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Let Stats NZ know that you want data on sex retained. Fill in the submission, just a paragraph will do. https://www.stats.govt.nz/consultations/sex-and-gender-identity-statistical-standards-consultation (closes 5pm on 13 Aug) Here are our main concerns, which you could include #nzpol
Integrity of data: The proposal that gender be the default data collected instead of biological sex will compromise the integrity and accuracy of the data used by government agencies. Undermining data reliability on a key demographic variable will damage our ability to capture
and remedy sex-based discrimination and inequality. ‘Sex by default’ should be adopted as a principle in the updated standard. Additional questions regarding gender identity should be added where relevant.
Women’s rights: Conflating sex and gender/gender identity will undermine sex as a separate category protected by law in the Human Rights Act 1993. The case could be made that the proposal contravenes the Human Rights Act where protections are given to women because sex is a
protected characteristic. Women cannot be protected, nor have progress measured, if statistics pertinent to their experience are no longer collected. Stats NZ are bound by the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, which incorporates the HRA grounds of discrimination.
Terminology: The word ‘cisgender’ does not exist in New Zealand law and Stats NZ does not have any kind of mandate from New Zealanders to rename us in policy.
Intersex: People with differences of sexual development should not be presented as not being male or female. They have a sex. It is inaccurate and can be offensive to place them as ‘other’. Additional questions regarding intersex conditions should be added where relevant.
Democratic process: input to these standards appear to have been restricted to a small group of politicised academics and activists. Just a fraction of New Zealanders experience the concept of “gender identity”, yet every one of us has a sex and consequently has a stake in
the standards uses to classify and count us. It is inappropriate that the majority of New Zealanders, whose experience of sex is not highly political but who nonetheless experience life impacted by it, have had no representation on the advisory board of this project.
Best practice: Canada’s rapid adoption of law based on subjective and ill-defined concepts such as “gender identity” should serve as a warning, not as an example of best practice. Stats NZ should instead look to the UK, where they have taken a measured approach including
consulting with women’s groups. Importantly, Stats NZ should look to other areas of data collection in NZ. For no other group do we falsify the population’s data. E.g. it is not best practice to collect data on how old a person feels rather than their actual age or date of birth.
Protection for minority sexual orientations: The promotion of gender as default has a knock-on effect. When sex is erased (in favour of gender) so too is same-sex attraction and people now find themselves being told they are “same-gender” attracted. This is harmful as it allows
for the complete distortion of what it means to be gay or lesbian which – for a group who have only just achieved majority acceptance in New Zealand – is alienating and disrespectful. Sex-based definitions must be retained for terms and concepts related to sexual orientation.
