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Fifteen months ago, while seven months pregnant with my first child, I received a message from a woman I had never met. She had been following an online discussion I had been having with a local politician. That message ultimately led me to join WRN Jersey. The subject of that discussion is one I have returned to many times over the last eighteen months, and one that I believe must continue to be raised. It concerns sex-based rights, safeguarding, and what I believe are unlawful policies that have been upheld by our government. In 2021, policy guidance titled Transgender Guidance for Schools was produced by CYPES (Children, Young People, Education and Skills) in Jersey. Since then, the guidance has expanded significantly, with the latest version published in March 2025. To summarise, this non-statutory guidance sets out how schools and educational settings in Jersey should support children who identify as transgender or non-binary, encouraging what it describes as a whole-school approach to inclusion. My concern is that the guidance not only encourages the teaching and acceptance of the idea that a child can be anything other than the sex they were born, but also that a child has the authority to dictate which pronouns they are referred to by, which toilets they wish to use, the uniform they wear, and which changing facilities they have access to. If this is not, at the very least, a questionable set of decisions approved by the CYPES ministerial team and our former Minister for Children and Families, then the fact that it appears to sit in conflict with the UK Supreme Court’s ruling on the definition of biological sex under the Equality Act 2010 should be. In my view, these policies raise profound questions about safeguarding, the rights of other children, and whether schools should be expected to affirm beliefs that conflict with biological reality. Whether Jersey’s guidance will ultimately withstand legal scrutiny remains to be seen, but I believe it reflects a broader ideological shift that deserves public debate. To understand why guidance such as this exists, I think it is necessary to understand the philosophy that increasingly influences many institutions across the Western world: postmodernism. Postmodernism is characterised by scepticism towards objective truth, universal reason and grand narratives. It proposes that reality is socially constructed by language, culture and power structures rather than existing independently of them. It is within this framework that ideas such as being “born in the wrong body”, or self-identification taking precedence over biological sex, become intellectually possible. To explain why I hold such a critical view of this philosophy, I need to tell a more personal story. In 2018, at the age of twenty-six, I admitted myself to Silkworth Lodge, an addiction treatment centre in St Helier, to begin treatment for alcoholism. I spent three months there receiving therapy and counselling for what had become a life-threatening illness. I am grateful to say that my rehabilitation was successful, and I am now approaching eight years of sobriety. Looking back, I don’t believe I recovered simply because I stopped drinking. I recovered because I gradually learned to stop running from reality. One of the most important lessons I took away with me was the difference between reality itself and the stories we tell ourselves in order to avoid discomfort. For years, I found endless explanations for why my life had become unmanageable. It was because I was a woman, I had grown up in a single-parent household, I had experienced sexual abuse, Society was unequal, and life just happened to be treating me unfairly. While some of those things were undeniably true and had shaped me profoundly, they were not the reason nor the excuse for why I continued to drink. The more I focused on external explanations for my unhappiness, the less responsibility I accepted for changing my own life. Recovery began only when I recognised that, however unfair my circumstances had been, I remained responsible for my own health and happiness in life. That experience fundamentally changed how I see the world. It is also why I believe postmodern thinking can be so attractive. If our personal interpretation of reality becomes more important than reality itself, then shared reality begins to give way to individual truth. Increasingly, people are encouraged to define themselves according to their internal feelings and self perception and expect institutions to affirm those identities, even where they conflict with observable reality. This is why I have concerns about transgender ideology as it is currently presented to children. In my view, it shares with postmodern philosophy the assumption that a self determined identity should take precedence over biological reality. I believe teaching children that reality is determined primarily by self-identification risks leaving them ill-equipped to navigate a world that ultimately does not bend to our feelings. We all have to learn, sooner or later, to live life on life’s terms. I chose to drink to escape having to accept reality as it was, and I was always going to lose. If we teach our children that their uncomfortable feelings can be fixed by adopting a false identity then they will lose too. The woman who contacted me fifteen months ago was a member of WRN (Women’s Rights Network) Jersey. She had followed my online discussions and reached out to thank me for speaking publicly about issues that many people felt unable to discuss openly. She invited me to join WRN Jersey, and I accepted without hesitation. WRN Jersey forms part of a wider international network that campaigns for sex-based rights, freedom of expression and the safeguarding of children. Whether people ultimately agree with WRN or not, these debates matter because they concern the kind of society we are creating for the next generation. I joined because I believe children deserve honesty, women deserve sex-based protections where they are necessary, and public policy should be rooted in objective reality rather than ideology.

