Crisis! Outrage! Fury! It’s all kicking off in Scotland today, with much nationalist self-righteous anger at the impertinence, nay the audacity, of a Tory government daring to object to a law passed by Holyrood. Why, it’s nothing less than a fundamental breach of the founding principles of the Scotland Act on which the parliament was built – including of course, er, Section 35, the mechanism by which Westminster has blocked Sturgeon’s Gender Recognition Reform bill.
It is of course worth considering what exactly the GRR would mean – especially as it allows 16 year-olds to change their gender without parental consent. And that is exactly what LBC presenter Tom Swarbrick yesterday when he confronted Green MSP Maggie Chapman, a member of Holyrood’s Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee which scrutinised the bill. Swarbrick began by asking Chapman whether the legislation ought to be extended to those under the age of 16:
TS: ‘You said and I’m quoting you here it would be “appropriate and beneficial for children to have formal gender recognition.” Is that to say that you would support, for example, an 8 year old being able to have their sex legally changed?’
MC: ‘I think in the committee that scrutinised this legislation, we heard from a wide range of trans people who knew well before they were 16 that they were trans and I think we should be looking at processes where they can be recognised. That does not mean to say I’m saying we set an age at which it’s fine. I think there will need to be much wider discussions around protection…’
TS: ‘Below 16? You’re thinking of a child below the age of 16 would have their own decision…’
MC: ‘Yes.’
TS: ‘…about whether to change their sex legally. So in theory an 8 year-old could do that?’
MC: ‘I think in principle we should be exploring that.’
The rest of the exchange was similarly illuminating. Chapman noted that the voting age in Scotland was 16; Swarbrick asked if she would therefore support 8 year olds being given the vote. She refused to rule it out and then accused the LBC host of ‘twist[ing] my words.’ Chapman was then asked about her previous comments that ‘sex is not binary and immutable’ and whether she could provide ‘an example of a human being changing their biological sex?’ It turns out she could not. Instead Chapman preferred to criticise GCSE textbooks and argue that ‘very few of us know what our chromosomal make-up is.’ Hmm.
Mr S looks forward to the day when Labour passes PR and we get to hear such Socratic musings in the House of Commons too.
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