by Rob Marchant Change happens, to paraphrase Hemingway, gradually and then suddenly. In the wake of April’s historic Supreme Court ruling (that a woman is defined by her biological sex, rather than how (s)he “feels”), it seems the gender ideology edifice is finally starting to crumble, in the UK at least. It cannot crumble soon […]
by Rob Marchant
Change happens, to paraphrase Hemingway, gradually and then suddenly. In the wake of April’s historic Supreme Court ruling (that a woman is defined by her biological sex, rather than how (s)he “feels”), it seems the gender ideology edifice is finally starting to crumble, in the UK at least. It cannot crumble soon enough.
Last week, Linzi Smith, supported by the activist group Fair Cop, won her case against Northumbria Police, the judge effectively ruling that their attendance at Pride celebrations – let’s face it, an act which is by no means politically neutral in the current context of Pride – inhibited police impartiality and was therefore “unlawful”.
Surrey County Council also finally agreed no longer to fund tarnished Surrey Pride, after its former leader, Stephen Ireland, was sentenced to 30 years for assorted crimes, including paedophilia relating to a 12 year-old boy (we should note that his colleagues and friends are still in charge of it). It is not, self-evidently, the case that anyone connected with gay or trans rights should be under any particular suspicion of criminal behaviour; simply that, for a few years, we stopped treating those activists as we treat everyone else when it comes to basic safeguarding. We created an “untouchable” class, who were beyond criticism, and paedophiles like Ireland gaining access to children was the tragic result.
The Labour party itself unexpectedly announced on Tuesday that it would no longer allow biological men to stand as women in single-sex categories for electoral representation – a position Uncut argued was madness a good seven years ago – and would return to the simple rule that sex means sex. Alleluia. And it seems unlikely that that move would have happened without Keir Starmer’s blessing.
Labour has still a way to go in terms of all its parliamentary party “getting it” – Jo Bartosch is quite right – but it is also true to say that, amongst those who actually sit within government, it seems pretty unthinkable that they will at this point be allowed to pass any legislation which will “make things worse”. Anneliese Dodds – perhaps the most anti-GC member of Starmer’s initial Cabinet – no longer sits in it. Formerly vocal “be kind” advocate Lisa Nandy, whose support may well have hobbled her leadership chances in 2020 (see Uncut piece from the vault) has gone remarkably quiet on the subject. And Wes Streeting has in recent years made his position on affirmative healthcare and puberty blockers very clear, acting to some extent as Starmer’s lightning rod for criticism from LGBT lobby groups, and others, on the subject.
When we talk of this matter, of course, the foregoing applies largely to England. Wales and Northern Ireland have markedly further to travel in this area, thanks to the differences allowed by devolved government. But Scotland after eighteen years of the SNP, with a former First Minister broken on the wheel of gender and a current Labour leader who has undergone a Damascene conversion on it, is a different kettle of fish altogether.
This is best exemplified by the somewhat extraordinary case of Sandie Peggie – who was suspended from her work as a senior nurse, after expressing her discomfort at the presence of a biological male doctor undressing in the female changing rooms of her hospital in Fife.
We will not speculate what the outcome of her tribunal will be at the end of this month, but we can hazard an educated guess. During said trial, the proceedings have veered towards comedy at various moments, not least when NHS Fife’s DEI lead, Isla Bumba, declared to general chortles that she did not know what sex she was, as she had never had a chromosome test. And, as a remarkable achievement in unfortunate timing, the health board’s own internal investigation last week exonerated Peggie from any wrongdoing, in the midst of the tribunal to which Peggie had dragged her former employer.
But perhaps the most notable thing about the case is, as the campaigning group Fair Play for Women tweeted: “Sandie Peggie hadn’t been following the sex/gender debate. She wasn’t an activist fired up by her beliefs. She was just an everyday woman who instinctively knew it was wrong for a man to be in the women’s changing room, and said so.”
In other words, what started as a debate for political anoraks and activists with quite narrow interests has now become entirely mainstream. Ordinary women are simply fed up of being asked to “suck it up” regarding biological men in their changing rooms, public toilets, prisons and women’s shelters.
Does that mean the gender wars are over? It manifestly does not. While it looks like we may have reached the high point of any legislation from a Labour government which might impinge on women’s rights, we still have major issues in devolved governments, as well as within a good portion of Britain’s managerial class, some of whom are clearly fighting a rearguard action against a sea-change in political thinking.
In pure political terms, the problem Labour faces is now not so much on its own benches – where the gender ideologues have at this point been largely marginalised out of government and onto the back benches – but the major trade unions, who still wield a great deal of backroom power.
This is a longer battle – as it usually is with unions, who lag behind public opinion on most matters – but an encouraging sign has been seen with Sandy Peggie announcing her intention to sue her own union, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN). While it is not affiliated to Labour, a loss from RCN would certainly give the Big Three (Unison, Unite and the GMB), which are, cause to reflect soberly on their hitherto supportive positions. Blah-blahing on their deeply-held principles is one thing: risking financial losses from lawsuits and public humiliation is quite another.
And aside from unions, there are large swathes of public- and third-sector organisations, not to mention corporate HR departments, which still have to dial down their uninvited activism and accept the Supreme Court ruling. This will take time.
As for Scotland, Swinney said earlier this week, perhaps ominously, that NHS Fife had his “full confidence”. It is too early to tell whether any coming backlash from the Peggie case outcome might yet bring down Swinney, as it did his predecessor. But the light it shines on the Kafkaesque culture present in some Scottish organisations after nearly two decades of SNP rule in Scotland, and the silencing of women who feel their rights are being taken away, is by no means edifying. And there is a general election only a matter of months away.
Starmer has by no means escaped unscathed from all this: there are a number of former Labour women who will not forgive his agonisingly slow progress in moving towards their point of view. As for Swinney, even if he wakes up and smells the coffee at this point, it may already be too late for him. The women, as they say, won’t wheesht.
