On 22 September Equalities Minister Liz Truss laid bare the government’s contempt for trans and non-binary people in a written statement that was a slap in the face to all those who have campaigned for reforms to the 2004 Gender Recognition Act (GRA). These reforms included then Prime Minister Theresa May’s pledge to ‘de-medicalise’ gender transition and were promised in 2018 following a government survey responded to by 108,000 predominantly LGBT people.
Truss only promises minimal administrative changes to the GRA, like moving the entire process online (38% of survey respondents said the process was too bureaucratic) and reducing the fee from £140 to an unspecified amount (34% said it was too expensive). Crumbs for the hungry! Not a peep in response to either the 64% of respondents who want to scrap the requirement that gender reassignment only be granted to people with medical gender dysphoria, or the 80% who wanted the requirement of a medical report removed.
The ‘announcement’ of three new gender clinics to be functioning and cutting waiting lists by about 1,600 by 2022 is a red herring. These new ‘clinics’ are actually pilot schemes that have been operating all summer in London, Manchester and Merseyside, offering appointments to some of the 13,500 trans and non-binary people currently waiting for their first appointment.
Truss argues the Equality Act 2010 allows ‘service providers to restrict access to single sex spaces on the basis of biological sex’, giving the all-clear to discriminate against trans people. There is no mention of non-binary people having no recognition in the GRA. This comes mere days after a landmark tribunal confirmed that under the same Equality Act non-binary people are protected against discrimination at work (Ms R Taylor v Jaguar Land Rover).
This is another attack on trans and non-binary people from a government determined to roll back the human rights of all oppressed communities. Already, in capitalist Britain, a quarter of all trans people experience homelessness; 89% have considered suicide, many forced to wait years for often expensive gender affirming treatment. It does not have to be this way. In socialist Cuba, trans and non-binary people are offered free health care and gender affirming treatment. There will be no trans liberation under capitalism: instead we must strengthen the fightback for socialism and against oppression in all its forms.
Sheila Rubio
