The Gender Recognition Act & Fair Play for Women – Hands off my Rights!

Have you filled in the government consultation on the Gender Recognition Act? If you’re reading this after 19th October 2018, your chance to do so has passed. If you’re reading this before then, carpe diem. You still have a chance for your voice to be heard.

As Nicola Williams of Fair Play for Women says “We have one chance to stop this.” This is it.

In their distinctive red T shirts, women have been campaigning all over the country.

*The quotes from ‘Fair Play’ women (presented as conversations in a cafe for the purpose of this piece) and preceded with a red asterisk * are the words of actual individual campaigners, given to me for inclusion in this article.

I salute every one of them.  Names have been changed.

Over the last few weeks, the women of Fair Play for Women (FPFW) have taken to the streets of England where they’ve been talking to members of the public and trying to explain what changes to the GRA could mean for the rights of women and girls nationwide. In their distinctive red, white and black T shirts, emblazoned with the slogan ‘Hands off my Rights!’, women have been handing out leaflets and encouraging people to fill out the consultation in places as far afield as Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Cornwall. You can see details of their work at Fair Play for Women, and you can also get guidance to help filling in the consultation here. You can have a look at the resources in their excellent library here.

If you’re reading this you’re probably already familiar with the Gender Recognition Act (GRA), but it wouldn’t do any harm to give a bit of a background refresher. Firstly, it’s not to be confused with the Ghana Revenue Authority, which is the first thing that will come up if you type ‘History of the GRA’ into Google. The GRA was established in 2004 to enable trans-identified people to ‘receive legal recognition of their acquired gender’.

The government’s helpful leaflets on the proposed changes to the GRA are astoundingly biased. For those of us who have really educated ourselves about this matter and don’t support the changes, flipping through the ‘Easy Read Factsheet’ is quite a depressing experience. The assurance that there will be no changes made to the Equality Act, for example, is misleading. When a man can simply change his birth certificate to say he’s a woman, then there’s no way of telling who actually IS a woman. Making this process a matter of simply signing a form renders The Equality Act completely meaningless so far as protecting single-sex spaces is concerned.

The government ‘fact’ sheet

The first page of the startlingly sexist ‘Easy Read Fact Sheet’ features a picture of a pearl-clutching, be-lipsticked man, smiling widely at the camera, while a much smaller picture shows a young woman happily educating herself from a large pink booklet. It’s so easy, a woman can understand it!

Page 2 tells the reader, ‘Trans is the word for someone who has changed their gender from the one that was given them when they were born.’

My head is in a spin already. Nobody is ‘given a gender’ when they are born. Our SEX is observed and recorded. So already, in the first sentence, the ideas of sex and gender are being confused. We are already battling the word salad. Come on government, you can do better than this, surely?

The leaflet also tells the reader, “If you are married you need the permission of your spouse”. Well, it’s true that if you want to stay married (and your wife is quite happy to suddenly become a lesbian) then yes, she needs to agree to the legal change.  The current position offers a dignified way out of a marriage which has quite possibly become untenable for the other partner. But heck, this isn’t about actual women, is it? On the government leaflet this point is accompanied by a picture of a blue-haired man in a choker and a low cut top, with a smiling woman giving a thumbs-up next to him. (He is not smiling. Only actual women are expected to smile all the bloody time.) It’s easy! Smile. I mean, what reasonable woman would object to her husband suddenly ‘becoming’ a woman?

Transmen, quelle surprise, are not given much thought in this document, although it does feature a couple of pictures of a fairly sullen teenage girl with short hair. I suspect she isn’t meant to be an actual female because she isn’t smiling. In one picture she wears a crop top and a tie! Gasp! Non-binary or gender fluid? You decide.

‘There will be no change to women-only spaces and services’ the helpful factsheet reassures the reader. Which brings us back to the fact that if there’s no way of telling who was born a man or a woman, women-only spaces become a bit irrelevant, don’t they?

The government says it wants to make the process of ‘changing gender’ easier, and that the consultation is only about this.

The only thing left that currently takes any time, money or effort to change is your birth certificate. Other documents are already a done deal. If you want to make things even easier, there’s only one way forward.

Yes, that’s right. You can already change your sex on all your legal documents. You might be surprised to know that anyone can already change their sex on their driving licence and passport without undergoing any sort of process other than filling in a form. Sounds unlikely? I didn’t believe it either. It’s true. There’s a woman in one online feminist group who still has a ‘male’ driving licence after seeing if she could change it. There was no problem. To change your sex on your passport just requires a signature from a ‘reputable’ person. Note that these changes are made to your recorded SEX and are done quickly and easily.

So why the need to make things easier? The thing that surprised me most about the GRA is that a man can already change his sex on his birth certificate. You might be forgiven for thinking the consultation was to see how the public felt about that. Many of us think that the government should be saying, ‘Woah. Changing your sex on your birth certificate? No way, bro.”

Instead, what the government is thinking of doing -what they are telling us they plan on doing – is making it as easy to change your sex on your birth certificate as your passport.  Currently, if you want to change your actual birth certificate, you have to ‘live as a woman’ for 2 years, get a medical diagnosis of ‘gender dysphoria’ & get a doctor to give details of any medical treatment; sign a piece of paper saying you’re not going to change your mind, and pay £140.

