Trans Learning Partnership

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13 days to defend trans and queer kids

On 12 March 2024, the UK Department of Education consultation on draft guidance on “gender questioning children” for schools and colleges will close. Until that date, we have our best possible chance to fight for the safety and wellbeing of young people.

Last month I wrote a long blog post and zine about this draft guidance: New Year’s Resolution: Smash the New Section 28. I argued that the guidance resembles the notorious anti-gay law Section 28, in that it aims to both directly oppress LGBTIQ+ young people, and create an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty around supporting them. This is to be done by reinforcing a strict sex binary. The guidance directly targets young trans people, but also threatens to enforce sexist and homophobic standards on all students, e.g. through stating that school uniforms should be allocated on the basis of “biological sex”.

I also argued that there are important reasons for hope, and many routes to resistance. One possible option is to take part in the consultation itself, but there are other approaches too, including noncompliance and resistance in schools, contacting politicians and unions to raise the alarm, supporting trans youth groups, and creative forms of protest.

Since I wrote Smash the New Section 28, the situation for young trans people has continued to deteriorate. In the UK, the Government has very quietly introduced a second consultation on proposals to segregate trans college students who are on trips or who would otherwise be sharing accommodation with other students. In the US, the murder of trans student Nex Benedict in a school bathroom shows just how dangerous the UK proposals would be in practice. I have updated my original post to reflect both of these events. Moreover, it’s emerged that the Royal College of GPs are hosting a conference for conversion therapy advocates in London, and the British public are more openly prejudiced towards trans people than they were just five years ago.

However, it’s also been really heartening to see how many people have read the blog post and shared the zine over the last month. I have particularly appreciated the support from the amazing independent Leeds book shop The Bookish Type, who have been giving away loads of free copies of the zine. I have heard from parents and bureaucrats who say they are using what I have written to argue for independent guidance that actually supports trans and gender non-conforming young people in schools and college.

Importantly, my writing is just one piece among many. Important critiques and consultation guides have been published by people and groups including The Diversity Trust, Just Like Us, Nancy Kelley, Gendered Intelligence, LGBT Foundation, Mermaids, Stonewall, and the Trans Learning Partnership. If you’re aware of any good writing or resources, please share in the comments and I will add it to this post.

You and the people you know have the resources to take action against the new Section 28. If the guidance is implemented, this will not be our only opportunity to fight back, but it is the best opportunity. Think about what you can do before 12 March: whether it’s writing to school governors or an MP, agitating in your workplace or union, or sharing information with others.

As ever, we can never win freedom alone, but have so much power when we act with others.

Photograph of a women holding a zine titled Smash The New Section 28. The woman is white and has shoulder-length brown hair, and is wearing glasses and a grey t-shirt. She stands in front of a large book shelf.
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NHS England proposals put young people in danger

NHS England logo

Three weeks ago, I wrote to the NHS England Gender Programme Board (of which I am a former “patient public voice” member) to raise urgent concerns about their consultation on a new interim service specification for children and adolescents.

The proposed service specification is deeply transphobic on numerous levels – from the dearth of relevant treatment pathways, to the assertion that being trans is likely a “phase”.

It is also probable that if implemented, this service specification will impact other young people more widely – especially girls and LGBTIQ+ youth – by undermining principles of autonomy and respect.

You can read more about the service specification here.

The proposals have been condemned by UK and international experts including Dr Natacha Kennedy, Cal Horton, and the Australian Professional Association for Transgender Health. Their well-evidenced critiques are well worth a read, especially if you might consider participating in the consultation. Edit 26/11: the proposals have now also been condemned in a strongly-worded and well-evidenced statement from world professional bodies WPATH, ASIAPATH, EPATH, PATHA, and USPATH.

The consultation is open to anyone. If you have the time and energy, there is a guide to participating in the consultation here, prepared jointly by Gendered Intelligence, Stonewall, Mermaids, and the Trans Learning Partnership. If you are a community member, a healthcare practitioner, a researcher, or work with a relevant charity, it would be particularly useful for NHS England to hear from you.

Other things you could do to oppose the proposals include: organising a demonstration, raising awareness of this issue on social media, and/or writing to your MP or trade union and asking them to place pressure on NHS England to reconsider.

