Peaceful protest against Boris Johnson and his government’s alleged anti-trans bathroom bill planned for central London
2019’s Trans Pride march in Dundee, Scotland (Stewart Kirby/SOPA Images/LightRocket/ Getty)
Plans are being made for a peaceful trans rights protest in London against Boris Johnson’s alleged proposal to ban trans people from public bathrooms and single-sex facilities.
The Sunday Times reported last weekend that Johnson plans to scrap long-delayed reforms to the Gender Recognition Act (GRA) – the process that trans people have, since 2004, used to update the gender marker on their birth certificates – and instead bring in “new protections” for women’s spaces that would bar trans women from using them.
This has led to outrage from LGBT+ campaigners, charities and politicians – many of whom have pointed out that the attack on trans rights comes in the midst of global protests against racism and police brutality and the continuing coronavirus pandemic.
The Sunday Times reported that a huge public consultation on GRA reform in 2018 – the results of which have still not been published – found that 70 per cent of over 100,000 respondents backed removing the requirement that trans people get a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria before they can update the gender marker on their birth certificate.
However, the paper also reported that Johnson and his equalities chief Liz Truss believe these results were “skewed” because trans people themselves responded to the consultation about their rights.
London trans rights protest will rally against UK ‘bathroom bill’.
Instead of modernising the outdated GRA to make it easier for trans people to use – it’s commonly said to be an overly bureaucratic, complicated and expensive way of changing legal gender in comparison to the process in several other countries – Johnson and Truss appear to be proposing a roll back of trans rights that will see US-style “bathroom bills” come to the UK.
In response, a public protest for trans rights is being planned in central London on July 4.
“We’ve been harmlessly using spaces that match our gender forever without issue, and people proved that they support us doing so,” the event description reads.
“But bigots in power don’t care about our wellbeing and would rather our lives were put at risk for just going about our business.
“We were already at risk of murder. Now the law will begin to support discrimination against us.
“Liz Truss and the Tories pose a threat of what is essentially a UK equivalent of the US bathroom bills.
“Trans people will be unsafe in public and at work and the law will back discriminatory actions to prevent trans people from harmlessly using spaces that match their gender.
“This is a peaceful protest to demand that our rights not be removed.”
More than 2,300 people have so far indicated their interest in attending in the two days since the protest was announced.
More information can be found here.