Since our report on sex crimes in leisure centres was published in December 2025, WRN has documented seven court cases involving voyeurs using mixed-sex swimming pool changing villages to satisfy their revolting urge – they just keep happening with depressing regularity. There are too many victims of this avoidable abuse. And yet despite these convictions, despite the warnings, no-one will take responsibility for the changing room design that puts women and children at risk. In an update to our 2025 report, we present new data on sexual crimes in leisure centres and swimming pools across Northern Ireland provided by the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI). The Results Of a combined total of 13 sexual crimes (rape, sexual assault, voyeurism) in leisure centres in Northern Ireland in 2023, seven (54%) occurred in changing areas. All victims are female, all suspects are male. From the information provided, we also know that: Of the seven sexual crimes that occurred in changing areas, six (86%) took place in mixed-sex changing areas. Crucially, these figures for Northern Ireland closely align with data from police forces in Wales, where of 16 sexual offences recorded in a changing room in 2023, 14 (88%) occurred in a mixed-sex village changing room, and also correlates with The Sunday Times report that 120 of 134 complaints (90%) of sexual assaults / voyeurism in leisure centres and public swimming pools in 2017-18 occurred in mixed-sex facilities. Sexual crimes are not ‘one-off’ events Voyeurism reported at leisure complex. Northern Ireland has its fair share of swimming pool predators: a 2020 news report highlighting the police investigation of a voyeurism incident at Omagh Leisure Complex revealed that there had previously been 12 alleged incidents of sexual misconduct/voyeurism since it opened after re-development in July 2014, five of which involved a child under the age of 16. The re-development of this leisure centre included the installation of ‘Family Friendly Village Changing Rooms’ and has been the main source of complaints about alleged sexual misconduct out of all the main leisure facilities in Tyrone. What do the ‘authorities’ say? There really is no need to look any further for insight or evidence that mixed-sex changing villages are a bad idea. When asked, Sport England, Councils and architects can provide no evidence of Risk Assessments or Equality Impact Assessments; they are therefore culpable for the harms caused by inadequate changing facilities that lead to the harassment, intimidation and abuse of women and children. We have done the work. We have the statistics. We aren’t interested in finger-pointing or hand-waving - we want action. Women’s Rights Network Demands: Sport England immediately withdraws all guidance promoting mixed-sex wet-side facilities as the default option for new and refurbished leisure centres. New facilities provide single-sex changing facilities for swimming pool users. Councils conduct a risk assessment on safety for women and girls before rubber-stamping plans for changing areas in new or refurbished leisure centres. Crime prevention officers are consulted on all design plans, and their expertise is used to help ‘design out’ crime. Existing changing villages must be assessed for the risk of sex crimes and robust mitigation measures be applied together with consideration of cost-effective solutions ensuring a female-only space. The safest changing room is a single-sex changing room.

By Claire Loneragan Way back in 2010 the Home Office officially recognised Pagan police officers, and in the same year Hertfordshire police enhanced their Chaplaincy team to include Christians, Jews, Muslims, Pagans and Humanists. PC Andrew Pardy was then vice-chair of the Pagan Police Association. Fast forward to 2026 and the Police Pagan Association (I promise I’m not making this up) is just one of several officially sanctioned “diversity networks” allowing Inspector Andrew Pardy of Hertfordshire Constabulary (now calling himself “founding chair” of the PPA) to run this association as part of his day job. Can any officer be paid to set up a diversity network then. It seems not. The request for a police SEEN (Sex Equality and Equity Network) was turned down by the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) despite SEEN having been approved by numerous other organisations including the civil service. You have to feel sorry, though, for the practicing Heathen (which is how Andrew Pardy self-describes). Between the “radical right” appropriating Heathen and Pagan traditions and iconography, and men like Peter Petrauske and Jack Kemp abusing young girls as part of a witches’ coven in 1970s Cornwall, it’s understandable that a senior police officer would want to ameliorate the reputational damage to fellow Heathens and witches across the UK. To give him his due, Pardy is very open about the links he believes exist between Pagan groups and the far right, including fascists, white supremacists, Pagan militias, the manosphere, neo-Nazis, terrorists and antisemites. He has outlined a worrying and persistent connection between what look to be dangerous groups and the belief system he is promoting. What should we make of it? The NPCC, the Home office, and others appear to take Inspector Pardy’s self-declared expertise seriously. He says he has advised counter terrorism policing, the British Army, and more. But if the threat to public safety and national security is real then a staff diversity network sounds like a very odd way to address it. And if it is not, then the Police Pagan Association needs a lot more scrutiny. It’s all gone a bit Hot Fuzz. But Andrew Pardy’s concerns don’t end there. The Police Pagan Association has this year issued its very own Trans Inclusion Policy. For a document weighing in at more than 3,000 words it is remarkably light on substance, and mostly consists of repeated demands for respect, tolerance, and inclusion of “trans and non-binary” people. The PPA has no sex-based joining criteria, nor does it operate any real-world facilities. So