the prescription? Mermaids for pushing the ideology? The lottery fund for funding the people who push the ideology?

I bet BLF cave.

what the TRAs need to realise is that the Big Lottery Fund would have just dismissed all the protests about this grant if they were all just 'evil, vile, transphobic hate speech'
The fact that they're reviewing the grant suggests that they think the protests are reasonable and worth investigating properly.

Brilliant news that they're going to pause and have a think. Brave decision. Let's hope sanity reigns

They've done the right thing.

They simply cannot ignore people raising concerns about the safeguarding of children. Well, they can, but in five years when Mermaids is bankrupt, then ex-clients of Mermaids will look to sue BLF instead. And rightly so.

And BLF need to investigate their own procedures. Alarm bells should have been ringing from the start. Mermaids has always been controversial; BLF should have investigated them thoroughly from the get go.

Mermaids promoting the services of a private GP who has been suspended by the GMC should have been enough on its own to disqualify Mermaids from a grant.

A High Court judge ordering Mermaids to stop contacting a family should have been enough on its own.

And Mermaids to set up 45 clinics? From a controversial charity that has no medical expertise and has a track record of attacking the NHS? Again, that should have been enough on its own to disqualify Mermaids.

The application should have been dead in the water from the start.

I would also love to see the grant application and the deliberations from BLF. Doubt we'll clap eyes on those.

When I've worked on charitable grant applications, they want evidence. I think there are sufficient questions now being raised about some of the false statistics that Mermaids throw around plus the Kids Company disaster (which was primarily down to a charismatic leader who people didn't dare question) to give Big Lottery pause. Green's highly questionable tweets from the WPATH conference don't do her any favours.

I hope some of the parents who have written so eloquently on MN about how they were excluded and shunned for wanting to take a watchful waiting approach get in touch too. Their testimonies are very powerful.

grant application and the deliberations from BLF

this is precisely what I've asked for in my FOI request (among other things). Let's see what they come back with.....

Good. The connection to Webberly alone should be enough to raise alarm bells. Mermaids is a lobbying organization led by people with no medical expertise in the area they're giving "guidance" on. They are actively undercutting the work of the people who are experts, such as the Tavistock. It's questionable that they should be allowed to keep their charitable status at all, much less be given more money to do ethically questionable things with.

I am sure the FOI requests will have had a big effect. Somewhere, there are minutes of the panel approving this grant.

Is enough to give them pause. Missed some words out.

That's fabulous news. Makes you wonder why they didn't do their research properly before deciding on the grant, though.

Makes you wonder how many other grants they've given out without bothering to do their due diligence, honestly.

Seems to me that the trigger words for these funding bodies are 'children' and 'suicide'. They don't look any further than that.

I have seen some successful grant applications which have been rather embroidered shall we say. The due diligence isn't what it might be.