“Most trans people are incredibly apprehensive about Liz Truss becoming Prime Minister”, TransActual’s Managing Director Helen Belcher said today (6 September 2022).
“We are all too aware of her statements on wanting to ‘protect women’s spaces’. These are little more than code for excluding trans people from public life. We are aware, too, of how she ignored the Government’s LGBT Advisory Panel before disbanding it in April 2021. We also see who she has put into the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and where they now are on trans people’s access to single-sex spaces and services.”
Liz Truss was appointed Prime Minister after a fractious contest for the leadership of the Conservative party, during which both of the last two candidates seemed keen to make transphobic statements.
“’A woman is a woman’ is another circular statement, like Theresa May’s ‘Brexit means Brexit’”, continued Belcher. “On the face of it, it’s utterly meaningless. But underpinning it is the idea that trans people are not who we say we are. And that is seriously dangerous for trans people.”
“We urge the new Prime Minister to govern for everyone, not to pander to hatred and bigotry”, Belcher added. “We hear that she has been fighting for a fully inclusive ban on conversion practices, and that she is supportive of new NHS services. But we need to be reassured by active statements of support, rather than being expected to be placated by silence.”