This is the only thing standing between us and sex self-ID.

Take away this barrier and absolutely any man can legally become a woman in a few sweeps of the pen or taps on a keyboard. This change would be totally unreasonable.

Many of us are wondering how legal this process is. A man is born a man and a woman is born a woman. This is, at least for now, enshrined in law. For a legal document to be changed saying a man was born a woman is surely an illegal process. He wasn’t. A new born baby does not have a gender identity – hell, I don’t have a gender identity, but let’s not digress – a new born baby has a SEX.  Saying a man was born a woman is a downright lie. Yet this can already be done by following the process above, and this has been the case since 2004.

Some people will say,“But trans people have been able to do this since 2004, and there haven’t been any issues, so what’s the problem?” Well, firstly, make no mistake, there have been issues. The latest high profile case is that of Stephen/Karen White, a trans-identified man who was put in a women’s prison- despite a history of rape and child sexual assault– and who was charged with sexually assaulting no less than four women within a few days of arrival. This case involved perhaps the most absurd words ever spoken by a prosecutor when Charlotte Dangerfield told the court, presumably with a straight face, “Her penis was erect and sticking out of the top of her trousers.”

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly – this isn’t really even about people who call themselves transgender. It’s much bigger than that. What the government wants to bring in is ‘sex self-ID’.  And what it means is that ANY man – yes, any man, your great uncle Bert, that bloke who works in the betting shop, that creepy guy that hangs around outside the school at the end of your street – they can all just say they’re a woman, and bingo! It’s a done deal. Fill in a form and get that M changed to an F. Access to women’s spaces R Us.

Fairplay for Women has made several short videos about on the subject of sex self-ID and you can watch them here. While Dick Travers approaches the issue from a comedy angle, the first, much darker, video of the series is shot from the point of view of a woman who has suffered a lifetime of abuse at the hands of men and is now rebuilding herself.

” I owe my life to female only groups,” says her voice. ” To crisis centres and refuges where I could be safe, to other women who gave me strength to face my past: showed me I wasn’t alone; let me be angry; let me breathe. And let me say the truth. That the rapist was male. The body was male.  The weapon was male. The violence was male.  And his belief that it was his right was male too.”

I was ready to go out campaigning.

There are several FPFW campaign groups in London and the surrounding area, so with the end of the consultation only a few weeks away I bought myself a T shirt (you can get yours here), signed up and went out leafleting with some local women.

I met them in a COSTA coffee shop, a group of seven cheerful, positive women aged between about twenty five and sixty.  I couldn’t have missed them: already wearing their ‘Hands off my Rights’ T shirts they looked a little like a patch of poppies planted in the earthy brown colours favoured by the decor of COSTA.

“COSTA coffee is TERF central these days,” joked Kath, as we shared a muffin and shared out the campaign leaflets and postcards.I asked them about their experiences leafleting. I was a little nervous myself, but Kath reassured me. 

“I’ve been absolutely terrified and totally out of my comfort zone every time,” she confided, “but every time I’ve been happily surprised by the reception I’ve got from ordinary people who get it, who say ‘but what about hospital wards?’ or ‘what, no operations necessary?’ and who want to take postcards and leaflets to pass on to their friends and family.  Every time I’ve met another brave woman, I’ve felt like we are part of something really important, and that we are absolutely doing the right thing. And every time I leaflet, I have to totally talk myself into it! But I am so happy I have contributed in my small way. It has made me braver in real life too, and for that I am glad. The leaflets are clear and simple to understand, the films really hit home, and the other brave women I have met are inspiring.”

“I’ve found it incredibly heartening.” said Laura. “Nearly everyone agrees with us. It’s easy to forget that outside the twitter bubble, very few people actually agree that “transwomen are women” and even if they do, they think that transwomen are men who have actually been through the operation and are astonished to learn that most of them are just transvestites. Even those who say “yeah, people should be what they want”- when you probe a bit further and ask questions, they realise they haven’t thought it through and that yes, we do need protections for women to be properly considered.”

* “I spoke to a woman in Dartford who is a rape survivor,as am I.” added Maria.  “She was really emotional and said she was hugely grateful to us all for raising awareness as the prospect of self ID terrifies her.”

We finished our coffee and walked out onto the High Street. There was an open square near the cinema, a mostly-pedestrian crossroads, and this was where we were going to begin leafleting.  I could just hear a busker playing ‘Brown-eyed Girl’ and make out some small children dancing at the top of the street.  A woman grasping a huge bunch of giant balloons stood outside the newsagent, and Elsa and a Transformer tumbled and twisted together in the breeze. The street was filled with shoppers, couples out with kids, teens and pensioners in small groups. They all looked fairly purposeful. I swallowed and approached a woman in her 30s, proffering a leaflet. She had long brown hair and glasses, I realised I’d automatically reached for a leaflet with a photo of Helen Watts on the front, because she looked a bit like her.

