What would the DfE schools' guidance and policy look like under a Labour government?

[BonfireLady]

I'm thinking ahead to a (likely inevitable) Labour government after the next election.

Obviously the DfE staff are civil servants, so are ostensibly non-partisan. However, from what I am understanding, thanks in no small part to the brilliant posters on this board, both the DfE and Labour have a high number of people who are very supportive of the notion of a "trans child".

The Tories have had a significant part to play in getting us to where we are now: notably both a) the teaching of sexual orientation and gender identity in the curriculum and b) the KCSIE statutory guidance stating that sexual orientation and gender identity are not safeguarding issues happened on their watch. Thankfully, we've now got the Gender Questioning Children draft guidance, which isn't perfect as is but is a significant step forward, and we've also had phenomenal discussion in parliament about children and gender identity following the Cass Report.

There were quite a few comments on the HoC thread which focused on schools and safeguarding needing urgent attention.

One comment that was indirectly related to this topic got me thinking.... Someone mentioned that Wes Streeting used to work for Stonewall, in education.

If/when Labour do get in, do we know who or where the influences will be coming from? We have no idea how far the Tories will get in finalising the non-statutory guidance, getting schools on board with following it, getting the teaching of gender identity belief out of the curriculum, improving how safeguarding is managed in relation to gender identity belief etc etc.

I wonder if we can "brainstorm" what/who to look out for in a future Labour government?
It might help parents to understand more about what is coming, so that they can raise concerns now with schools or their MP.

"Queer children", an activist's interpretation of the Equality Act (after Cass's interim report which told everyone about LAC and child sexual abuse in the cohort) and no consideration of self-ID:

www.iicsa.org.uk/news/lgbtq-child-sexual-abuse-victims-and-survivors-blamed-their-abuse.html

x.com/cforwomenuk/status/1598231553594867712?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

Can you expand on the point you are trying to make here? Because when I read the link about survivors of sexual abuse I just felt sorry for the victims it quoted.

Many men also said that when they were younger they had been accused of ‘inviting’ sexual abuse because they showed an interest in other men by being stereotypically ‘effeminate’.

Just really sad and shows how entrenched victim blaming is in society.

The data confirming that gay and lesbian, LAC, mentally unwell children etc being over represented in the cohort who think their sex is wrong is appalling.

There needs to be some really grown up thinking about this in the LP. There must be a balance between ensuring that children are free to explore their emerging sexuality in an age appropriate way and a school understanding that it's not their role to introduce children to particular sexual experiences.
Allowing activists to prepare SRE materials, training, model school policies despite their lack of knowledge about child development, learning etc has resulted in too many age inappropriate resources and initiatives for schools.

I'm not sure that Labour can or will return to their previous "imposed" curriculum as they did previously. But the current situation is unsustainable. Somehow we need to return the schools who have got caught up in trans extremism (and I know of many who have successfully protected children from it) to being places of learning, not indoctrination in a falsehood.

A very good point.

And in fact, this provides an option for Stonewall too. They (and Mermaids) are already saying that they support "holistic" care. From what they've said so far, their definition of holistic care is having access to a range of options. This sounds very much like the Embodiment Goals approach that Eliza Mondegreen talked about after attending the WPATH and EPATH conferences. Embodiment goals being a constant journey, whereby there is no such thing as detransition because it's simply a shift in the person's embodiment goal.
Shifting the focus on to waiting lists will help significantly to delay any work in education to stop the pipeline from schools: they can "legitimately" prioritise the Cass Report's recommendations and say that they need to leave it to the clinicians to speak to children and... for nothing to be done in schools until this is sorted because "we just don't know what we should be doing in schools"....

Mrs O's point about the civil service role seems very apt here. If Stonewall finds a way to legitimise itself while remaining LGBT, Labour will bring them back in and the civil servants in the DfE and Department of Health and Social Care will control the direction of travel.

Devil's advocate: why would they bring in groups like the LGB Alliance when there are enough voices saying it's a "hate group" and Stonewall ostensibly represents the whole LGBT "community"?

Wes Streeting's previous affiliation with Stonewall in education (and his retained belief in the "trans child"), his current role in Health and Iain Anderson's move from Stonewall to Labour are key here. There will be a lot of people who they both know in various positions in the civil service who they have good working relationships with.

I wonder if there is a way to find out who in the DfE and Department of Health and Social Care has Stonewall connections?

My guess is the SEEN network in the civil service will have the receipts. I recall they submitted a multi paged complaint about political bias in the civil service - presumably well evidenced as the overreach and bullying is extensive. Trouble is it's such a massive organisation covering all aspects of public life with transactivists having been allowed to breach the Nolan Principles from day 1 and also cross departmental boundaries.

