LGBT History Month

Olivia Blake Excerpts

Thursday 7th March 2024 Westminster Hall

[Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered LGBT History Month.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. LGBT History Month was in February, and as co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on global LGBT+ rights, which I am delighted to co-chair with the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle), I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing time for us to discuss the topic. It has become something of an annual debate, so I do not want to repeat too much of what we have said before. However, having looked through Hansard at some of our previous debates on the topic, it is a shame that we have to repeat a lot of what has been said on what we need to do in the UK and around the world to further advance the rights of LGBT+ people.

I want to stress a point that we as colleagues in this place have made on a number of occasions. LGBT+ people have always existed; we did not just pop out of the ground in the 1960s and 1970s and start marching through the streets of London and other cities. I worry about that idea sometimes, particularly with the rhetoric around trans people that has developed over the last few years. During the debate on the Conversion Practices (Prohibition) Bill last Friday, one colleague justified not supporting taking that Bill to Committee by saying, “Well, you know, we just never saw anything about trans people when we were younger.” Of course not—they were not allowed to be public. As LGBT+ people, we were legislated to stay in the closet. The law did not allow us to be open and free, so of course we did not have the ability to be open and free as we are today. That is a bit of a ridiculous argument.

I will begin by talking about some of the positive steps that have been taken around the world since we last held the debate. The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association maintains a database of laws around the world, which includes dashboards showing which countries criminalise same-sex acts, and a chart showing decriminalisation year by year. When we were here last year, we celebrated the fact that Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados and Saint Kitts and Nevis decriminalised same-sex acts. I am delighted to report that in 2023 the Cook Islands, Mauritius and Singapore joined their ranks.

Same-sex marriage was legalised in the last 12 months in Andorra, Slovenia and Estonia. Same-sex civil unions have been proposed or passed in Latvia, Poland, Czechia, Hong Kong and parts of Japan. Conversion therapy bans have been proposed or passed in Portugal, Norway, Tasmania in Australia, Switzerland and the Netherlands. Other laws to improve the lives of LGBT+ people, such as adoption rights, anti-discrimination laws, advances in the rights of trans people to gender recognition and others, have been passed in places such as New Zealand, Colombia, Australia, Mexico, Cuba, Taiwan, Paraguay, Thailand, Iceland, Georgia, Italy, Cyprus, Germany, South Korea, Pakistan and more.

There is much to be positive about and we welcome that progress around that world. However, a point that has been made by colleagues in other debates is worth repeating: we cannot take progress for granted. We cannot assume that the hard-fought rights and freedoms that we have managed to achieve, in not only the countries I mentioned but the UK, are set in stone and that there is no chance of them ever being reversed. In this House we have spoken about some of the disgraceful measures taken around the world to row back on the rights of LGBT+ people, such as Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act, with other African nations such as Ghana looking worryingly close to doing the same.

In fact, anti-LGBT+ laws have been passed or proposed in countries such as Bulgaria, Bahrain, Russia, Belarus, Niger, Nigeria, Puerto Rico, Kenya, Hungary, Iraq, Lebanon, Malaysia, Oman, Jordan and Burkina Faso. There have also been worrying developments in countries where we would assume that things were only heading forward, particularly in Italy and Spain, and a huge swathe of state-level anti-LGBT laws in the USA.

LGBT+ rights have become increasingly politicised, and we can see that happening in the UK as well. Of course, we have made incredible progress and I always want to champion that. In the last decade alone, we can talk about the successes of same-sex marriage, becoming a leading country in eradicating new HIV transmissions, LGBT content in relationships, sex and health education, and more. There is still a lot to do, however, and I am afraid my right hon. Friend the Minister will not be surprised to hear me speak mainly about the need to make progress with banning conversion therapy.

I was incredibly disappointed that last week we did not manage to persuade the Government or the House to allow a very compromised Bill—so well compromised, in fact, that it was not necessarily universally welcomed by the LGBT+ community. Yet the fact that it was not even allowed to go to Committee stage so we could thrash out some of the challenges and finally make progress towards banning such abhorrent practices was disappointing indeed.

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree with me that it is disappointing that the UK did not feature on any of the lists he mentioned, apart from the last one, obviously? Would it not be good, since we have a whole history month, for the Government to come back to the table quickly with a conversion therapy Bill?

[Elliot Colburn]

I could not agree more with the hon. Lady. The Bill we were debating last week was the product of extensive hard work and compromise, including meeting people who were both sceptical and incredibly pro banning the practices. The Bill attracted criticism from those in favour of a ban because, unlike in other countries such as Norway, it does not carry a jail sentence. None the less, it was an attempt to try and bring everyone together, take the heat out of the debate and allow us to finally make some progress. That did not happen; the Government were not keen to support it and it was talked out.