“Excuse me,” I started. “Could I give you a leaflet about women’s rights?”

For a moment it seemed she wasn’t going to stop, but at the words ‘women’s rights’ she looked more interested.

“Thank you,” she replied, taking the leaflet. I watched her walk up the street, moving more slowly now, as she read the leaflet. Then she popped it in her handbag, looked back at me and smiled.

I felt ridiculously heartened by this small victory and decided to be braver next time. Next time I would try to start a conversation!

“Hello,” I tried, chirpily. “Did you know the government is considering changing the definition of woman so any man can just declare himself to be female?”

It was a bit wordy, but the couple I was talking to stopped. The man chuckled.

“No really! You Sir, if the current changes go through, you could just sign a piece of paper and get your birth certificate changed to say you’re female.”

“Nah! Is this about transgender rights?”

“It’s not really about men who believe themselves to be women,” I told them. “It’s about any man being able to make that change legally, really easily. It’s called sex self-ID… “

A few minutes later the couple walked off, having taken a leaflet and a postcard. When the woman turned back and asked for a few extra leaflets to give women at her book group. I felt absurdly proud.

The next five or six people I approached either ignored me completely or looked at me with distaste, as if I might be trying to sell them something. I felt that some of them thought I might be a bit bonkers.  I spoke to Maya about this feeling when we went for coffee afterwards. She agreed and said she’d had similar feelings herself.

*“Something I said to a lot of people” she told me, “was ‘anyone could be a woman.’ And a fair few people stopped at that, wondering what I was talking about. On the faces of those who didn’t stop, I often saw a little smirk and shake of the head which seemed to suggest they thought I was crazy; some mad woman in the street who doesn’t understand how the world works, spouting nonsense to people who have better things to do.  And the thing is,” she sighed, “they’re right; it is nonsense. But nevertheless it is something that’s happening. So although it’s a disheartening experience having so many people walk past you uninterested, that’s really balanced out by those who do stop to talk.”

So there I was, standing in the middle of the street, trying not to feel disheartened, and to get my enthusiasm back, when a tall, grey-haired man in his 60s approached me, waving a leaflet.

“Your friend just gave me this,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s very interesting. But this can’t possibly be right? ALL the major political parties support this change?”

They do,” I said. “It’s very difficult for people to speak out against it for fear of being called transphobic.”

“But women NEED single sex spaces!” he said indignantly. “Of course they do! My granddaughter…” He trailed off, looking worried.

“There’s still time to let the government know what you think,” I offered. “On the Fair Play for Women’ website there’s a booklet that can help talk you through filling in the consultation. It doesn’t take long.”

“Thank you, yes, I really think I will,” he assured me.

My confidence restored, I chatted with several other people including two older women, who were astonished and rather angry, and assured me they would fill the consultation that very afternoon.

“On our phones,” one of them offered. “Over lunch.”

“There is one more thing I’d like to ask you, darling,” her friend turned to me. “Do you know any decent Greek restaurants around here?”

I spoke to a woman who worked for the NHS, who said she’d take some leaflets to work. She promised she’d fill in the consultation herself at lunchtime, hoping a colleague would do it with her.

I spoke to a mum with three children who took a leaflet and a postcard and said she’d fill it in once the kids were in bed. “I’ll tell my sister about that website too,” she added.

Laura seemed to be being monopolised by a large bloke so I drifted over to see what was going on.

“I don’t believe in this women’s rights stuff,” he was saying. “Women’s rights? Pah! Women should just stand up for themselves!”

“That’s what we’re doing.” pointed out Laura, reasonably.

“My Missus wouldn’t take no crap in the toilets, not off anyone, male or female. Men in women’s sports teams? Just kick ’em out. Bet you can stand up for yourself,” he added. “Big girl like you! You’ve very tall, aren’t you?”

Laura sighed. “We have to go now,” she said firmly, and we moved nearby to where Kath was talking to a young couple. Once she’d finished her conversation we decided it was time for a well-earned break, rounded up the others and headed back to COSTA.

 

* As a middle of the road, middle-aged mum I don’t class myself as radical,” Sara said, sipping a cup of green tea. “The lack of public awareness of the proposed changes to the GRA and bullying and silencing of women only dawned on me a few months ago. When the penny dropped I was furious and determined to be brave and speak out! As a domestic abuse survivor, I’ve learnt the hard way what male control looks like and the need for boundaries to keep women safe. I’m confident now to assert boundaries for myself and my fellow women and girls. In joining the campaign, I’ve found a home to discuss women’s rights and make a difference. I’ve met great women from all different backgrounds but all eminently sensible and calm! The response when leafleting has been overwhelming positive, I see people of both sexes and all ages shocked and often cross when the penny also drops for them. The public don’t want these changes, the majority don’t care about gender identity, live and let, but they are cross at the government’s proposal to accept a lie and legally shift the definition of sex when we all know that biological sex can never be changed.”

* “Watching people realise what is happening makes it all real.” nodded Karla.  “You never know how anyone is going to react. Some are appalled. They can’t believe it. They don’t know why gender self-identification was ever suggested. Some look at you and say “I know what this is about and don’t want to talk”. But most are astonished. One young man, out with his very pregnant partner asked: ‘Does that mean we can choose which sex we are going to have? ‘ He was dumbfounded.’

