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We salute the MPs who support the Equality Act Review Campaign: all are champions of human rights, determined to make society a better place for the vulnerable. They want to improve the protections in the Equality Act based on an expanded range of factors:/1of8
These factors include homelessness,low socio-economic status and/or poverty, caste, & immigration status.We believe these are wholly well-intentioned proposals that deserve serious consideration. There is a problem, however. Among these ideas is one of a very different kind:/2of8
the campaign proposes “joining ‘sex’ and ‘gender reassignment’ to be one protected characteristic using gender neutral language.” “What’s wrong with that?” you ask. Isn’t gender-neutral language fairer? What would the “gender-neutral” term be? Gender identity?/3of8
This innocent-looking proposal would have the effect of eliminating existing rights. It would remove the category “sex” from the Equality Act. That would remove the EqA’s specific protections for women and girls – that is, people born female./4of8
Moreover, and importantly for us as an LGB organisation, it would also make the protected characteristic “sexual orientation” meaningless. For if sex is not retained as a distinct category, “same-sex attraction” cannot be defined. This must not be allowed to happen./5of8
Embedding this regressive proposal along with other – progressive – proposals aimed at helping disadvantaged groups is a tactic best described by James Kirkup in his incisive article https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-document-that-reveals-the-remarkable-tactics-of-trans-lobbyists /6of8
We urge all MPs to firmly reject this proposal, and to preserve the Equality Act’s protections of the rights of LGB people, women and girls. We will happily meet with any of you to answer your questions on these issues./7of8