--- Later in debate ---

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I thank my glass ceiling-smashing hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) and the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn) for calling this important debate, and for being visible and an inspiration to young LGBT+ people across the UK. I was happy to support it when it was proposed as a Backbench Business debate, and I thank the Committee for allowing us time to discuss this important issue. It is important that we continue to make LGBTQ+ people and the issues that affect us visible, and that we continue trying to build a world where we are not only tolerated but celebrated for who we are. That seems truer now than it has in a long time.

I am married to a Roman historian, so I could bore everyone senseless on the LGBTQ+ history going back to Roman times and much further, but I will not. Instead, I will focus on my short life instead. I was born in March 1990, three years after the parliamentary debate on section 28. In the decade before I was born, attitudes to LGBT+ people had shifted dramatically. In 1983, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) mentioned, 50% of those questioned by the British social attitudes survey believed that sexual relations between two adults of the same sex were always wrong. However, by 1987, that proportion had risen to 64%.

The horrifying truth is that, in the years immediately before I was born, society became less tolerant of LGBTQ+ people. That is frightening, because it shows that attitudes do not automatically become more progressive over time. The shift in opinion did not fall out of the sky; it was driven by the debate on section 28 and a Prime Minister who, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey already mentioned, said that no one had an “inalienable right to be gay”.

In the years that followed my entry into the world, things began to change. While I attended secondary school, when I was 13, section 28 was repealed, and new rights for trans people had been enshrined in law, as has been mentioned. As I grew up in the decade that followed that, I saw a wave of legislation affirming the rights of LGBTQ+ people. I am so proud to be a Member of Parliament for the party that brought in so much of that legislation. It is the accumulation of those things that led me to the firm belief that we absolutely do have an inalienable right to be gay. I am not alone. Where once, 64% of people thought that same-sex relationships were always wrong, now 67% of people believe that they are never wrong.

That is why now is a frightening time for people like me. I grew up under progress, and now for the first time since I have been alive that progress is not only stalling but feels like it is going backwards—and backwards quickly. It was only in 2018 that the then Minister for Women and Equalities, the right hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt) told the House that,

“trans women are women and trans men are men.”—[Official Report, 3 July 2018; Vol. 644, c. 184.]

Obviously, things have changed since then, and not for the better. Now we are more likely to hear a joke at the expense of trans people from the Dispatch Box than an affirmation of their identity. Despite the lessons we should have learned from section 28 and the damage that it did, we are still haunted by the premise that some people do not have the inalienable right to be who they are.

That has consequences. As has been mentioned, hate crimes against trans people went up by 11% last year, nearly double those committed in 2010-11. It also has consequences for the wider community. In the previous year, we have seen far-right and fascist pickets outside LGBTQ+ events, and while there has been a reduction in hate crime directed at LGBTQ+ people in the last year, I think that probably has more to do with reporting. If we look back over the past two years, there has been an overall increase of 37.5%, and anecdotally, I know that people are feeling much less safe.

Britain is part of a pattern. Across the United States, we have seen shootings at LGBTQ+ venues, alongside legislative attacks on queer culture and performance spaces. In Poland, anti-LGBTQ+ zones that ban symbols like pride progress flags, which show that a place is safe for queer people, have now been banned, making it harder for people to live freely and in supportive spaces. In Hungary, section 28-style laws that ban the depiction of LGBTQ+ people in culture are causing havoc. In Australia, fascists are marching to strip trans people of their rights. In Italy, Giorgia Meloni’s post-fascist party has banned municipal authorities from registering the children of same-sex couples. How have we got here? Our steps towards progress, both domestically and internationally, are faltering, and we are being pushed backwards.

I also have hope. Three years before I was born, more people than not thought that being gay was morally wrong. Now attitudes have changed. To turn the tide, we must learn the lessons: to support and celebrate people, not force them into the closet; to treat people with dignity and respect, not as objects of fear or ridicule; and, whatever anyone may say, to insist on their inalienable right to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans, queer, or every other identity represented by the pride progress flag.

Hormone Pregnancy Tests

Olivia Blake Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

I was moved and saddened to read of the lifelong health difficulties experienced by one of my constituents, whose mother was given the Primodos hormone pregnancy test. It is a story of school, work and family life disrupted over a period of decades, with frequent hospital visits, multiple operations, organ transplants, and a lifetime requirement to take a powerful concoction of immunosuppressants and other medication. I was hugely impressed and inspired to hear of this brave individual’s determination to succeed in life despite that adversity, and I believe it is time that he, and other Primodos victims, are finally given justice. I pay tribute to all the campaigners who have continued their fight for redress over all these years, despite so many setbacks.

