LGBT History Month

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 2nd February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dame Angela Eagle]

It is almost like my hon. Friend can read my mind—which is a slightly worrying prospect—because I am going to come on to make precisely that observation.

These gains have led to the increased visibility of LGBT people and confidence among our community for them to live their lives as they wish, in the open. I also see it in the recent census returns, which show an increased propensity of young people to define themselves as LGBT+ without the stigma that that label would have presented in the past. There are those who regard this as a bad thing and call it a “social contagion,” but I regard it as a welcome freeing of our society from oppressive norms which imprisoned people and narrowed their lives, depriving them of the chance to flourish and live their lives more truthfully.

None of this was easily accomplished. None of it happened automatically as if there was always going to be an inevitable progression from less enlightening times to a more enlightened present day. This progress was not inevitable. It had to be campaigned for; it had to be fought for; it had to be won. And it was won, often in the teeth of fierce opposition from the red-top tabloids and some in the Conservative party who put section 28 on the statute book and blighted the lives of generations of children—although I am glad to see that there has been progress there too, and I genuinely welcome Conservative Members to the ongoing fight to maintain and strengthen the gains we have made, because there is no doubt that there is a backlash, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) pointed out, and a threat that we may go backwards here and in the rest of the world.

In the UK, we are approaching the 20th anniversary of the repeal of section 28, the 10th anniversary of the equal marriage Act and, incidentally, the 25th anniversary of my own coming out, but there are still things on our immediate to-do list. First, the Government must fulfil their pledge to legislate for a comprehensive ban on conversion therapy. That must include all LGBT+ people and not be rendered ineffective by either a religious or a consent loophole. For let us be in no doubt: conversion therapy is torture, it is inherently abusive and damaging, and five years after pledging action it is past time for this Government to act. I hope we can hear from the Minister in his response some indication of precisely how and when the Government will do that. I note the recent announcement of a draft Bill, which is welcome, but as yet there is no detail on when it might be enacted, or what it will actually consist of. As the delay lengthens, vulnerable LGBT+ people are left at risk of this unacceptable abuse.

Secondly, the Government should be tackling the rising tide of anti-LGBT+ hate crime. Currently in the UK, the atmosphere is becoming increasingly hostile, with a 42% increase in reported hate crime targeting sexual orientation and a 56% increase in the targeting of transgender people. Some of this is associated with the backlash I mentioned earlier, to which I will return. Some of it, I am sad to say, has been provoked deliberately by the disgraceful targeting and problematising of transgendered people by some members of the Government and their enablers in the press.

We are currently in the middle of a full-blown hysteria which targets transgender people using many of the tropes and smears which those of us who lived through the ’80s remember only too well being used against gay men and lesbians. Trans people, especially trans women, are disgracefully being portrayed as automatically predatory, inherently dangerous to women and children and somehow responsible for all the violence against women which plagues our society. That is an offensive caricature which does not bear relation to the truth.

The Prime Minister spent his leadership election campaign pledging to save, and I quote him, “our women” from the supposed threat of trans people, and we currently have an Equalities Minister—not the Minister opposite, the right hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), I hasten to add—who feels able to use the term trans women and predator in the same sentence, as if the two were somehow inherently the same. Although she appears to have lost the battle, it was reported that she wished to exclude trans people completely from the proposed ban on conversion therapy even though they are more likely than anyone else to be subjected to it.

For the record, I believe that the cause of equal rights best advances when the interests of all those who have suffered discrimination in the past advance. We advance together. There is no contradiction between LGBT+ rights and women’s rights that is not adequately covered in the Equality Act 2010. Trans rights which grant them respect and dignity are not a threat to anyone, and I say that as a lifelong feminist and a lesbian.

It is obvious that we are now in the midst of a well-organised global backlash against LGBT+ rights. It is well-funded, ferocious and potentially deadly for LGBT+ people. Its adherents range across the globe, from President Putin to Steve Bannon, from Viktor Orbán to ex-President Trump. Its aim is to reverse progress and, sadly, our own country is by no means immune to these global issues. The Government’s announcement of a review of those countries whose gender recognition certificates they will recognise is ominous, with rumours circulating that the Government are seeking to delist as many as 18 countries whose gender recognition certificates we currently accept. That is so that they can justify their use of section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998 to strike down the recently passed Scottish law on gender recognition. Surely the best way forward would be to have, not that confrontation, but a sensible discussion to find a way through. I urge the Government to reconsider their confrontational stance. I hope the rumours of delisting are not true and that the Minister can reassure us on that point, because such a move would take away existing rights.

Many countries are at risk of going backwards on LGBT+ rights. Russia legislated for a modern version of section 28 and then extended its so-called anti-LGBT+ propaganda laws across society. That follows the vicious persecution of LGBT+ people in Chechnya; legislation has been passed in Hungary, with so-called LGBT-free zones appearing across the country, and anti-LGBT law is also being passed in Ghana, accompanied by open persecution of LGBT+ people.

