Scottish Government closes petition to axe controversial school trans guidance

[IwantToRetire]

Teacher guidance that encourages the affirmation of gender identity beliefs in Scottish schools will not be axed and MSPs are under fire for their 'silence'

MSPs will no longer be exploring an update to transgender guidance in Scottish schools.

Holyrood's Public Petitions committee backed away from calls from campaign group Safeguarding Our School (SOS) who want the Scottish Government to axe its "Supporting transgender young people in schools" guidance.

SOS described the current guidance as potentially breaching teachers' duty of care and raised conflicts with the Equality Act's sex-based provisions. Critical of the brief conversation at the Holyrood meeting of MSPs, the group said: "They would appear to rather have bad, out of date & harmful guidance, than have to actually reflect on and have difficult conversations about the issue."

SNP MSP for Kirkcaldy David Torrance, who called for the petition to be closed after evidence was considered, said axing the guidance would be "detrimental to the well being of transgender young people."

https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/politics/scottish-government-closes-petition-axe-31610508

And another quick update.

Foysol Choudhury flat out says the Cass Review does not apply to Scottish schools because education is devolved.

Ie our children are not entitled to the same level of safeguarding as their English counterparts.

“Since Education is a devolved issue in Scotland, and we have a different education system, the findings of the Cass Review are not applicable in Scotland as it was not conducted based on the Scottish Education system.”

Does he mean the Cass Review as a medical/health matter doesn't apply to Education? I can see the reasoning there, to an extent. And so long as you try furiously hard to avoid joined up thinking at all costs, that makes sense.

I’m struggling to make sense of it.

While yes, both healthcare and education are devolved and so Cass does not automatically apply to Scottish healthcare policy, to say it doesn’t apply because of devolution is making our children political footballs. Given how often we heard (including from Pam Duncan-Glancy) how important it was to follow international best practice, to dismiss Cass out of hand because of devolution is quite stunning.

However, he’s not even dismissing Cass because healthcare is devolved. He’s dismissing it because he has this bizarre idea that it is based on the English and Welsh education systems. He doesn’t understand the basic fact that Cass is not based on any education system. It is based on the best evidence based approaches for the care of gender distressed children. The education setting not “system” only comes into play because social transition is a psycho social intervention and considered a treatment - a treatment which other people in the school setting participate in. Nothing to do with the English vs Welsh vs Scottish education system.

Plus he doesn’t seem to know that education is devolved in Wales.

And finally, the SNP have repeatedly said they will consider the findings of Cass. Just today, Shirley Anne Somerville told Parliament they will “closely consider” Cass. (Let’s ignore the fact that we all know she doesn’t actually mean it. Let’s take her at face value for the sake of my argument). Is Foysol saying the Scottish Labour position is that Scottish Labour won’t or that it shouldn’t be considered?

Its one of the most illiterate and incoherent responses I’ve ever had from an MSP.

“Reviews of evidence that smoking is harmful were not conducted in Scottish schools so are not relevant to children smoking in Scottish Schools”

Ha! I might steal that when I go back to him with my next round of questions!

🎯

On the other hand, a tiny survey of selected adult transgender people and their mates in a Canadian city, some of whom were homeless, and the relationship between these adults and their parents, is totally relevant to preteens in Scottish schools and must be included in the school’s guidance….

https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2021/08/19/use-of-statistics-in-the-scottish-government-publication-supporting-transgender-pupils-in-schools/

Yep, and Safeguarding Our Schools also pointed out the info graphic in their petition and linked to the MBM blog. Completely ignored by the Petitions Committee as well. 😡

(shall also steal that point but will give you credit- this is very much taking vulnerable children and making them political footballs because “devolution”.)

I can't work out why some Tories are going for it, though. That's really concerning.

Don’t bother giving me credit. I am just pointing out what others have.

Unlike all the other parties that whipped their MSPs to vote for the GRR bill, the Tories allowed a free vote and 3 voted for. One of those sits on the petitions committee. However one of the SNP MSPs who broke whip and voted against the GRR bill also sat quiet on the committee whilst they dismissed the petition…