To date, I have not received a reply from NHS England. Given the danger the proposed service specification poses to the safety of young people, I have now decided to make my letter to them public.

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Dear all,

I am emailing to share my great alarm at the proposed service specifications for child and adolescent gender dysphoria services. It is my expert opinion that, if implemented, these proposals will cause great harm to young people. Moreover, in opening such poorly designed and unevidenced specifications to consultation and media commentary, NHS England has already caused harm.

The fact that this consultation is happening at all represents an enormous failure on the part of every professional involved.

I stepped down from the Gender Programme Board earlier this month due to clashes with my teaching schedule. However, given the severity of this situation, I would be remiss in my ethical duties if I did not also email you directly to share my concerns.

My three main areas of concern are:

  1. Social transition should not be subject to medical oversight. This would represent a gross abuse of power on the part of commissioners and practitioners. Choosing to wear different clothes, and possibly use a different name and/or pronouns – is a personal, non-medical decision related to a person exploring their identity and/or coming out. Preventing a young person from choosing a social transition amounts to an attempted conversion practice.

  2. Punishing young people and their families by subjecting them to investigation if they access private services will not help them access healthcare. Young trans people who access private healthcare in the UK or abroad generally due so due to the severity of NHS failures.  It will increase the likelihood of young people hiding the fact they are accessing external treatment from NHS clinicians, and of people turning to black-market hormone providers rather than private doctors. I am not sure that members of the Gender Programme Board are fully aware of how prevalent and dangerous the home-made substances already in circulation can be.

  3. Requiring that young people become research subjects as a condition of accessing treatment is completely unethical. This is a well-established principle in the trans health literature. There is no way in which you can truly obtain informed consent for research participation from individuals who will be denied healthcare if they refuse to participate. I fully support the expansion of NHS-funded research into trans healthcare, but participants must not be recruited through coercion.

I will end by inviting all recipients of this email to reflect on what they do not experience, and what they do not know.

Most members of the Gender Programme Board have not experienced gender incongruence or gender dysphoria.

Most members of the Gender Programme Board are not members of a trans community. It is likely therefore that you – even if you are a clinician – have never found yourself in a position where you are confronted with the true impact of NHS failings on young trans people who rely on community support. You do not know what it is like to be trying to look after many extremely damaged members of your community dealing with complex trauma and self-harm from people who have been repeatedly abused by NHS clinicians and processes. We, in the community, are the ones left picking up the pieces of your failings, finding ourselves on constant suicide watch and scrabbling to keep people alive. Invitations onto bodies such as the Gender Programme Board, where we are expected to be polite while fighting for scraps – only to be ignored – do not right these overwhelming wrongs.

It is now on you to rebuild trust.

Sincerely,

Ruth

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Trans inequalities in English perinatal care

About a month ago I participated in the TPATH conference. This groundbreaking online event centred trans healthcare practice, research, and activism by and for trans people.

I was very impressed with the measures taken by TPATH organisers to ensure the conference was accessible to as many people as possible from around the world. They organised live translation to and from English, French, and Spanish, provided live captioning, encouraged presenters to speak slowly and clearly to enable lipreading, and ensured that generous scholarships were available for those who would not otherwise afford to attend. Most of the event was recorded, and videos are gradually being uploaded to the TPATH Youtube channel.

At the conference I joined Tash Oakes-Monger from NHS England to present initial findings from the ITEMS project (Improving Trans Experiences of Maternity Services). The ITEMS team, led by Michael Petch from the LGBT Foundation, ran a survey in early 2021 to explore the experiences of trans people (including non-binary people) who give birth in England. I supported the design and dissemination of the survey through my former role with the Trans Learning Partnership.

Bar chart indicating that increasing numbers of trans and non-binary people are giving birth in England every year.
Bar chart indicating growth in number of trans people giving birth in England each year.


There is some really exciting information emerging from the ITEMS data. For example, it appears that more trans people are giving birth than ever before (see above). However, it was also apparent that trans people face substantial inequalities.

Many of the questions in the ITEMS survey used comparable wording to the CQC Maternity Survey – from this we can see that trans people appear more likely to have negative experiences in NHS maternity services than cis women across the board. Even more disturbing is that 30% of trans respondents gave birth without the support of an NHS or private midwife (rising to 46% among trans people of colour). This indicates a lack of trust in midwifery services among prospective trans birth parents, with potentially lethal consequences for both parent and baby.