On that point, I wonder if the Minister might be able in his response to scotch persistent rumours that the Government are in the middle of trying to negotiate a Rwanda-style deal with Ghana. The implications of that for LGBT+ asylum seekers are too horrendous to contemplate, so I hope the Minister will be able to put all our minds at ease that that is not currently on the Government’s agenda.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I am very concerned to hear what the hon. Lady has just said; I had not heard that rumour, but many of us are already expressing grave concerns about Rwanda’s record on LGBT rights. Does she agree that this House and the Government in particular would do well to focus more on the terrible abuses of LGBT rights abroad, particularly where people’s lives are at risk in other countries?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

I agree with the hon. and learned Lady about the work that the Government should be doing abroad. To be fair to the Government, they do use and are using diplomatic channels, particularly to try to further decriminalisation in those countries that still criminalise LGBT relationships. While I have to give the Minister 10 out of 10 for his tie at the Qatar world cup, I can give only five out of 10 for his Government as a whole for their work across the world, simply because there are such contradictions between doing good, progressive things in some areas and then contemplating really not very progressive things at all in others. I hope that he will be able to reassure us that sending asylum seekers to Ghana is not on his Government’s to-do list.

No fewer than 300 anti-LGBT+ laws have been introduced by the Republicans in the USA, attempting to create a new era of repression that includes, significantly, the rolling back of women’s abortion rights and the overturning of Roe v. Wade. As I have said, in the fight for equality, we advance together or not at all. If we start losing LGBT+ rights, women’s rights will not be far behind.

After all those warnings, I wish to end on a positive note. There has been an increase in nations decriminalising LGBT+ relationships, and equal marriage legislation has progressed across the world, which means 33 countries have such laws, covering 1.3 billion people. I am already taken, Madam Deputy Speaker, but 1.3 billion people is quite a big pool to fish in.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

May I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) on securing this debate? I also publicly thank her, as I have done before, for coming out when she did in 1997. It was a very powerful moment for lesbians of my generation to see a Member of Parliament come out so publicly and so strongly, and I will never forget it. It was also good to hear her mention the abseiling lesbians. I remember seeing that on the 6 o’clock news 35 years ago when I was studying for my finals, just a couple of years after I first came out. It was a great moment of lesbian visibility. I also thank the hon. Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant) for his speech, which I found very moving—particularly the beginning. It is a great reminder to us that much of our focus as human rights activists should be on supporting LGBT people in countries where they are still put to death—that still happens, as we have seen in the middle east—and where they do not have basic civil rights. I very much endorse his plea for the Christian churches to take a more tolerant approach towards same sex love.

LGBT History Month should be a time of celebration, but many lesbians do not feel like celebrating. I would like to explain why, using the words of my constituent Sally Wainwright—not the Sally Wainwright who writes “Happy Valley”—who, like me, is a lesbian. Sally is a left-wing activist and author. In recent years she has spent a considerable amount of time volunteering to support refugees on the Greek island of Lesbos. Last month, The Times published a column that Sally wrote about her fear that lesbians—women who love women—are being forced back into the closet. I want to read out some of what she said, because lesbians who feel like her do not have much of a voice in our current public discourse on LGBT issues. I want to give them a voice in this Parliament. Sally wrote:

“I choose to spend much of my free time in the company of lesbians and other women. This is essential for my personal happiness and wellbeing. I find women-only gatherings a world apart from mixed ones, gaining support as well as friendship.

The atmosphere, our shared experiences and understanding and much more, are unique — not only in the privacy of our own homes, but also in our social and cultural activities, even walking groups, that are open to all lesbian women.”

She continued:

“In 1988 the Thatcher government introduced Section 28, prohibiting local authorities from ‘promoting’ homosexuality. In response, a friend and I founded the Deckchairs Collective, which organised annual lesbian gatherings. The point was to assert our right to exist and to ensure lesbians were not afraid to be ‘out’ in the aftermath of that appalling homophobic legislation.

I was unprepared for the fear lesbians experienced. One woman rang to say she and her partner were teachers but hid their relationship from everyone for fear of the consequences of being discovered. She was too frightened to tell me even her first name or the town where they lived, but phoned just for the opportunity to speak to another lesbian.”

Sally went on to say:

“With the reversal of Section 28, changes in public attitudes, eventually the introduction of gay marriage, I thought lesbians would finally be able to live free from prejudice, and certainly without state interference. For a few years that was more or less true—homophobia persisted of course, but we were able to organise lesbian discos, bookshops, nights out, walking groups. Naively, I thought that we had achieved an unchallengeable right to live publicly as lesbians. How wrong I was.”

Sally goes on to describe the challenges that some lesbians now face while defending our right to meet as lesbians, without men who identify as women demanding access to our events. She said:

“For some years now, lesbian groups have been forced to organise and meet in secret, taking care how we advertise our activities or invite new members. Almost all our social spaces and meetings closed.”

I can vouch for that. You will not find lesbian bars anymore in the United Kingdom, which is a real shame.

She said:

“Women self-excluded from previously safe lesbian spaces and events which had, de facto, become mixed.”

Sally went on to describe how and why many lesbians feel unwelcome at Pride marches. She said that lesbians who feel like her have been betrayed by the political class. She sees politicians as happy to watch while lesbians who feel like Sally are erased from our culture and young women who are gender non-conforming are encouraged only to think of themselves as trans, rather than to acknowledge that they might just be lesbian. She believes some politicians are pandering to homophobia.