the policy amounts to little more than handwringing about concern and anxiety resulting from the Supreme Court ruling in April 2025, and a requirement to use stated names and pronouns. The Trans Inclusion Policy strongly promotes respect for the law: This policy therefore sets out how the Police Pagan Association will continue to support trans inclusion within the current legal framework. It reflects our commitment to equality, dignity, and safety for all, and our determination to act in a way that is consistent with UK law, policing values, and the principles of mutual respect that underpin our communities. On the other hand, Inspector Pardy’s FaceBook page suggests that the law is an ass and needs to be changed. That it misrepresents the Equality Act 2010 and the Supreme Court ruling: The court’s decision means there are now multiple legal classes of ‘woman’ and ‘man’, each of which invites a different interpretation of the act: cis women, trans women with a GRC, trans women without a GRC, cis men, trans men with a GRC, trans men without a GRC. But inclusion, tolerance and coerced speech is not just a matter of principle for Inspector Pardy (he/him) because the intersection between PPA members and people who have opted out of the sex binary is personal. Meet Evie (Ethan) Pardy (they/them). We can’t know if Evie (Ethan) brought the concept of gender identity into the Pardy household, but they both seem to be heavily invested in anime and trans iconography, not all of which is entirely respectful of other people’s rights. And their father, (assuming Andrew is Evie’s father), for all his calls for respect and tolerance from everyone else, saw fit to change his FaceBook profile picture to this. (Does that “hammer” remind you of something completely different? Maybe it’s just me.) Inspector Pardy’s superiors should perhaps be keeping a closer eye on their police association chairs because it’s not just members of the public who can become radicalised. A self-aware Inspector Pardy, with his MA in Terrorism Security & Radical Right Extremism (from which he appears to have created his own accreditation), would know that extremism can take many forms. He might have asked himself whether a quote from Alok Vaid-Menon in the PPA Trans Inclusion Policy is entirely appropriate. His line manager might be interested in the answer too. Meet Alok Vaid-Menon. The man who infamously said: “There are no princesses. Little girls are also kinky. Your kids aren’t as straight and narrow as you think.” It’s surprisingly easy to undermine all that effort to sanitise the reputation of witches. Suddenly there’s barely a fag paper’s distance between Pagans, Trans Inclusion Policies and men like Peter Petrauske and Jack Kemp. If only Inspector Pardy had known someone who could have done a little detective work. It’s a baffling case. The same year that the Equality Act is passed, the police embrace Heathens and Pagans, and are now funding their support from the public purse. The most senior Heathen in the force has decided to use this public largesse to advocate against women who want to reclaim their sex-based rights. And Chief Constables continue to maintain the fiction that an extremely clear legal judgment is complex and nuanced. What on earth is going on?

By Natasha DuRose It's been hard to avoid articles and social media posts talking about "queer" people, "queerness" or "Queer Theory" in recent years, but it's even more difficult to find concise but neutral definitions for these terms. This article addresses that gap. Queer Theory is a set of ideas that developed in the 1990s to challenge established thinking about sex, gender and sexuality. It argues that the categories of male and female, man and woman, and heterosexual and homosexual, are not biological facts but ideas that society has created and made to seem natural over time. It sees these categories as fluid and changeable rather than fixed, which is what people mean when they say sex or gender is ‘socially constructed.’ Queer Theory argues that treating the male/female division and heterosexuality as the normal, default state of human life reflects the interests of some groups in society rather than a biological reality. It is worth knowing that Queer Theory deliberately avoids a single precise definition. Its leading thinkers argued that defining it would contradict its purpose, which is to break down fixed categories, meaning it can mean different things in different contexts. Queer Theory developed in American universities in the early 1990s, growing out of gay and lesbian studies and feminist theory. Its ideas were shaped primarily by two thinkers: the philosopher Judith Butler, who argued that gender is something people act out rather than something they are born as, and the French philosopher Michel Foucault, who argued that what societies call “normal” behaviour is a form of social control rather than a reflection of biology. These ideas can now be found across university subjects, schools and public policy. One key practical consequence of Queer Theory is the idea that biological sex and gender identity are equivalent. If gender is not biological but a matter of how a person feels, their inner sense of gender becomes as significant as their biological sex. This may be recognised as the basis for the claim that a person can be born in the wrong body. Queer Theory is not the same as support for gay and lesbian rights. An earlier tradition argued that gay people deserve equal treatment because their sexuality is something they are born with. Queer Theory rejected this, arguing that all identity categories, including man, woman, gay and lesbian, are social inventions rather than natural facts. Many gay and lesbian people disagree with Queer Theory for this reason, arguing that it does not reflect their experience. Queer Theory started in universities, but its ideas can be found in schools, teacher training, healthcare guidance and public policy. When parents encounter materials presenting the idea that children may question their gender identity, that sex