50 Years of Pride in the UK — House of Commons, 2022-06-30
Topic: Civil Rights
Kirsten Frances Oswald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): It is a pleasure to follow such a powerful speech from the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard), and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate. It is an honour to sum up in this debate for my party, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) on securing the debate and on her incredibly powerful speech. The speeches we have heard today have been absolutely worth listening to in full, every single one of them. The points made by the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) about why this matters and why nothing should be taken for granted are ones we ought particularly to reflect upon Clearly, lot of the speakers today have spoken from the perspective of personal experience, and I cannot say that I do. But it is important that I stand up and speak today, and reflect on what I have heard, all the same. It is good to be speaking on the 50th anniversary of Pride. As we have heard, it is a time for people to come together in unity and celebration. We have heard eloquently today about why this movement has been born out of protest, and why both the celebration and the protest remain very relevant, because we have made so much progress but we are absolutely not there yet. It is brilliant that we have so many visible and powerful role models, a number of whom are in the Chamber today, and it is fantastic that Pride parades take place so widely. My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) spoke warmly about the local Pride parades, which are so important to communities. It is important that local authorities fly the flag—my local council in East Renfrewshire raised its Pride flag recently, which is fantastic—and that corporates wear their Pride colours with, well, pride. My hon. Friend spoke insightfully about what lies beneath that. Despite all those positives, clearly challenges remain and part of the way we continue to deal with those is by speaking out and trying to empower others to do the same For that to be possible, we need, for instance, to have an unshakeable commitment to proper, open education for young people. That is absolutely vital to making sure that we continue on a positive, inclusive road, and that we make these critical school years so much better than they were for my peers in the 1980s. For that to happen, work that groups such as the TIE—Time for Inclusive Education—campaign in Scotland do in making sure that inclusive education is delivered is hugely important, and I want to put on record my admiration for what they do. Our young people deserve to have inclusive, open and clear education, to have that confidence that goes all the way through their schooling that they are perfect and valued just exactly as they are I also thank LGBT Youth Scotland for what it does and for the really positive influence that it brings to the table. Obviously, here in this place, we often disagree, and that is healthy and vital for democracy. I wish to note the tireless work of Out for Independence, which is the SNP’s LGBT group, but I also applaud its counterparts in other political parties. That focus that political parties have on equalities issues, driven by the volunteers within these groups, is incredibly important for all of us here That broad input matters. The progress that we have made, and the progress that would be really easy to take for granted, is not guaranteed and is not worldwide. As we can see from the very depressing recent events in the USA, progressive policies can be reversed and rights can be removed. My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston and the hon. Member for Wallasey spoke very powerfully about the vested interests and the misinformation that lie beneath some of these regressive and discriminatory moves that we can see We need in this place to be ready to call out issues when they arise. We need to keep pressing for equality. That means that we have to speak out and that we have to decry the terrible plan to fly asylum seekers to Rwanda, not just for the very obvious straightforward reasons, but because the UK Government know full well the peril that that puts LGBT asylum seekers in. It means pointing out that that inclusive education that I just spoke about, and that the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn) powerfully explained, really does matter. It means calling out dog whistle language and calling out those who would happily engage in what they would probably term "culture wars" My hon. Friend the Member for Lanark and Hamilton East was very powerful when she talked about hate crime statistics, particularly in regard to trans people. She very correctly reflected the similarity of some of that narrative to the period around section 28. I can remember that; it was all going on when I was at school. I am really glad that we have moved on from that particular issue, but we have heard here today, and we need to be frank about this, that the narrative around trans issues now is just as toxic—the othering, the misdirection and the hostility that we hear is disgraceful For the avoidance of doubt—I have said this before and I will no doubt say it again—I consider myself to be a feminist. That is in no way in conflict with my support for LGBT rights, or for trans people in particular. My rights are not threatened by other people having their rights respected As the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport said so effectively, our rights—the rights of all of us—are better protected and far more secure when we do not permit the rights of any one group to be eroded The UK Government, the Prime Minister in fact, behaved very shamefully around the issue of conversion therapy—so-called therapy—when he U-turned and said that the support previously expressed for a ban on conversion therapy was no longer in place. That was swiftly followed by a partial U-turn on that U-turn—how confusing! None the less I do take my hat off to those members of the Conservative party who were absolutely scathing in their views about this. I am sure that some of that heat was responsible for the partial change of heart, and I applaud them for that The situation remains that, as things stand, the UK Government plan to ban conversion therapy in a limited way. There are very large holes in the provisions as far as I understand them. It is absolutely unjustifiable to exclude trans conversion practice from the plans being put forward. The suggestion that trans people would be excluded because it is too complex is both nonsense and shameful.