The experience of Sally and her friends is shared across the United Kingdom. Here is what a group of lesbians from Wales have said about it:

“lesbians are facing enormous challenges defending our rights to meet as lesbians. We hear the stories regularly. Online groups being assailed by demands for access, even if only to a book group.”

They said that dating apps are filled with males seeking “friends, maybe more.” They went on to speak of:

“Young lesbians, including university students, unable to find safe spaces without men telling them to hate their love of women. Events facing at best constant efforts to join in and at worst full scale picketing and aggression.

Lesbians have always faced challenges from men unable to accept our independent sexuality, but in the last five years we have seen such attacks ramp up every month. The number of assaults and the vitriol aimed at us has grown beyond many women’s ability to manage. The organisers of such spaces sometimes give in to these demands. Maybe they are not too concerned about lesbian boundaries, or they sincerely welcome male-bodied people into their organisations. That’s not a problem, so long as everyone knows what to expect… But we hear too often from women saying that they don’t believe they have any legal choice, but to allow men into women’s spaces. Or they are scared of the doxing and abuse that frequently follow when women say ‘no’. We are seeing lesbians forced into gathering in secret, meeting behind closed doors or passwords, and using false names in social situations.”

Those are the words of lesbians from an organisation called LGB Alliance Cymru. They say that they refuse to go back in the closet and to return to hiding. They think those days are over. Like Sally, those Welsh lesbians believe that lesbians who want mixed spaces are welcome to have them but, equally, those who want to meet, socialise and interact only with other lesbians must be allowed to do so.

I recently met in this House a delegation of lesbians from Women’s Declaration International, who shared those concerns and had come to lobby parliamentarians. Despite voices to the contrary, those concerns are widespread across the lesbian community in the UK. I do not say that all lesbians think the same, but I simply wish to give a voice to those who express such concerns.

I do not have time today to set out the solution to those concerns, but as a lawyer, inevitably I see it involving the proper application of the right to single sex spaces in the Equality Act, the recognition that sexual orientation is a protected characteristic, and lesbians not being discriminated against, harassed or victimised on account of their sexuality and their same sex attraction. The solution would also involve the recognition of the rights of lesbians under the Human Rights Act and the European convention on human rights to safety, dignity and privacy, freedom of belief, freedom of expression and freedom of association.

Earlier this week, the Women and Equalities Committee heard some interesting evidence about the legal rights issues from the barrister Naomi Cunningham, who is an expert in equality law, and the constitutional law academic Michael Foran, himself a gay man. I commend it to those interested in learning more about the legalities around these issues.

My point today is that in LGBT History Month we should be able to say that lesbians are women who love other women. That is our history and we should be free to say it, so I am saying it here in this Parliament that is supposed to represent the voices of everyone in the United Kingdom. No doubt, because I have made this speech, someone will call me a transphobe and a bigot. In previous weeks, I might have expected to be shouted down, but after recent events, MPs have learned that shouting down their colleagues when they are talking about LGBT and women’s rights is not a good look.

Some lesbians have faced losing their livelihoods for saying what I am saying. They have faced threats of sexual violence and death threats for sticking up for their right to love other women. But they have stood up and fought, and they deserve a voice in this Parliament. I am thinking in particular of Kathleen Stock, Jo Phoenix, Julie Bindel, Shereen Benjamin, Allison Bailey, Rhona Hotchkiss, Bev Jackson and Kate Harris. Those two last women set up an organisation to represent the interests of lesbians who are same sex—not same gender—attracted. It is called LGB Alliance and it is currently facing what I consider to be a malicious lawsuit akin to a SLAPP to remove its charitable status. It is very important that organisations such as LGB Alliance should be allowed to organise on the basis of same sex attraction. That is their legal right under the Equality Act and human rights law. I believe that LGB Alliance will prevail and that lesbians will prevail. In this month of lesbian history and in future months, we will stand up for who we are and for our rights with pride.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kemi Badenoch]

Items moving between countries normally attract customs duty and import VAT, but my right hon. Friend will know that the trade and co-operation agreement means that there will be no customs duty on goods moving between Great Britain and the EU if the goods meet rules of origin. Delivery companies may charge their clients handling fees for moving products internationally, but the Government do not have control over those charges, which are a commercial matter.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

T3.   The Scottish Parliament would be unlikely to ratify a free trade agreement that did not include a standard human rights clause, such as the one that the European Union insists on. The Government seem to have ditched those human rights clauses. Should not trade policy reflect the policies and requirements of all the constituent parts of the United Kingdom, not just those of the Westminster Government?

[Greg Hands]

The hon. and learned Lady raises the important issue of human rights, but the UK Government engage around the world in defence of human rights, as she will be well aware from all her interactions in this place. The Scottish National party has always opposed EU trade deals, and the deals that she mentions that include human rights clauses were opposed by the Scottish National party in Brussels. It is a bit rich to say that EU trade deals are great but UK ones are not when she has opposed every single EU trade deal.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. There are indeed many people across the Department and our network around the world who are to be congratulated on getting us this far. He is right: there are massive benefits in market opportunities, but the deal will also have a disproportionately positive effect on sectors here that have high wages. That will really help in creating jobs with above average wages. We will work very hard to ensure that we can realise those opportunities in the shortest possible time.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

13. What steps her Department is taking to (a) reduce barriers to and (b) increase the speed of the flow of goods from the EU to the UK.