*Ordinary people are shocked when they hear what the government are proposing,” agreed Trish.  “Most haven’t heard about the consultation and are very grateful to be informed. Many people I’ve spoken to have read a story in a newspaper which had alarmed them – the rapist in the women’s prison, Girlguiding policy, the man allowed into TopShop’s women’s changing-room – and they were angry and disbelieving that the government would support such policies.”

Had nobody disagreed with her, I asked Trish, called her names or supported the changes?

* “No,” she shook her head. “Men and women, young and old, all were equally horrified at the idea that men might be able to simply self-identify as women to become women in the eyes of the law.”

*” Most people have been really interested and supportive, but I have met some who disagreed with what we’re doing,” interjected Sonia on my left. “Three of us were leafleting near a museum when two young women approached us. They said that they’d read the leaflet and wanted to let us know that what we were doing was transphobic, and that anyway women were just as likely to assault men as men were women- which of course we know isn’t true. We said it wasn’t about transphobia, it was about men being in women’s spaces, and we asked them how they would define ‘woman’. They said being a woman wasn’t about biology.  “It’s more of a feeling,” said one, but she couldn’t be any clearer. It was surreal: they were both educators in their late twenties, both mums with toddlers.  They said what we were doing was hateful and that they were going to tell somebody in the museum to get us stopped. One of the women in our group felt really nervous about that happening, so we left.

* “But last week,” Sonia continued, “we popped into a branch of Starbucks for a hard earned cuppa after leafleting. My friend asked for ‘adult human female’ on her cup of coffee, and the woman that served us said, “I’ve seen you lot on Twitter and I’m behind you 100% and I love those stickers that are going around, too. If I didn’t have this job and my son to look after I’d be out there leafleting with you.” And that was a great feeling. So you take the good with the bad.”

We finished off our drinks and cake crumbs, went back out onto the High Street and spent a further half an hour handing out leaflets and talking to people. Some were too busy to stop, others were happy to have a chat.

One woman told me, “Oooo, I’m past all that now, love. Leave it to the younger ones I say!”

Laden down with shopping bags, another said, “My hands are full but it looks interesting! Drop it in my bag and I’ll read it later.”

“I saw something about this on Facebook,” said another. “I’m a classroom assistant and we’ve been talking about this in the staff room at school. It’s just wrong. Give me a few different postcards and I’ll take them in on Monday with some biscuits.”

“What’s this about then?” called a man passing by with his two small daughters. “I care about women’s rights! Well, I’ve got to, eh?” he grinned proudly at the little girls next to him.

I explained how single-sex spaces were under threat by the idea of sex self-ID, how there was only a short amount of time left to fill in the consultation and how the fair Play for Women website could help him fill it in.

“I’ll do it when I get in,” he promised. “My wife will have something to say about this as well. Can I take a few of those leaflets? I know she’ll want some.”

“Can I have a postcard too, daddy?” asked the eldest. I handed her one and they skipped away happily.

The street was getting quieter and a slight chill was in the air. Another group of women had been leafleting a few miles away and had arranged to meet us for a chat before we all went home. Kath came over to say she’d received a text saying they’d arrived. Back we went to COSTA for the third time that day. The other group had grabbed a set of comfy sofas at the back of the cafe, where we joined them.

I asked them their experiences leafleting.

*“It was really difficult walking up to strangers to talk to them about this.” said one.  “I’ve never done anything like this before. Although it’s a disheartening experience having so many people walk past you uninterested, that was balanced by those who did stop to talk, and I’ll definitely be going out leafleting again.”

* “For me, it was genuinely enjoyable to be actively doing something rather than feeling angry and helpless reading about all this at home.” put in a young woman called Sandra. “It felt good to be informing the- grateful- public about the consultation. It could change their lives and yet many knew nothing about it. I spoke to a teenage girl today who was really interested. She understood the issues straight away and wanted to share the info with her school. And I spoke to a man and woman with two kids who stopped to talk, thanked me for giving up time to protect the rights of their children, and took leaflets for their friends. Broadly, people were very pleasant.”

* Well, I’m angry at having to campaign with Fair Play for Women!” said another campaigner, stirring her tea crossly. “How can we be fighting for the right to exist in 2018?! Talking to shoppers was reassuring though, everyone agrees that it’s madness to deny that men are men and women women. But how many will find the time to fill in the consultation?” She shook her head. “Who is listening to them?”

 

 

If you can fill out a response to the consultation, please, please do. Time is running out.

To submit to the consultation with the help of the Fair Play for Women guidelines, click here.

If you really don’t have the time to submit a response you’ve composed yourself, Fair Play for Women have designed a simple prototype response which you can read. If you agree with the wording, you simply fill in your name, address and details and they’ll email it to the government for you. You can click here to fill in the simplified response.

 

Posted in Activism, Event Reviews, Women's Rights | 5 Comments

Linda Bellos and Venice Allan. A case to answer?

