As if it hadn’t experienced enough splits over the last few weeks, it transpires that Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s new party is divided over its policy on trans issues. ‘Your Party’ – not its official name, according to a fuming Sultana – is set to have six MPs, with four pro-Gaza independents to join the group. But while Sultana has insisted she will ‘always’ speak in support of trans people, one of these, Adnan Hussain MP, stated last week that trans women are ‘not biologically women’. Talk about trouble in paradise, eh?
Hussain is currently a member of the Independent Alliance of MPs, alongside Corbyn and Sultana. Once the new group holds its first conference this autumn, the Alliance will join the party. But while all these politicians appear to share similar views on the war in Gaza, they take different positions on other policies. On Friday, Hussain was quizzed on what stance the new lefty group would take on LGBT issues and single-sex spaces. He took to Twitter to write that: ‘Women’s rights and safe spaces should not be encroached upon. Safe third spaces should be an alternative option.’
But this appears to have ruffled feathers, with his soon-to-be colleague Sultana raging online:
I’ve always stood with the trans community, and I always will. The same forces targeting migrants and Muslims are attacking LGBTQ+ people, especially trans people. Our safety is in solidarity. None of us are free until all of us are free. That’s the new party we’re building. Bigotry has no place in it.
Meanwhile Corbyn told a party event in Oldham last week that ‘trans rights are human rights’. But despite the new co-leaders of Your Party being unequivocal in their view, Hussain doubled down over the weekend. The Independent MP was accused of ‘trans hate’ by trans journalist India Willoughby – and he hit back. Hussain responded soberly:
There was no hatred expressed, India, it’s a conversation that needs to be had. Agreeing with women on their need for spaces exclusive to them is not an expression of hatred to any other community. I stated the need for safe spaces for trans people, that’s not hatred.
He also said that trans women are ‘not biologically women, hence transwomen’, adding about single sex toilets: ‘We’re talking about toilets. Most sane people want to be segregated in a toilet.’ He better watch out before he starts sounding a little too reasonable for this new group…
It’s not the first stumbling block the new left-wing group has come across. It still doesn’t have a proper name, its co-leaders barely get along and already left-wing activists are trying to oust party strategists. Mr S reckons Sir Keir Starmer need not panic too much about his prospective rivals just yet…
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