[The Minister for Trade Policy (Penny Mordaunt)]

Removing barriers to trade is the core business of this Department, and we have plans to introduce the best border in the world by 2025.

[Joanna Cherry]

I thank the Minister for her answer. Unfortunately, Brexit has erected trade barriers with the European Union, and businesses are struggling with imports and exports. A new business in my Edinburgh South West constituency lost thousands of pounds importing a consignment of honey, because it lacked the correct paperwork. A huge amount of effort went into sorting out that paperwork, which was ultimately unsuccessful. The Scottish chamber of commerce tells me that Scottish businesses are effectively spending twice as much in costs due to inconsistencies in interpreting rules for imports and exports across the European Union and its partnership countries. This situation has been brought about by Brexit, so the Government have a responsibility to help businesses, such as the one in my constituency that I mentioned. Will the Minister reopen the Brexit support fund to help business?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I would say two things in response to that. First, much of the friction that the hon. and learned Lady is talking about is coming from the EU’s requirements on us. In voting for Brexit, it was not our intention, or the nation’s motivation, to erect trade barriers. The problem was that the price of frictionless trade was too high. That is why the UK has left the EU. What we want to do is remove barriers; we want as frictionless trade as possible. I hope that she will help us make the case to the EU to do that.

We have the Export Support Service which the Under-Secretary of State for International Trade, my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) has spoken about, and also the Trader Support Service, which is focused absolutely on these issues. There is also financial support to enable businesses to export or to get their sectors better prepared for some of the challenges that they are facing. Our door—I speak for all Ministers—is always open to the hon. and learned Lady if she wants to raise individual cases. We stand behind our producers, our manufacturers and our exporters, and we will do everything we can to ensure that they are maximising the opportunities available to them.

Gender Recognition Act

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Monday 21st February 2022 Westminster Hall

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that MPs are afraid to engage in this debate because, if they do so, as I have, they receive death threats and, in my case, a threat of corrective rape from a member of my own party?

[Elliot Colburn]

I completely agree with the hon. and learned Lady. We have failed to make a genuine space to express concerns and come to an understanding with one another, and that has left a vacuum, because, in that space, where the few people making their voices heard want to pull us into one of two very extreme positions, we are left with only one of two options if we want to engage with this debate. It seems we must agree that to be trans is not right or even real and that trans people are inherently dangerous and need a cure rather than support, or, on the other side, we must use trans people as an example of why the entire western liberal system is wrong, and agree that no one can be truly equal until the very foundations of what we understand about society are broken down. The failure to have a real discussion has consequences for us all. We now have a situation where people fear speaking up, and they fear to ask questions in case they get attacked or targeted. There are, of course, strongly held views on both sides, but to shut down discussion and to say that everyone must agree with one’s own worldview, or else, is damaging to society and poisons the debate.

One of the most common things I hear from colleagues in this place—and I am sure Members will agree—is that they just do not know enough about the issue. They have not given much thought to reforming the Gender Recognition Act 2004 before, and, as far as they know, they have never met a trans person. That is completely fine, but it therefore falls to us, when we bring these matters to a national platform, to allow space for discussion to happen, so that we can explore and ask questions.

--- Later in debate ---

[Elliot Colburn]

The hon. Member has second-guessed what I am about to move on to. I truly believe that there is a way for the House to come together on this issue. As a member of the Women and Equalities Committee, which conducted a very recent inquiry into reform of the GRA, I was struck by how much agreement there was on both sides of the debate on many of the practical issues this petition is calling for. There was also repetition of what the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) said, specifically on the issue of the application process for the GRC. After all, that is what the petition is all about. Much of the discussion has centred around access to such things as single-sex spaces, but those are not catered for in the GRA or included in the scope of this petition; they are instead governed by the Equality Act 2010, which sets out provisions around single-sex spaces. It is right that we make space for that discussion to happen, because part of the reason that the debate has become so toxic is the confusion around the application of the Equality Act and its relationship with the GRA.

[Joanna Cherry]

May I just disagree with the hon. Member on the legal impact of the single-sex provisions in the Equality Act? There is a respectable body of opinion that there will be an impact on the single-sex provisions in the Equality Act, and we are waiting for guidance to come out from the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Does he agree that that guidance is much needed and will bring some clarity to the debate?

[Elliot Colburn]

I agree with the hon. and learned Lady on the point of guidance, and I will come on that point next. It is the failure of successive Governments since 2004 and 2010 to produce any guidance about the relationship between the GRA, the Equality Act and the exemptions provided for that has led to a disjointed application of those exemptions in much of public life. There are those who use it to exclude everyone, those who use it to exclude no one and a large majority in the middle who simply do not know what to do, because there is no guidance from the centre as to what best practice looks like.

I therefore urge the Government to look again at the recommendation of the Women and Equalities Committee to produce that guidance and to convene an advisory panel of those on both sides of the debate to look at what that guidance could look like and to bring that guidance before the House so that we can debate and discuss it.