The crowd gathered to support Linda & Venice outside Westminster Magistrates Court.

On 26th September 2018, Venice and Linda had to present themselves at Westminster Magistrates Court in answer to a private prosecution brought by a tranactivist who felt threatened by one of 67 year old Linda’s comments at a ‘We Need to Talk’ meeting last year.

I’d arranged to meet Venice and a few other people at Starbucks on Baker Street at 8.45, which meant getting up at 7am. Not my favourite time in the morning.  It was an early start and I’m not great at early starts.

Venice & her mum enjoy a pre-court coffee

It was a bright, cool morning and the coffee steamed in the sunlight. Linda arrived, with her partner and friends, looking very dapper in a pin striped suit. Everybody seemed in very high spirits, and Ruby and I sat outside with Venice and her mum while we waited for her solicitor and paralegal to arrive. Two coffees later, Venice & Linda sped off in a taxi with them and the rest of us walked the short distance to the court.

When we arrived at Westminster Magistrates Court, over half an hour early, there were already a few clusters of women and a handful of banners of support waving. I went straight through after a bag search: Venice had warned me that there might not be many seats available in the public gallery and I was keen to watch the proceedings so I could blog about them for those unable to be there. Well, ok, it wasn’t an entirely altruistic motive, I was hugely curious to hear what Guiliana had to say for himself. It’s a very strange case indeed.

Linda and Venice wait for a cab to take them to court.

For those of you unfamiliar with the story,  on November 8th 2017, at a ‘We Need To Talk About The GRA’ [Gender Recognition Act] event in York, organised by Venice Allan, Linda Bellos was one of the speakers.  Speaking, she says, with reference to the assault of Maria Maclachlan at Speakers’ Corner a few months beforehand, 67 year old Bellos said:

 

“‘I play football and I box, and if any one of those bastards comes near me I will take off my glasses and… clock (?) them.”

Linda is no stranger to activism. She came out as a lesbian in the early 80s, led London Lambeth Borough Council from 1986-88 and is the instigator of Black History Month in the UK.  She received an OBE in 2006 for ‘services to diversity’, having worked in various roles including co-chair of the LGBT Advisory Group to the Metropolitan Police. This article,  ‘Yes, we were bloody angry’  from 2006 chronicles some of her achievements.

A month before ‘We Need to Talk‘, in October 2017, Bellos had been uninvited by the Beard Society, a self-described gender and feminist group at Cambridge University, after telling organisers she planned to question ‘some of the trans politics’ in her talk.

The Beard Society’s decision to uninvite Bellos (undaunted, she planned to go and speak at Oxford instead) led Claire Heuchan to observe:

“It is ludicrous to claim that someone who has committed her life to liberation politics is a risk to the well being of those who listen to her perspective – and deeply insulting.  Black, female, Jewish and lesbian feminist, Bellos is not exactly a preacher of hate.”

Nonetheless, despite her stirling record of service to both the party and the community, LGBT Labour claimed that Ms Bellos’s views and perceived threats of violence were ‘deeply offensive’ and accused her of ‘clearly inciting violence against trans members and the wider trans community’. LGBT Labour complained to the Labour Party General Secretary and  North Yorkshire police interviewed Ms Bellos under caution in October 2017, but understandably took no further action.

It seemed the incident had blown over until a month ago when Giuliana Kendal, a transgender rights campaigner who I understand saw a video of the comments online, decided to bring a private prosecution (PP).

The court papers accuse Bellos of breaking Section 5 of the Public Order Act which makes it an offence to use ‘threatening or abusive words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour’  within the hearing or sight of a person ‘likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby’.

Kendal’s prosecution also summonses Venice Allan, who Facebook live-streamed the event, despite the fact that she was not interviewed by police at the time. Allan is accused of sending an offensive message ‘by means of a public electronic communication network a message or other that was grossly offensive”.

Yes, I think we read that right, in a nutshell it seems that Venice is being prosecuted because while she was live-streaming an event, somebody said something that somebody else didn’t like. Let’s get some perspective here: I know a woman who was punched in the head on a train platform by a random strange man and advised by the police not to prosecute.

Two terms of half-hearted study of 20th century ‘A’ level law several decades ago did not prepare me for understanding this. I just don’t get it. If a male transactivist DMs or @s me, I click on their Twitter profile and a video springs up of them taking it up the arse, or of a dog being beaten to death by a police officer in China (both IRL examples of my recent Twitter experience), that’s ok? But Linda’s feisty self-defence speech isn’t? Am I missing something here?

‘This is an attempt to silence women and it is outrageous… I’m a disabled pensioner, with no funds to defend myself since my partner died of cancer, being intimidated by men purporting to be women.”  Bellos told the press.

Nope, I’ve done a bit of research and I still don’t get it. Firstly, how startlingly unfair is a private prosecution (PP) system? How incredibly undemocratic, how entirely unjust the idea seems to me and surely to anyone who gives the matter more than cursory consideration. Secondly, surely it must cost somebody a fortune, whoever wins or loses?

