For anyone who hasn’t had time to read the Hansard report, these are my notes about the transgender issue, from reading it online (thanks for link above).
Baron Lucas, Tory, pro-women: “Stonewall should put away its kimono and baseball bat and settle down to the idea that maybe it needs to modify its rather extreme views. The Fawcett Society should listen to its founder and the quote that is on the statue in Parliament Square, ‘Courage calls to courage everywhere’, and get involved in the discussion in a serious way.”
Baroness Brinton LD, pro-trans: either dishonest or just accepting TRA propaganda, ie women can be paedophiles too, asks for figures on who attacks whom in changin rooms (widely available - men attack somen) and says: “there is considerable evidence that LGBT people, especially transpeople, are more likely to be attacked, more likely to suffer abuse and hate crime and more likely to be at risk of suicide because of the pressure”.
Baron Blencathra Tory, pro-women: “ My blunt message to the Government tonight is this: when will you stand up to the small, militant, transgender fascist lobby and say that the rights of 32 million real women and 800,000 wheelchair users are more important than the rights of tens of thousands who identify as transgender?”
Baroness Greengross, Cross-bench - sensible points about incontinence; didn’t touch on TR issue.
Baroness Nicholson, Tory, pro-women. NHS has misunderstood EA2010, and “A man could wear a frock, rouge and nail gel every day of the week for 10 years without qualifying for the protected characteristic of gender reassignment according to the Equality Act 2010.”
Baroness (Tanni) Grey-Thompson, pro women. “I have been involved in elite sport for the last 40 years, and we have seen that a small number of horrible individuals will use their position to get close to children, women and boys. That is why we need to have protections in place. There is a reason that the UN, WaterAid and other organisations have called for single-sex spaces. Social convention is there to safeguard women and girls to prevent harm. Eroding social convention will make it harder to maintain these boundaries.”
Baroness Barker LD, pro-trans, claims that TW have the right to use women’s loos, without making clear that isn’t supposed to include those who self-identify, which i believe is the vast majority: “We are proposing to take away from trans women a right that they already have: trans women use women’s toilets all the time”. She ignores the fact that TW offend at the same rate as other men: “Andrew Gilligan when he was a Times journalist ... made a rather crude FOI request about different types of crimes, and he concluded that it is men whom women should fear: it is not trans women who are the perpetrators of the crimes against them.”
Baron Kennedy, Lab Co-op, pro-trans in a please-be-nice way: “This is not about satisfying an aggressive, militant lobby, but about ensuring that we are all treated with respect.”
Baroness Bloomfield, Tory “The [Equality] Act is clear that trans people should be treated according to the gender they present” (surely she is wrong, since this suggests self-ID is already legal?) “although it also states that transgender people can be excluded from single-sex places if it is proportionate. However, it is for providers to determine this on a case-by-case basis. The protected characteristic of gender reassignment encompasses people who are intending to, are undergoing or have undergone gender transition. This does not require any medical intervention to have occurred.”
To me, that last part shows how foolishly the EA was worded, since no one knows what anyone else is “intending”. But I still don’t think the EA says “trans people should be treated according to the gender they present“.