The first warning of harm caused by hormone pregnancy tests came as early as 1958. Over the following period, many further problems were highlighted to the regulator of the time, the Committee on Safety of Medicines. As we have heard, the 1967 study by Dr Isabel Gal provided a clear warning of the serious damage being done by those tests, yet the sale of the product was not formally halted until 1978, 20 years after the first safety alerts, and 11 years after Dr Gal’s ground-breaking study. Since then, research has repeatedly indicated that taking the test increased the risk of children being born with debilitating and life-shortening birth defects such as damaged limbs, brain damage and heart problems.

A major review was conducted at the University of Oxford in 2018, led by the distinguished scientist Professor Carl Heneghan, director of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine. That study looked at 26 hormone pregnancy test studies involving over 76,000 women. The researchers concluded that taking drugs such as Primodos increased the risk of birth defects by 40%. They found “a clear association” between Primodos and several forms of malformation.

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I am a biomedical scientist by background, and having read that review, what I find important is the way the researchers interrogated all the subsequent research that had been done, to ensure that there was no bias in any of the studies they included, and they excluded any studies that they felt were biased, using stringent statistical analysis. That makes the review all the more important to listen to.

[Theresa Villiers]

I agree with the hon. Lady. It was a rigorous study, and it is a concern that in 2019 MHRA experts rejected that report, arguing that the quality of the studies examined was poor and the methods used to analyse them were

“not in line with best practice.”

As the hon. Lady pointed out, I do not think that is justified, and the Oxford team behind the research strongly refuted the claim made by the MHRA.

Despite all the scientific studies and research, campaigners have so far failed in their attempts to get compensation through the courts, and they have not been able to establish clear enough evidence of causation. That has been a massive hurdle in many cases over the years, not least in relation to tobacco, where it took decades of legal battles finally to show beyond doubt the causative link between smoking and cancer.

One of the problems faced by the families campaigning for compensation in this case is that many of the scientific studies of the ’70s and ’80s just do not meet the standards we necessarily expect in the 2020s. Many times in this House the call has come from Back Benchers loud and clear to support the families, to listen to their stories and to secure a fair outcome at last. The pressure that has come from this Chamber in so many debates helped to secure the welcome decision by the then Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) to include Primodos in the independent medicines and medical devices safety review, led by Baroness Cumberlege.

Baroness Cumberlege concluded that Primodos was responsible for avoidable harm, that it continued to be used for years longer than it should have been, and that a fund should be set up to support families with the cost of care. She was very clear that, in the face of growing concerns, it should have been withdrawn from 1967. Her report acknowledges the disagreement between experts on whether Primodos caused birth defects, but she stated

“the fact remains that thousands of women and unborn children were exposed to a risk that was acknowledged at the time. That should not have happened. This is not a case of us judging the actions of the past by the standards of today. This was discussed at the time, but not acted upon. The system failed.”

Those conclusions from Baroness Cumberlege are truly damning. We have a Government-sponsored independent review concluding that the system failed the victims and survivors of the Primodos tragedy. We must find a way to put that right and ensure that the families get the recognition and financial redress they deserve. I urge Ministers to listen to the House today and take action at last. We cannot let this injustice continue.

Legislative Definition of Sex

Olivia Blake Excerpts

Monday 12th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is always difficult to talk about these sensitive issues. By and large, apart from some exceptions, we have managed to do it in a calm manner today. I have not always been the calmest on this issue, because it is difficult when we are talking about people’s lives from all sides. Last time I spoke in this Chamber about some of these issues, people who were in the room then spread lies about me wanting to teach BDSM to children and so on. They were horrible, pernicious lies that were put on Twitter and caused a lot of hate. I think it is important to note that there has been a lot of hate and angst outside of this room directed at politicians on all sides of the debate. It is totally unhelpful. It is also probably unhelpful to say, “It’s just me, your honour”, because all of us have had really horrible times. I think it is important to start by saying that. We need to defuse that, and I will try to take the lead and do that myself.

What we have heard today is a set of cherry-picked case studies of examples and exceptions. Each one of them will have been very complex cases that need complex answers. People are not simple. People are not just binary. Biology is not as simple as that, as I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Olivia Blake) will attest to.

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

Absolutely. There is a risk in this House of us talking about GCSE biology rather than actually biology. The aneuploidies XXX occurs in one in 1,000 women, and XXY occurs in one in 500 men. These are very common biological differences that do complicate the matter—and those are not intersex individuals, to be clear.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

I appreciate that, and coming from a biologist that is important to note. People are complex. That is why flexibility in the current law is important. By defining things too much, what we suddenly do is assume that everyone lives in these easy, binary boxes. The current principle of the law, as my hon. Friends have mentioned previously, is that general and specific discrimination should not happen, but there are a number of exceptions for people with protected characteristics where discrimination can happen to provide specific spaces. We know that this can be on sex, race, disability and on gender reassignment.