In 2014 the Independent ran an article about the growing popularity of PPs, entitled ‘Two-tier Justice‘  wherein I discovered that The Director of Public Prosecutions (head of the CPS) can take over and stop a case if it is considered “vexatious”, “malicious” or “not in the public interest”.

Could I mount a PP against anyone who offends me, ever, as long as I have the money to follow through? It seems not.

“Prosecutors must be satisfied that there is sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction against the defendant.” informs the Private Prosecution Service, adding tantalisingly, “Can you fund the private prosecution proceedings?” but their website doesn’t tell you how long that particular piece of string is.

Interestingly, I read on Wikipedia that in 2014, Westminster Magistrates was used as what one journalist described as a publicity stunt when  an ex-mormon summoned the head of the Church of the Latter Day Saints to appear on fraud charges. The leader, who resides in America, did not attend, but the guy that summoned him got over three quarters of a million visits to his website when the press broke the story.  A former crown prosecutor stated: “This is just using the law to make a show”. Obviously the courts are not keen on such behaviour.

According to EMM, a UK PP specialist, a fraud and financial crime service can “cost(s) in the region of £6000 and upwards… cases can become expensive.”

I’m both intrigued and confused, but it’s 3am and I’ve an article to finish.

 

Back to the tale in hand. I arrived at Westminster Magistrates and passed through the huge glass doors. The court was built in 2011 and the architect was clearly a fan of glass.  Security was understandably tight. My bag passed through an Xray machine, I passed through a metal archway and headed up several flights of stairs to find Court Nine.

There were already about a dozen women waiting outside the court room. Five or six of them were wearing “Woman= adult human female” T shirts. One was engaged in a discussion with a court clerk who was suggesting they all sat down until the court was open. She was not convinced.

“We’ll just wait right here, thank you.” she told the clerk, politely but firmly.

I lurked close to the door. It hadn’t crossed my mind spaces would be so limited.

“There’s only room for 12 people inside,” explained the clerk. “Six from each side.”

There was no sign of Giuliana, although two trans people, a man and a woman, were standing near the doors.

“Are you Venice Allan?” the clerk asked the man, who looked somewhat surprised and explained that he was not. No, nor was he Giuliana Kendal. A couple of women seemed understandably disgruntled that we wouldn’t all be able to fit inside.

“What about neutral people?” asked one. “Can we go in?”

“If there’s room,” said the clerk.

We waited.  It was ten past ten and the session should have started at ten. I felt restless.

 

I could see through the window that a larger crowd had gathered outside, and its colourful banners swayed as it moved.

There were representatives from Fair Play for Women, Man Friday, Get the LOut, A Woman’s Place, Lesbian Alliance, Object, Let A Woman Speak… and many supporters who had come independent of an organisation. Almost all were women.

A journalist asked me afterwards who had been present and I tried to list all the groups that had sent or expressed support. Hadn’t Liverpool Resisters sent a banner? I knew Leeds had brought their beautifully embroidered “Wrong Side of History My Arse” banner.

 

Some of the banners outside court in support of Venice & Linda

When I did my two terms of A level law,  fifty million years ago, we attended a case where the public gallery was an actual gallery, empty and echoing, encircling the proceedings below, with polished handrails of mahogany, wooden benches and seating for several scores of people. But of course, Westminster Magistrates Court is not a Victorian building housing a Crown Court. Once the clerk opened the door and those of us who made it inside entered the ‘public gallery’ I could see why observers were limited to twelve.

Two rows of about ten seats each, lined up cinema-style, were set behind a partially-enclosed glass screen, on the same level as the proceedings. On the other side of the screen, twelve people sat at their desks, piles of partially-confined papers and computers in front of them.  It reminded me of a 90s television studio.  Julie Bindel and Joani Walsh, who had press passes, were seated on the other side of the glass. Venice and Linda were sitting on the right. They looked calm and confident. Venice was smiling. I nearly waved. Several people were talking.

I heard a woman shrug and say to Giuliana, “Are you seeking to…” and “there’s an awful lot of material,”  but it was too noisy to make out much else. A policeman popped his head around the door and reminded us that we weren’t allowed to record the proceedings.

“And no jeering,”  he told us, good naturedly, “or I’ll have to ask you all to leave.”

We assured him we planned no jeering.

The chatter died down; District Judge Richard Blake entered the court room, a slate-haired, pleasant-faced, fatherly-looking chappie, and we all rose. And then we sat. And then started a somewhat bizarre session.

Guiliana rose early in the proceedings, to tell the judge that he was a solicitor himself but had brought along a friend to help for medical reasons.

“Well,” said Judge Blake, “he can’t address me,” but added that he was content for the friend to stay.

Kendal spoke slowly and addressed Judge Blake  with great pomp, asking him

J, after the hearing, in the offending T shirt

 “to exclude the person at the back in the public gallery who is wearing a T shirt saying ‘Adult Human Female …

…and also, the defendant, Linda Bellos is wearing a suffragette colours square. The T-shirt is a highly political emblem, it is the slogan of the organisation called Standing For Women… brazen in contempt of court…”

“You object to a T shirt?” enquired the judge, with perhaps a very slight raising of one eyebrow.

