Cass Review

Rosie Duffield Excerpts

Monday 15th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am anxious to ensure that everyone gets in, because this is an important statement, but we also need to ensure that the questions are brief so that the Secretary of State can give brief responses. We have a big debate ahead of us on the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill, followed by another debate on the hospice movement, and I am sure that many Members will want to participate in those as well. Perhaps they will bear that in mind when framing their questions.

[Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Lab)]

Let me first thank the Secretary of State for her thoughtful and considered statement on the Cass review, and especially for mentioning the journalists, such as my friend Hannah Barnes, who blew the whistle on the Tavistock clinic. As she has said, those who have raised this issue over the last few years, desperately concerned about the safeguarding of vulnerable children and young people—too young to make life-changing decisions—are owed a heartfelt apology for being no-platformed, ghosted, sidelined and disciplined at the behest of a few extreme groups of activists, some within political parties. Does she agree that these academics, politicians, writers, psychologists and actors, along with any other people who have questioned the signing up of their workplaces to Stonewall law, have now been vindicated by Dr Cass’s expert review, and that they should be apologised to?

[Victoria Atkins]

I come to the Dispatch Box with huge admiration for the hon. Lady for the commitment that she and other Labour Back Benchers have shown, in a culture and an atmosphere in which their views were demeaned and they were sneered at and castigated. Indeed, I hear rumours that efforts were made to remove certain Members from the party itself. This is the moment for apologies and for humility, but also for us to start a clean page and ensure that, when perfectly reasonable questions are asked about the medical treatment of our children, those questions are allowed to be asked in an atmosphere of respect and understanding, so that these vulnerable children and young people are looked after in a caring and careful way.