I want to focus specifically on the application process for a gender recognition certificate, as catered for within the petition. In the Select Committee inquiry, we received evidence from those in favour of further reform and those who were against it, but what struck me was how much agreement there was between the two sides on the application process. Indeed, the three big asks for reform of the GRC application process were more or less welcomed universally. I strongly hope that the Government will have a chance to look at those in a bit more detail.

--- Later in debate ---

[Miriam Cates]

I do not accept that pausing puberty has no repercussions, but it is also the case that 98% of those who are prescribed puberty blockers go on to cross-sex hormones. That is the reality of what is happening at the moment, with a 5,000% increase in the number of girls referred—

[Joanna Cherry]

The hon. Lady will be aware that Dr Hilary Cass has been tasked by the UK Government with looking at the reasons why there has been such a huge increase in the number of people, particularly young girls, seeking puberty blockers and surgical treatment. Does she agree that we would be wise to wait for the outcomes of that review before taking a final view on whether we should support self-ID?

[Sir George Howarth (in the Chair)]

Order. Before the hon. Lady resumes her speech, let me say that of course anyone is entitled to make an intervention and the speaker is entitled to take them. I would just warn those who are on the list, however, that their chances of being called will be reduced by the amount of time spent on interventions. I am not trying to dissuade anyone from intervening, but they need to realise that it may jeopardise their own chances of making the speeches that they came prepared to make.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I refer to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, where I am listed as a member of the advisory group of the not-for-profit organisation Sex Matters. I am also a supporter of the LGB Alliance, and proud to be so.

The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) says that he is a massive gay. Well, I am a massive lesbian—rather more massive than I was in my younger years. I want to challenge everyone who has said in the debate that they want a respectful debate on reform of the GRA. I want to challenge them to live up to their words and listen to the concerns that are held by many women and same-sex-attracted people about the dangers of conflating sex with gender. Like them, I share the view that the introduction of self-identification of sex would negatively impact on existing provisions under the Equality Act. That view is valid and well-founded and has been supported by the recent intervention of the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Their concerns centre on the potential consequences for individuals and society of extending the ability to change legal sex from a small defined group who have demonstrated their commitment and ability to live in their acquired gender to a much wider group who identify as the opposite gender at a given point. It is not a modest reform; it is a reform with potential consequences, including those relating to the collection and use of data, to participation and drug testing in competitive sport, to measures to address discrimination barriers facing women and to practices within the criminal justice system.

Reform of the Gender Recognition Act is proposed in Scotland and supported by my party. Last year, our manifesto for the Scottish election stated that

“we will work with trans people, women, equality groups, legal and human rights experts to identify the best and most effective way to improve and simplify the process by which a trans person can obtain legal recognition, so that the trauma associated with that process is reduced.”

Our manifesto also stated:

“We will ensure that these changes do not affect the rights or protections that women currently have under the Equality Act.”

I was content to support that policy, which did not commit the SNP to a policy of self-ID. What I have to say today is in line with my party’s promise to work with women, equality groups and legal and human rights experts and to ensure that reforms to the GRA do not affect the rights or protections that women currently have under the Equality Act.

Under the Equality Act, there are a number of protected characteristics, including sex, sexual orientation and belief. We now know, thanks to the employment appeal tribunal, that belief includes gender critical beliefs such as I hold. The Equality Act also protects people who are at any stage of a personal journey of transition or, indeed, de-transition. So widely accepted are those protected characteristics that when my party was trying to win the independence referendum in Scotland in 2014, our current First Minister, then Deputy First Minister, produced a draft constitution for an independent Scotland that would have enshrined those personal characteristics in the fundamental law of an independent Scotland, alongside the human rights protected by the European Court of Human Rights.

I just want to correct something that the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) said. There are laws about who can use which toilet, and women should not be expected to share their intimate spaces with men. Under the Equality Act, security staff, school supervisors and so on are allowed to set and enforce single-sex rules. The Equality Act exceptions allow that. It is not a matter of criminal law; it is a matter of civil law. It is important to be clear about these things, because if we lose clarity over what the words “male” and “female” mean, it will make it more difficult to set and enforce clear and simple rules for female-only services and women’s sports.

[Sir Christopher Chope in the Chair]

Some people have been very critical of the Equality and Human Rights Commission for seeming to have modified its position on self-identification for trans people and reform of the Gender Recognition Act, but Baroness Falkner has been very clear that it has done so because new evidence about the tension between trans and women’s rights has emerged. I remind those who have sought to impugn the Equality and Human Rights Commission and Baroness Falkner that her appointment was unanimously approved by the Women and Equalities Committee and the Joint Committee on Human Rights after an evidential hearing in this Parliament.

There is ample evidence that the concerns of the Equality and Human Rights Commission are well founded. Only last week in Scotland, we had two major legal decisions seemingly in conflict about the meaning of sex in law. Fortunately, because of the appellate system, we know that the appellate court’s decision will take precedence, and the appellate court in Scotland was very clear that as our law stands under the Equality Act, sex is not interchangeable with gender. There is a protected characteristic of sex, but not one of gender. There is a protected characteristic of gender reassignment, but the appeal court in Scotland was very clear that sex means male or female in law, based on biological sex. That is the highest interpretation of the Equality Act in our law at present. The word “women” in the Equality Act does not include males who self-identify as women.