Indeed, Guiliana did, calling the T shirt ‘deeply offensive’ and the suffragette square was mentioned once more, with a suggestion that the presence of either or both items breached the Equality Act and denied Kendal ‘as a transwoman’ the protected characteristic of sex.

“Who is the person in the gallery?” asked the judge, with weary patience, and J obligingly rose so he could see her T shirt. After a moment’s perusal, the judge referenced the Sufragette movement, calling it ‘an historical cause’.

“I’m not prepared to make any rulings on these items,” he declared. “People are free to wear what they want… I’m not satisfied that amounts to an offence.”

Judge Blake urged everybody present to be ‘cautious’, observing that, “this case clearly reflects issues in the community,’ and telling Kendal, “I understand the sincerity of your application.”

My notes from the hearing. It was complex at times. Top right reads ‘I got lost!’

There followed mention of various things that half made sense when I was writing them down, but don’t make so much sense reading back my notes. Obviously accuracy is important and most legal terminology eludes me.

To tell the truth, I was tired, it was sometimes hard to hear what was being said, and it was just a little bit boring. I stared at the back of Kendal’s head and wondered what would induce someone to mount a prosecution for something like this.

 

There are those, of course, who think the whole thing was a wonderful idea.

Oh, the hyperbole! Harrop looms, like a 21st century Dr T. J. Eckleburg, over the valley of ashes where the dark and malevolent forces of gender-critical feminism swirl and swarm! Guiliana later spoke of the ‘floodgates of hate being opened’ on 8th November, the day of the York meeting. What is with this excessive drama? Is this all we are left with when we deny biological facts?

There was some discussion over the mis-spelling of Venice’s name- Rose before Venice, Allan not Allen- and some deliberation over what did or didn’t constitute an amendment.

Guiliana had, so I understood, dismissed his legal team and was representing himself. He was, in the words of the judge, “seeking to lay a further summons under the Communications Act”. I got the impression that this wasn’t allowed because the summons wasn’t related to ‘the York event’, or possibly because it hadn’t been filed in time.  It was a little baffling. At one point Kendal told the judge, “to be honest, Sir, I’m not quite sure what happened” and at another wanted to “check we are talking about the same thing” although if I’m honest, I’m not quite sure exactly what was being referred to on either occasion. There was talk of dates, things expiring, and much subjective speculation, interspersed with frequent slights upon the character of Ms Allan.

“There is a long history of abuse, of transwomen in particular, by Ms Allan, against the community as a whole, against targeted individuals and against me in particular.”  proclaimed Kendal, referencing Allan’s responsibility for broadcasting at the York event.

“You didn’t persue section 127,” interrupted the judge, in an attempt to stay on track. This was discussed for a while. An incident was said to be out of time and another- the same one? I’m unsure- had been dropped.

“”There is a continuous history of abuse…   It was never the prosecutor’s idea to drop the abuse, the abuse is a fundamental aspect of the prosecution” said Guliana.

“But that’s what you did,” asserted the judge.

Kendal accused his previous legal team of “a conspicuous failure to follow my instructions” and at one point seemed to attempt to correct Judge Blake, telling him “my understanding of the law, Sir, is that it’s perfectly legitimate to add offences.”

The judge, with infinite composure and patience, pointed out that this further allegation didn’t arise from the York event.

Kendal then spoke of the events at Hyde Park Corner and the University Women’s Club, citing that they were arranged by Ms Allan and included ‘obscene speeches by associates of Miss Bellos’ asserting again that, ‘Miss Allan has abused transwomen.’ and claiming ‘all these matters are inextricably linked’.

He then asked to play the court a video, a request which Judge Blake refused.

Venice Allan

“Ms Allan seeks to paint herself as a middle-aged mother of two…” began Giuliana, but we will never know what hyperbolic depiction was about to ensue- perhaps Venice as some modern-day Medusa with a head full of transphobic snakes?- because the judge cut him off, reminding him again that, “the York event is the legal issue.

I could see Venice smiling politely at the side of the court. I wondered how she remained so patient in the face of all this insulting rhetoric. Giuliana was now telling the judge that the prosecution had, “conclusive evidence that Ms Allan is responsible for a whole series of what can only be described as anti-trans hate meetings.”

“Excuse me, they can’t only be described as ‘anti-trans,.” Amanda Jones, Allan’s barrister, finally objected, concluding her complaint with, “This continued abuse in inappropriate.”

The gist seemed to be that Guiliana wanted to add more offences to the charges against Venice and that the court held that this wasn’t possible as it was only concerned with what happened in York, when Linda spoke her now-infamous lines. Let us remind ourselves of what was said at that meeting in York.

A few sections of Bellos’s talk are below, you can hear the full speech (she speaks from 48.40 – 55.45) here, on YouTube.

“My focus tends to be the political use of power and I have- perhaps its naive, but I have a desire to see the notion of equality in the world. I say that as a black women; I say that as a woman and having grown up with a very conscious awareness that being female put me in a lesser position than that of my brother, a male. And it’s still played out sixty-something years later.

