Starmer rowing back on self ID - what do we think?

[JohnnyMcGrathSaysFuckOff]

The Times is reporting in its live politics feed that KS has explicitly said Labour will not push for self ID without public backing. I know not everyone can access their content so here is a copied n pasted version: what do you think?

Sir Keir Starmer has shifted Labour’s position on transgender rights as he said the bitter rows over Scotland’s Gender Recognition Bill showed the party must consider public opinion on the issue.The leader of the Labour Party has previously insisted it was committed to updating the Gender Recognition Act to introduce self-identification for transgender people.However, in a significant shift in Labour’s policy, he said the backlash over the SNP’s gender reform bill had made him think again. The SNP passed legislation this year that would make it significantly easier for people to acquire a gender recognition certificate and reduced the minimum age for doing so to 16. The bill was blocked by the UK government.Starmer said: “I think that if we reflect on what’s happened in Scotland, the lesson I take from that is that if you’re going to make reforms, you have to carry the public with you.

“And I think that’s a very important message and I think that’s why it’s clear that in Scotland, there should be a reset of the situation.”

Pixie, I can't comment on the other parties because it's still a year until the GE and none have published a manifesto. I can comment on the Tories because they've been in power for 13 years.

Well that's a shame. Just because the other parties haven't been in power for a while doesnt mean you can't comment. They are still doing/saying things albeit in the background. How do you think single MPs get their constituents problems and fears across, like Claires Law and Suzys Law (among many others). How effective as a group are they? As a party do they just block things because they can or do they think of what it can do for the country as a whole, or do they do fuckall except whinge? The GE manifesto is not the be all and end-all of a political party.

Dunno.

I didn’t join until the post-Blair years, maybe the Kinnock Era had cleaned lots of the most extreme dissidents out well before Blair took the reigns?

There was still a lot of internal party hooha in the Blair years (eg Ken Livingstone standing as an independent for his first win as London mayor in 2000 and a whole sweep of the Labour Left quitting over the Iraq War and starting the Respect Party) but how much of that involved expulsions and how much involved walking before you were pushed or just outright rage quitting I don’t know.

Hard to Google anything up because searching for ‘Blair expulsion’ and differently tensed variants just brings up endless articles about Alistair Campbell being expelled in 2019 🤷‍♀️

1999 article on Ken Livingstone
https://amp.theguardian.com/uk/1999/feb/14/livingstone

Wiki entry on Respect Party which was most active circa 2004-2008 ish.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Respect_Party

I can’t even remember the name of the official Labour candidate (Blair’s preferred pick) for the first London Mayoral vote (not sure if that’s a reflection on his dullness or my middle aged brain)!

Well that's a shame. Just because the other parties haven't been in power for a while doesnt mean you can't comment. They are still doing/saying things albeit in the background.

Exactly. Lots of Labour MPs currently sitting in parliament have had a lot to say about all this. Why shouldn't they be judged on their words.

Manifestos aren't usually worth the paper they are written on.

FRANK DOBSON!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Dobson

😅😅😅

He does get it.

In particular, lawyers work with definitions. Sir Keir knows full well that "a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman" would not be considered a workable definition in any contract or piece of legislation.

He also knows that when legislation uses words to mean something other than their usual meaning, they are supposed to be defined. So it won't have escaped his notice that the Gender Recognition Act refers to "male" and "female" as "genders", which is absolutely not their usual meaning, but fails to define any of these words.

But he doesn't care.

There is a reason why he left the law and went into politics.

In law you try to avoid confusion and make things legally watertight.

In politics you try to deliberately create confusion to convince opposing groups of people that you are on both their sides in the hope that they will all vote for you. That's what he's doing now. Unfortunately I don't think it will work on gender critical women, and it seems to be enraging trans activists. Serves him right, the duplicitous wanker.

Whereas the Tories are probably 30% TWAW at most and at least 50% GC.

The grateful begging tone LWD are having to employ makes me very glad I resigned from Labour several years ago.

Sunak really should have given the role to someone with their own biological children who had no truck with gender identity ideology. I am sure there were lots of other options. The fact that she started to endorse the Scottish nonsense as 16 being old enough tells you all you need to know.

Mordaunt is Leader of the House not in Education?