To find out what the general populace thinks about self-ID, we can look at some recent polling. We have had two big opinion polls in Scotland in the past month, and also a BBC survey, which have shown that while the majority of Scots support equal rights for trans people—as, for the avoidance of doubt, do I—they are unhappy about the implications of a system of self-ID of sex without a gatekeeper. That is not because it will discriminate against trans people, but because it opens up self-identification of sex to a much wider group than just trans people—to anyone. Many of the groups, such as the LGB Alliance, which has tried to promote a respectful dialogue around such matters, have not had the sort of reception that the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn) has suggested they should. They have been vilified, sometimes by Members of this House. That is not right.

We need to have a respectful debate. By all means, let us reform the 2004 Act, but let us do it in a way that respects the protected characteristics that are enshrined in our Equality Act and takes into account the legitimate concerns of many women and same-sex-attracted people.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

I know that the Secretary of State greatly enjoyed her visit last year to the farms in my hon. Friend’s constituency. CPTPP is a great opportunity. I referenced in an earlier question growing Asian demand for products such as meat and other British agrifood products. We see there being tremendous opportunities in that fast-growing market—13% of global GDP across four continents. This is a real opportunity to be able to sell British farming produce to those fast-growing Asian and American markets.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

What recent assessment she has made of the UK’s trading relationship with China.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Trade (Graham Stuart)]

China is an important trading partner for the UK, with bilateral trade worth £78.8 billion in 2020. In fact, China was our third largest overall trading partner and seventh largest export market last year, with UK exports to China amounting to £22.9 billion. The UK also remains a leading destination for Chinese outbound investment in Europe.

[Joanna Cherry [V]]

Coda Octopus, a company based in my constituency, has been encouraged by successive Tory Governments to expand its sales to China. Its world-leading Echoscope is used in underwater port construction and in renewable energy projects, and it does not have a military use. Yet despite a 23-year track record of exports, it is now losing millions of pounds in orders due to a change in attitude on export licences, and responses from the Minister’s Department are taking over 100 days. Will the Minister meet me so that I can sort this situation out for my constituents?

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

May I remind the hon. Lady, as the Secretary of State said earlier in response to a question from the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), that the UK has one of the most rigorous arms control regimes in the world? We follow the consolidated criteria at all times. On trade agreements, I ask her to judge us on our deeds and not always on our words. In terms of the trade agreements that we have rolled over, there has been no diminution of human rights clauses in any of those agreements.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

What steps she is taking to simplify the process of (a) exporting and (b) transporting UK goods around the world.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Trade (Graham Stuart)]

The Department for International Trade is working closely with Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and others to ensure that businesses are prepared for 1 January. We have delivered specialist webinars and support tools to ensure that industry understands the changes required to keep trading effectively with the EU as well as to start trading under preferential conditions, such as those with Japan. Looking forward, we are aiming to produce the world’s most effective border by 2025, simplifying and digitising border processes so that exporters across the country will be able to sell their products around the world more easily once our free trade agreements are agreed and in place.

[Joanna Cherry [V]]

A report published this month by the National Audit Office estimates that the number of HM Revenue and Customs declarations that will need to be processed from 1 January will increase from the current annual volume of 55 million to 270 million. That is a huge increase. What discussions is the Department having with other Departments to ensure that this huge increase in the administrative burden does not discourage exports to Europe and the world?

[Graham Stuart]

The hon. and learned Lady is quite right; there are a lot of challenges. That is why, across Government, we have been making such an effort to work with other Departments to make sure that we do everything possible to inform business and to facilitate the border, including investing hundreds of millions of pounds in improving customs processes and others.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

One of the points that we laid out in our negotiation objectives is that we want to achieve an advanced digital and data chapter. Currently, 79% of all our services are provided remotely. A digital and data chapter will give us the ability to underwrite those transactions and do more electronically, which will provide huge benefits to those high-tech industries in my hon. Friend’s constituency.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

All this debate between the Secretary of State and Labour’s Front-Bench spokesperson shows how important it will be to scrutinise the small print of the deal, so will she allow this Parliament a vote on the deal, such as the kind that the US Congress will get, or does she think that America deserves more democratic scrutiny of the deal than the United Kingdom?

[Elizabeth Truss]

We have a parliamentary system in this country, so for these types of decisions the treaties are laid before Parliament through the CRAG—Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010—process. I point out to the hon. and learned Lady that we also have an extensive programme of engagement with business. We have 17 expert trade advisory groups, through which we will ask business for their specific feedback to ensure that we are not lowering standards, and to ensure that we have the right standards for our industry. That is the consultation process that we are undertaking.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)]

T6. The Secretary of State knows that I am very excited about the prospects for Scotland to grow its exports. Scottish Development International does a good job, but it does not have, as it would concede, the global reach of her Department. So to ensure that Scottish businesses get the maximum support going forward to grow exports, will the Minister commit today to increase the Department’s presence on the ground in Scotland?

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

No, thank you!