I got a note today from a transwoman who I know, I can’t remember what she said to me but something – I said she because I’m always respectful- that she was very hurt by what I said, and I asked her a question about race. Because it seems to me that one of the cateogories that human beings- actually men-  came up with is the notion of races. The categorisation of races seems to have been created around the time of gender being created.

I must say, having borne two children I think I’m physiologically, and in many other senses, a female and a woman. But I play football and I box, and if any one of those bastards comes near me I will take off my glasses and… clock (?) them.  I take my glasses off and I can’t see a bloody thing! (laughs) That’s not the point. I’m quite prepared to threaten violence because it seems to me that politically, what they’re seeking to do is piss on all women…

What really offends me is the extent to which academia and political parties have listened to them in a way that they’re not listening to us as women….

I think the solution is to revisit the Women’s Liberation Movement. I really do see that we have spent too long- I don’t know what we’ve been doing but not very much in the name of feminsm- and I think it’s timely to bring back, the answer is to bring back feminism. To bring back a politics in which we seek… try to build, an 8th demand of the WLM… it would be useful if we took another step which is called consciousness raising. It was and remains a vital method.”

But back to the court room. Where were we? Ah yes, Amanda Jones had just complained that the continued abuse of her clients, Allan and Bellos, was inappropriate.

There was talk of summonses and photographs, statements and issues, and the phrases “these are not matters arising out of the York events” and “well out of a six month period” drifted to my ears and I scribbled them down, but mostly I wished that I had a nice, strong, hot coffee in my hand.

 “The defendant strongly objects to the additional offence which the prosecution was quite rightly advised had no realistic prospect of success.” stated Jones.

Dates were tossed around, and times and running out of time, and places and applications. Kendal said information was made available in time. The judge said it wasn’t.

“It doesn’t take a mathematical genius to work out that this is out of time.” quipped Jones.

“I’m not persuaded it does arrive from the circumstances of York event and I refuse the application.” concluded Judge Blake.

I perked up. That sounded positive! Was it almost time for coffee?

“Where do we go from here?” asked Judge Blake.

‘Starbucks?’ I thought, hopefully.

Jones said they would be contacting the CPS and asking them to take over or discontinue the proceedings.  She talked of ‘frank disclosure about this issue’ and mentioned the idea that there was no prospect of conviction of either defendant.

“We were served yesterday and this morning with a great deal of information and are not in a position to enter pleas.”

Jones went on to note that one of the difficulties with a private prosecution is ‘there is emotional involvement on behalf of the prosecutor’ which is not an issue in a standard proceeding.  She added that she was concerned about the language being used and the importance that it should establish facts, using as an example Giuliana’s comment that ‘the defendants have opened the floodgates of hate’ and calling it ‘both hyperbolic and prejudicial’ and calling for ‘appropriate language’ to be used’.

Judge Blake said both that it was the right of the defendant in a private prosecution to invite the CPS to look at the case, and that a date needed to be fixed for the defence to make submissions.

“Shall I retire for a little while?” he asked, concluding, “It’s quite apparent that here are two factions with very different views of the world,” and pointing out that if conflict could be avoided it would be a happy day for everyone.

We came out of the courtroom onto the landing and milled around for a while. People  wanted to know what had happened, which was basically that the case was adjourned. A journalist asked J and I a few questions before I slipped down the stairs and outside.

What a sight greeted me! Well over a hundred women, and a few men, circled the front courtyard, laughing, chanting and talking; waving their hands in the air and banners by their sides. I hadn’t expected to see so many people, and it was definitely the sudden exposure to the bright midday sunlight that brought a tear to my eye. I wanted to hug every one of them.

After we’d been waiting for about ten minutes, a  chant of “self defence, no offence” broke out before turning to cheers and clapping as Linda and Venice joined us. Huge smiles broke out on their faces as they hugged those who had come out to support them. One group of women broke into a chorus of “there’s only one Venice Allan” and others took photos of and with the defendants. Linda made a rousing speech, but I missed what she said. Luckily, it was recorded and you can see the video on YouTube here.

 

A large group of us went to the nearby park and lay in the sun under some trees, beside the water. Somebody opened a bottle of champagne and poured Venice a glass.

 

 

What will happen next? Your guess is as good as mine. “Only time will tell,” as my old gran used to say, sagely, when she hadn’t got the foggiest idea what was going on.

One thing’s for sure, it’s unlikely to be dull. Cheers!

 

POST SCRIPT – PRESS STATEMENT

Westminster Magistrates Court, Wednesday 26/9/18

Linda Bellos and Venice Allan made a statement to the press:

“The judge refused an application to remove a Suffragette pocket square from one of the defendants and a woman in the public gallery wearing a T-shirt that said Woman equals Adult Human Female.

“The case has been adjourned for the CPS to consider whether to take over the case and discontinue it. And the issue of whether the summons should have been issued is re-opened.

“The prosecution’s application to add additional charges to Ms Allan was refused. The judge accepted Miss Jones’ submissions that the new matters were out of time and did not arise substantially from the same facts.

“And we have reserved the option of a judicial review.“

 

 

POSTSCRIPT 3/12/18 You can read what happened next in my follow-up post,here.

 

 

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