I'm glad a handful of women in the Labour party still have the energy to hold the line.

Clarifying that that sex means sex in the EA2010 would be a big step forward for women. Alas the noises coming out of Labour suggest they won't support that petition.

I agree with the Twitter thread posted recently that it is utterly ridiculous that women have to justify their existence like this. And against the supposed party of equality and social justice.

I don't have the bandwidth or inclination to hoke around what the losers/also-rans say. I'll be interested in their manifestos, but until then I will continue my railing against the party in power. The Tories. You know the ones that wrecked the country and fucked women's rights over.

No Neil Kinnock did the prep work for him in expelling Militant Tendency. Because I was around then and voted for Blair, I was unable to remain a party member when Momentum/Corbyn came on the scene in 2017...same old same old...nothing learnt from history.

Ok. You do you!

Those of us that actually have to pick out political representation from the English, Welsh and Scots parties will try and look a little further ahead.

Destructive tunnel vision doesn’t usually end well.

Are you actually pro-women at this point? Or just anti-Tory?

I am always Pro-women. I have zero party political loyalties as it is incompatible with my feminism. Attacks on women come from all directions so it is complacency for a feminist to believe any party provides a political home. Its also dangerous as it can blind/distract people and make them easy to manipulate.

I am always pro-women. It's one of the reasons I'm anti-Tory.

I don't have the bandwidth or inclination to hoke around what the losers/also-rans say. I'll be interested in their manifestos, but until then I will continue my railing against the party in power. The Tories. You know the ones that wrecked the country and fucked women's rights over.

I think the Opposition have to be taken to task too, and hard questions should be asked of them. If they are awful and ineffective in Opposition then they are never going to be any good as leaders...which is EXACTLY the reason the tories have been in power so long. You are focusing on the wrong party. You need to quadruple your bandwidth and look at them all.

Labour need to step up. And its looking like they won't. That is not the tories or the voters fault, that lies squarely on Labours shoulders.

I think the Opposition have to be taken to task too, and hard questions should be asked of them. If they are awful and ineffective in Opposition then they are never going to be any good as leaders...which is EXACTLY the reason the tories have been in power so long. You are focusing on the wrong party

Exactly. Labour have been appalling in opposition since 2012:

1. Ed Miliband decides to trash the Blair/Brown legacy. I was totally opposed to the Iraq War, but that didn't mean that nothing else was achieved. The most successful Labour government ever and, instead of defending their domestic legacy, Labour decide to join the Tories in trashing it. Then wonder why voters aren't keen to give them another go.
2. Corbyn. Nuff said
3. Anti-semitism
4. Misogyny/abuse of GC women
5. The worst of all possible worlds on Brexit - no position, flailing around, pleasing no one.

6. completely failing to challenge "the science" behind the lockdowns. We were only saved from the final one due to Tory rebels. It was clear at the time of the Christmas one that the "Kent variant" had been clocked by officials in September yet no one in opposition demanded an explanation as to why they let it go until December. Unforgivable.

I have respect for Starner and Labour womens declaration if they turn this around.

I won't vote Labour as they are continuously trans activists and gaslighers - lite - that's what you are if you want to retain or update the GRA, it has to go. I signed the government petition to repeal the GRA, I won't vote for anyone who wants to keep that stupid law or a new version of it and gaslight the public, its psychological abuse.

I look at NZ and no way am I walking into that. Labour is that

I agree. It's how I felt (still do) about Canada

Starmer must acknowledge this recent LWD missive, and the organisation itself, especially if like the flare up over anti semitism, it leads to a proper highlighting and sorting of the issues involved.
Anything less than a free and frank discussion, is not good enough.
Has Starmer got it in him? When he has at least two of his inner circle with trans IDs kids, and at least six who are fully TWAW, many more at the next level, and the activist base fully signed up. Can he stand up to the personal and professional pressure of resisting their takes.
He knows this will be the difference btwn a small majority or hung parliament, and a comfortable or even huge majority.

Exactly.

I suspect she has trans identified young relatives.

Cornwall Live said they witnessed a local woman being assaulted by a member of the anti-fascist group, with the culprit disappearing into the crowd.

What's with all the left wing men beating up women this week?