International Women’s Day

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I start by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum), who gave us a very powerful and assured maiden speech and much food for thought. On International Women’s Day, we should think about what kind of country we women want to live in. I was reflecting on this when I realised, to my disappointment, that the Domestic Abuse Bill, which was recently reintroduced, will be yet another missed opportunity for the United Kingdom Government to finally do what is necessary to ratify the Istanbul convention. As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin), who speaks for my party on women and equalities issues, said, our then colleague in the SNP Dr Eilidh Whiteford led a successful campaign in 2017 to pass a law requiring the UK Government to ratify the Istanbul convention. This was the first time that an SNP MP had managed to get a private Member’s Bill into law, and it is very sad that, three years later, the UK Government have yet to ratify the convention.

The Istanbul convention is based on the understanding that violence against women is a form of gender-based violence that is committed against women because they are women. The convention makes it clear that it is the obligation of the state to address it fully in all its forms, and to take measures to protect all women from violence, to protect victims and to prosecute perpetrators. The convention leaves no doubt that there can be no real equality between women and men if women experience gender-based violence on a large scale and state agencies and institutions do not do enough to stop it.

I raised the issue of the UK’s failure to ratify the Istanbul convention in the House of Commons last week. That was before the Domestic Abuse Bill was reintroduced. I asked whether it was the requirement to support migrant women experiencing domestic abuse that was holding things up. It seems, I am sorry to say, that it is. Migrant women often find it impossible to access emergency protection because of the no recourse to public funds condition, and they are highly vulnerable to domestic abuse, and to coercive control in that situation, as a result of their immigration status. I am pleased to see that the new Domestic Abuse Bill is going to address some of the remaining issues preventing us from ratifying the convention, such as extraterritorial effect, but it will still fall short in the key area of the provision of services for migrant women, and that is simply not good enough.

My colleagues in the Scottish Government have ensured the passage of all the necessary legislation to enable ratification in respect of devolved matters. Does anyone think that the Scottish Government, led by my colleague Nicola Sturgeon, would still be quibbling after all this time about extending services to highly vulnerable migrants? I think we all know that the answer to that question is no. Last year, on International Women’s Day, the Irish Government ratified the Istanbul convention. The UK is now one of only six EU—or, in our case, former EU—countries still to do so. I believe that the best thing the British Government could do to mark this International Women’s Day would be to ratify the convention. When does the Minister think that the Government will deal with the issue in relation to migrant women, and when will we be in a position to ratify?

Just last week, the UN Commissioner on Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet—I hope I have pronounced that correctly—warned against complacency regarding women’s rights. She said that women’s rights

“cannot be an optional policy, subject to the changing winds of politics”.

When we look at the statistics right across the world, we can see that she is absolutely right about that. One in three women across the world experiences violence that is perpetrated by men. Between 60 million and 100 million women who should be alive today are missing, presumed dead, because of male violence. One woman dies every minute across the world due to problems relating to pregnancy, and 15 million adolescent girls have experienced forced sex. I am sure that we can multiply that figure several times for adult women. We also know that 72% of human trafficking victims are female, and that the vast majority, many of whom are children, are trafficked for the purposes of prostitution. Women also work two out of three of all labour hours worldwide, but they earn just 10% of the world’s income.

For all these reasons, women must be allowed to organise themselves to campaign against their oppression. Sometimes, this means excluding the group that has historically been responsible for the oppression of women, and that group is men. One of the things I want to say today, as forcefully as I can, is that it is eminently reasonable for women to organise on the basis of their sex, if they wish to do so. It is also legal for them to do so. It has been central to decades of feminist thought to say that gender is imposed on women in order to uphold their oppression. By gender, feminists mean presentation, modes of dress and the falsehood of masculine and feminine personality traits, about which we heard earlier. So if we say that gender is somehow innate, and that it supersedes sex, the logical conclusion is that women can somehow identify out of our oppression. Many feminists disagree with that, but increasingly, disagreeing with gender ideology has become a dangerous thing to do, as we heard from the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price). This brings me to the problem of no-platforming and the attempted silencing of well-respected feminist academics and others simply for asserting women’s rights. I would like this Chamber, on International Women’s Day, to send the really strong message across all the nations of these islands that no-platforming and attempting to silence feminist academics and other women who assert women’s rights is wrong.

Last weekend Selina Todd, a professor of modern history at the University of Oxford, found herself disinvited from making a short speech at a conference commemorating the 50th anniversary of the first women’s liberation movement meeting in the UK. That meeting had taken place at Ruskin College, as did last weekend’s conference. Professor Todd is a feminist and a socialist who has written extensively about women’s history and working-class history. Since 2017 she has been president of the Socialist Educational Association. The decision to silence her was not supported by the women who attended the conference, and thankfully it has been widely condemned, but she is one of a growing number of feminist academics who have been censored for their views that biological sex matters and that women, as a marginalised group, should be allowed to organise themselves according to their own definitions.

Professor Todd now requires security to attend her place of work. Sadly, she is not alone. Professor Rosa Freedman, an expert in human rights law who has worked for the UN and is now at the University of Reading, has suffered similar abuse. Naturally, because she is Jewish, she has also received antisemitic abuse for daring to be a feminist. The door of her office at the university has been vandalised and urinated on, and she has been followed home by individuals threatening rape and violence, simply for asserting women’s right to organise on the basis of their sex.