However, the ability to have flexibility on one’s determination, such as in an organisation or on a specific place-by-place basis, is important. Survivors’ Network in my constituency, the predominant organisation supporting survivors of abuse, has for over 30 years decided to take a trans-inclusive approach to how it treats women’s spaces. That has been done through working out what the local need is for the service provision. The majority of providers in Britain choose to draw the line on biological sex. Both are legal. Because of the flexibility in the law, both can be determined.

What would happen if we then made a strict rule that the discrimination could only happen according to biological sex? Survivors’ Network would be barred from the flexibility that was dreadfully important in providing its inclusive service in our city. Moreover, we would have a legal provision that would prevent a trans man going to use male changing room facilities. I believe that in many respects we should try to find accommodation. A lovely new swimming pool has opened up in my constituency. It has fantastic changing facilities, with all individualised cubicles and individualised facilities. Gender is not an issue.

Eating Disorders Awareness Week

Olivia Blake Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2023 Westminster Hall

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Harris. I thank the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) for securing the debate and for all her work on the APPG, which I am proud to be a member of.

I want to start by recognising the amazing work carried out by eating disorder specialist NHS workers and campaigners in my city and around the country, who continue to provide life-saving care and vital early intervention under increasingly difficult circumstances. Recently, I spoke to frontline workers about the situation in Sheffield, and what they reported was extremely concerning. Numbers of referrals are still up, having increased every year since 2015. The South Yorkshire Eating Disorders Association—also known as SYEDA—has a four to five-month waiting list for its services, which it fears is deterring people from seeking help.

The tsunami of eating disorders that health workers warned the Government about during the pandemic is not going away; if anything, it is getting more severe. That is because this crisis is not new. In 2017, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman for England published a damning report, which concluded that

“NHS eating disorder services are failing patients”.

Yesterday, six years later, the same ombudsman concluded that urgent action is still needed if the Government are to prevent more people from dying—a stark condemnation.

What needs to change? First, services must no longer be forced to choose between investing in early intervention and emergency support. NHS figures show that hospital admissions for people with eating disorders have risen by 84% in the last five years. Meanwhile, more than 8,000 adults are waiting to be seen for therapy—the highest figures since records began. Early intervention is the most effective form of treatment, so it is no surprise that, as it becomes harder to access, the number of critical cases is increasing. Investing in early intervention would be transformative for patients and services.

Next, we must increase training for all healthcare professionals. On average, UK undergraduate medical students receive less than two hours on eating disorders. I welcome the fact that the ombudsman is now encouraging pharmacies to take part in training programmes, as they play a crucial role in preventing more harm.

Finally, we must be consistent in having a fully funded access and waiting time standard for adults seeking help, as we now have for children. We also need a treatment pathway specifically for avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder so that people are not left undiagnosed and untreated. That needs to be commissioned through the NHS.

But we cannot stop there. To truly address the crisis, we need a root-and-branch review of eating disorder provision. We need a holistic approach, with preventive, community-based, tailored support centred around the needs of each individual patient. We need to adopt innovative forms of treatment and to launch well-funded research programmes into the most effective treatment.

This crisis could, and should, be an opportunity to rebuild our approach to how we support and treat the 1.25 million people in the UK who suffer from an eating disorder. I therefore urge the Minister to look at the transformative work groups such as SYEDA are doing to help build an alternative framework for care nationally.

I want to turn now to an issue that has been raised with me and that I have written to the Department about. I have been hearing worrying reports from eating disorder specialists, researchers, medical staff and parents of young people about the rising use of restraints on children with eating disorders in general medical wards by staff with no training in mental health. I have heard harrowing stories of staff having to close the entire ward just for one patient because the use of restraints is so disruptive and distressing. In other cases, I have heard of security guards being brought in to restrain patients because the staff were not trained to provide this sort of care.

The use of restraints and restrictive interventions can have long-term consequences for the health and wellbeing of patients, as well as a negative impact on the staff involved. I have also heard that these interventions have been used far too early and without following guidance, such as that from NICE.

Under section 6 of the Mental Health Units (Use of Force) Act 2018, medical staff are required by law to record the use of restraint in all medical settings, but the Act does not apply to patients being treated for a mental health disorder in general medical settings. I am extremely concerned that that means that we do not know how prevalent the use of restraint is for children currently stuck in a medical ward awaiting a tier 4 bed. I hope the Minister will consider applying the recording requirements that apply to the use of restraints in mental health settings to patients who are currently in non-mental health settings. Will they meet me to discuss this further?

In my city, Sheffield Children’s Hospital has recognised this as an issue and has already started recording restraint, recognising the difference between the services it provides for mental health and non-mental health conditions. That is so important. It is a national scandal waiting to happen that people are being forcibly restrained when it is not needed.