Sorry @ResisterRex I realise my choice of words was poor there when I said "it provides an option for Stonewall too".
You had already said that. D'oh.

Great point re the receipts. When I get the chance to read it in detail, I'll have a look through their 30 page document to see if there are any nuggets specific to the education and health/social care departments.

I am not optimistic. I think Labour will shelve the draft guidance for gender questioning children to appease their base and then be too scared to produce a replacement, so we will be back to schools outsourcing their thinking to suspect organisations.

To be honest I'm not even hopefully of the draft guidance being accepted by most schools even if the Tories stay in power. It's non statutory and a lot of schools are entrenched in their position and won't budge.

My experience of civil servants in the DfE is most are very young, not parents themselves, with no teaching experience. Not necessarily ‘captured’ in the institutional sense, but from a generation where “TWAW/ T are the most marginalised/ we all have a gender identity” was pretty unchallengeable on most uni campuses.

This, combined with the gradual erasure of local authority influence and the fact that staff in schools are starved of time to properly research things outside their main curriculum responsibility, enabled the ideology to gain such a foothold (via Stonewall, Gendered Intelligence, AllSorts, DRM etc) that questioning gender identity ideology felt distinctly career limiting. The teaching and leadership unions and the Chartered College facilitated these organisations and to some extent the culture of no debate.

Apart from the views of the Labour politicians likely to take up ministerial roles, and the civil servants who advise them, my biggest worry is what Helen Joyce identified as the need to cling on to the GI fiction if you’re an adult who has encouraged a child to believe lies, (and possibly do themselves lasting damage in the process). We could find ourselves spiralling away from Cass.

Not necessarily ‘captured’ in the institutional sense, but from a generation where “TWAW/ T are the most marginalised/ we all have a gender identity” was pretty unchallengeable on most uni campuses.

This is the Be Kind majority, so a reasonable assumption across both education and health/social care Departments. It's like that Villagers and Werewolves game that Glinner describes:

https://youtube.com/shorts/M8j1xWbyfjI?si=SPz4iU9zB2ZpufJL

I'm hoping that the receipts of the "werewolves" that reside in both the DfE and DfHSC are somewhere in that big letter 🤞🤞

I wonder who the current education and health "specialist leads" in Stonewall are too.

I would add to this that teacher training and all the teaching unions, including the ones for Senior Leaders, are TWAW/if children say they are trans then they are. Local Authorities aren't neccessary the force for good that is being suggested on this thread either. As you can see on the thread about local authorities responding to the draft guidance and not being willing to share how they responded. There are so many battles still to fight.

Sorry just seen that you'd already mentioned teaching unions! Will read more closely next time.

Do the teaching unions and LAs have any direct influence on how the DfE policies are structured (in the same way as the civil servants who work with ministers or is their role later e.g. blocking/protesting it from being put in action once it's written, responding unfavorablly to public consultations etc if they don't like it?

Or is it not quite a simple either/or?

It's no longer straightforward as it used to be. There are now so many Academies, Trusts, Faith schools, Free schools, city technology colleges and the independent sector with different structures and many easy to capture by activist groups. The relationship between LAs and the DfE has been weakened as some LAs are now responsible for very few schools.
Not sure how good the relationships between the unions and DfE are? The fact that there's been a revolving door of secretaries of state for education (10 during this government) means that few have got fully to grips with issues before they're removed.
Hopefully that Labour will be less chaotic. Bridget Philipson's held the brief since 2021 so the chances are that she's across the issues and post Cass can clearly see the problems with schools transitioning children?

Thank you MNQ 🙏❤️

Apart from the views of the Labour politicians likely to take up ministerial roles, and the civil servants who advise them, my biggest worry is what Helen Joyce identified as the need to cling on to the GI fiction if you’re an adult who has encouraged a child to believe lies, (and possibly do themselves lasting damage in the process). We could find ourselves spiralling away from Cass.

Cass makes a distinction between children and adolescents socially transitioning . The detail is on p164 of the report.
"...a more cautious approach needs to be taken with children than with adolescents."
Without puberty blockers the risk of transition for adolescents seems lower. How big will the trial be? What effect does the possibility of getting PBs or cross-sex hormones have on teenagers' interest in social transition?
The clinical trial of PBs is already being taken forward. Recommendation 6 proposes "a full programme of research" looking at characteristics, interventions and outcomes". I think the patients' stories of what influenced them to develop a trans identity might sit in here but it's not stated as such. (You could look at interventions such as school LGBT clubs/ events as interventions but I don't know if they will.)