Elsewhere in the United Kingdom, the philosophy professor Kathleen Stock has found herself de-platformed and subjected to a sustained campaign to have her ejected from her job at the University of Sussex. Prominent female politicians and journalists in my own country, Scotland, have been hounded and told that they should lose their jobs, simply for asserting women’s sex-based rights.

I had just a little taste of the treatment that some of those brave feminists have endured last year when, in the course of my duties on the Joint Committee on Human Rights—ironically, it was during an inquiry into freedom of speech—I raised with a Twitter executive Twitter’s one-sided practice of banning women and categorising as hate speech tweets stating biological facts, such as “women don’t have penises”, while tolerating and upholding abusive tweets threatening direct violence towards leading feminists such as Caroline Criado Perez and Helen Lewis. As a result of my intervention—not because I am special, but because I am a Member of Parliament and Twitter has to listen to people like me—those tweets were taken down and Twitter said that it would look again at its policy on hateful conduct, which does not include sex as a protected characteristic, which the Committee’s report commented was problematic.

The response to me doing my job in this House was an outpouring of bile on social media, culminating in a death threat, which Police Scotland and the Metropolitan police took seriously enough to give me police protection. Since then I have endured a daily stream of abuse on Twitter, including allegations that I am a transphobe and, ludicrously, a homophobe—it is quite difficult to be homophobic as a lesbian, but anyway. I am not remotely transphobic; I support the rights of trans people and have very good relationships with trans women in my constituency. I can tell the House that many trans women I speak to are angry that their quiet and dignified lives are being disrupted by malevolent individuals pushing identity politics in a way that is anti-democratic and abusive.

I am very proud of the fact that in Scotland we have very good rights-based protections for trans people. No one wants to change that, but some feminists have legitimate concerns about changing the law on gender recognition to allow self-identification. That is why I, along with a trans woman in my constituency, wrote to a colleague in the Scottish Government last year to suggest that the issue might be considered by a citizen’s assembly, in the way that Ireland has dealt with contentious issues. That is because my constituent and I think that refusing to acknowledge that legitimate concerns exist is not a solution to the current impasse in the debate on gender recognition, and nor is shouting down and targeting women. We must identify the issues, reflect and find ways of addressing them together.

Last year I found myself in the ludicrous situation of having to sue PinkNews for wrongly alleging that I was being investigated for homophobia. I am pleased to say that it settled out of court, and I donated the damages to a well-known lesbian and gay charity. Unfortunately, not all bullies are as easy to tackle. It is over time that every Member from every party in this House stood up to bullies in the gender lobby who want to shut down the right to free speech for those who do not 100% agree with their ideology.

Even if one does not care about this issue, if we allow bullies to triumph over free speech in one area of public discourse, we are giving them free rein to triumph over free speech in other areas of public discourse. I use the word “bullies” advisedly, because men—and it is mostly men—who want to silence women and prevent them from organising as a sex class are bullies and human rights deniers.

The right has a strong tradition of standing up for free speech and freedom of assembly, for which I applaud it, and so once did the left in the United Kingdom. The left must stand up for free speech again where women’s rights are concerned, and it must not give in to intimidation. The left should not let the right have a monopoly on free speech and freedom of assembly. Those rights are fundamental human rights and should matter to all of us as democrats, regardless of whether we sit on the right or, as SNP Members do, on the left of politics.

Women must be allowed to organise to protect their hard won sex-based rights, and, on International Women’s Day, this House should stand up against the bullies who are seeking to prevent them from doing that.

UK-US Trade Deal

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Monday 2nd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

I agree that we need to make a clear case, and to ensure that Parliament is engaged.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I am interested to hear the Minister say that she wants to ensure that Parliament is engaged because, unlike our counterparts in the US Congress and the EU Parliament, Members of this House do not get a vote on trade deals. Is she prepared to consider reversing that policy? If not, can she tell us in what way having no debate on the trade deal constitutes taking back control?

[Elizabeth Truss]

The hon. and learned Member will be aware that the UK has a parliamentary system that is similar to those in Australia and New Zealand, and we are following a similar process to those Parliaments. It is a different structure from the separation of powers in the United States.

US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Monday 7th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Conor Burns]

The answer to the second part of my hon. Friend’s question is yes, absolutely, we must remain a champion of free trade, and that we will do. The answer to the first part of his question is that we have to deal with the world as it is. The greatest strategic interest that we have—that the House has, that the Government have—is to try to persuade the United States not to implement these tariffs in 10 days’ time, and thereby to protect the Scotch whisky industry.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I must say that it is wonderful to hear a UK Government Minister recognise the enormous value that Scotch adds to the UK economy. I hope he will remember that next time his colleagues try to suggest that the Scottish economy is some kind of basket case.

The North British Distillery, which is in my constituency, is one of Scotland’s oldest and largest grain whisky producers, and is a very important employer in Edinburgh South West. While this tariff is of course aimed at single malts, it is a worrying indication of how the US Government may treat iconic Scottish food and drink products in any trade negotiation. As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) suggested, if the Prime Minister’s alleged good offices with President Trump cannot resolve this problem, what hope is there for future trade negotiations outside the EU?