To learn more, you can watch our presentation on the TPATH Youtube channel.

A formal report of ITEMS findings should be published in the coming months.

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New roles: University of Glasgow and CATS

I am very excited to announce that I will be starting a new job at the University of Glasgow this summer!

I have been appointed Lecturer in Community Development at the School of Education. I will be teaching and conducting research on a range of topics relating to social justice theory and movements, community action, and collective empowerment. This will build on my previous work on topics including trans health, queer music scenes, and gender inequalities in Higher Education.

St Andrew’s Building, University of Glasgow

I am also delighted to have been appointed Senior Fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies (CATS) in Chicago. As a Fellow at the Center I intend to collaborate with international colleagues in conducting and disseminating impactful research by and for trans people and communities.

All of this does however mean that sadly I will be leaving my current role as Research Coordinator at the Trans Learning Partnership. We have achieved an enormous amount with this new partnership over the last year, including co-production of community research priorities, design and pilot of shared data collection, participation in public consultations and advisory groups, and support work around groundbreaking research with trans birth parents in England. I wish my former colleagues all the best with their future work, and fully intend to continuing collaborating with them as a university-based researcher.

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Trans Day of Visibility events

I am doing a couple of events for Trans Day of Visibility (Wednesday 31 March).


Katy Montgomerie’s TDOV livestream

I’ll be joining Katy Montgomerie‘s TDOV livestream, in which she will “talk to a load of cool trans people about whatever!” I’m dropping by for the start of the event at circa 19:00 BST (British Summer Time) – join us for chill times, and stick around for conversations with a load of great trans thinkers, writers, and Youtubers. You can watch through the link below:


Spectra Interview

I did an interview with Joanne Espada for Spectra’s Trans Programme. We spoke about the Trans Learning Partnership, the background to my research work, and my decision to become “visibly” trans in my mid-20s after several years living stealth. You can watch the full thing through the link below!

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GRA reform: my evidence to Parliament

In December 2020 I was invited to present oral evidence to the Women and Equalities Commons Select Committee, as part of their Inquiry into proposed reforms of the Gender Recognition Act. This material is now available through the UK Parliament website.

Oral evidence: video

Oral evidence: transcript

I also submitted more extensive written evidence as part of the Trans Learning Partnership. This document was co-authored with colleagues at Gendered Intelligence, the LGBT Foundation, and Spectra, plus Goldsmiths researcher Dr Anna Carlile.

Reform of the Gender Recognition Act: Written evidence submitted by the Trans Learning Partnership

We argued that the Government’s proposed changes for those wishing to change the sex marker on their birth certificates – reducing the fee and moving the form online – are deeply insufficient, and will make the process neither “kinder” nor “more straightforward. An ideal approach would be a free and simple process based on the principle of self-declaration, rather than medical diagnosis and the provision of extensive documentary evidence. This should be available to non-binary people and under-18s as well as adult trans women and men. We also discussed the possibility of decertification (that is, the feminist principle of removing legal sex altogether) and the damage caused by Parliament’s poor handling of the “gender recognition” debate.

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New job with the Trans Learning Partnership

I am very excited to announce that I will soon begin work on a new project. From the beginning of April I will be working full-time with Spectra as Research Coordinator for the Trans Learning Partnership.

The Trans Learning Partnership is a groundbreaking collaboration between trans and non-binary community representatives, academics, and four organisations who work to directly provide community services: Spectra, Gendered Intelligence, Mermaids, and the LGBT Foundation. The aim of the Partnership is to drive the development of a robust service and advocacy-oriented evidence base, enabling trans services and their service users to have needs-based, impactful services.

This also means that I will be leaving the Trans Pregnancy Project at the University of Leeds, but rest assured that I plan to continue supporting my colleagues from that project in writing up and publishing our findings. We have a number of academic articles currently in the pipeline, along with a themed special issue of the International Journal of Transgender Health.

I will of course continue to update this website periodically with information and reflections on all of my ongoing research.

The Trans Learning Partnership feels like such an important opportunity to design and undertake research intended to directly improve people’s lives. I can’t wait to get started!