is a spectrum, or that the categories of man and woman are simply social conventions, these ideas often have their roots in Queer Theory. These are contested ideas. Many parents and professionals who take a sex realist view argue that treating biological sex as a social invention has real consequences for the safeguarding of children, the protection of single-sex spaces, and women’s rights. Understanding the origins and contested nature of these ideas helps parents feel better informed about what their children are being taught and the policies their schools are following. This document draws on the following peer-reviewed and authoritative reference sources: Chandler, D. and Munday, R. (2011) A Dictionary of Media and Communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Britannica (2024) ‘Queer’, Encyclopaedia Britannica. Pickett, B. (2024) ‘Homosexuality’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. For readers wishing to explore the academic debate in more depth: Sullivan, A. and Todd, S. (eds.) (2023) Sex and Gender: A Contemporary Reader. London: Routledge. Note: this volume is written from a sex realist perspective. For further information Cass, H. (2024) Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People. NHS England. The most comprehensive independent review of the evidence for treatments for gender-questioning young people. Free to access. Department for Education (2025) Revised Statutory Guidance on Relationships, Sex and Health Education. London: DfE. The updated government guidance on what schools in England must teach. Free to access. Department for Education (2026) Gender Questioning Guidance within Keeping Children Safe in Education. London: DfE. Government guidance on how schools should handle gender-questioning children, including the protection of single-sex spaces. Free to access. Support for parents Ayad, S., Marchiano, L. and O’Malley, S. (2024) When Kids Say They’re Trans. Written by three experienced therapists, this book offers a careful, exploratory approach for parents navigating a child’s gender distress. Genspect: Support for Parents and Relatives. An international organisation offering support and information for parents of gender-questioning children. Wider Lens Podcast. Psychologically informed conversations on gender and young people. Useful for parents who prefer to listen rather than read. The following terms are used in everyday life and in schools and come directly out of Queer Theory. Understanding where they come from can help parents recognise when Queer Theory is influencing what their children are being taught. Term What it means Social construction The idea that something we think of as natural or fixed, such as the categories of man and woman, is actually created and maintained by society, culture and language rather than by biology. Heteronormativity The idea, embedded in laws, institutions and everyday life, that heterosexuality and the male/female division are the natural default for all human beings. Performativity Judith Butler's idea that gender is not something a person is born with but something they act out repeatedly through behaviour, dress and presentation, and that this repeated acting is what makes gender seem real and natural. Queer Theory uses this idea to argue that biological sex and gender identity are equivalent. Binary The division of people into two opposite categories, such as male/female or man/woman. Queer Theory argues that these divisions are not natural facts but invented social categories that can be questioned and changed. Normativity The way in which certain behaviours and identities come to be treated as normal and therefore preferable, while others are treated as outside the norm. Queering The act of applying Queer Theory's ideas to any area of life, education or culture to challenge what is considered normal. Parents may come across this in the context of “queering the curriculum” in schools. Sex realist The view that biological sex is real, binary and matters for law, policy and everyday life. Sex realists argue that the categories of male and female are biological facts, not social inventions. This is the position that Queer Theory directly challenges. This document is intended as an accessible introduction only.

Janice Moore, Coordinator of Women’s Rights Network Jersey Background Jersey is a self-governing British Crown Dependency with its own legislature, courts, and legal system. It drafts and passes its own laws, policies and guidance. Its current schools “Trans Inclusion Guidance”, in place since March 2025 (replacing the 2021 version) supports children’s social transition—sometimes without parental knowledge—and allows children of the opposite sex access to single-sex toilets, changing rooms and residential accommodation based on their gender identity. Women’s Rights Network Jersey and Stephanie Davies-Arai of Transgender Trend have been working together to overturn this guidance and to replace it with alternative guidance grounded in safeguarding. Stephanie visited Jersey in early 2025 for meetings with government and the public to raise concerns about the existing guidance. Following from this visit, Deputy Sir Philip Bailhache decided to act. He drafted a proposition to revoke the guidance and adopt alternative guidance written by Stephanie, based on safeguarding. After a briefing by Stephanie and discussion with politicians at the Jersey parliament in March this year, the proposal was debated in the States Assembly and ultimately defeated. Jersey has chosen the same activist pathway as England, although in the case of Jersey some public debate has happened. This is down to the tireless work of local parents and one brave Deputy. We wait to see if raising early awareness of the issues will have any impact on the future direction Jersey takes. Comment The proposition to revoke and replace the schools guidance was defeated a few weeks ago. Sadly, this was fairly inevitable. It is a topic most people avoid. For politicians, particularly in an election year, it is seen as too toxic to risk; it takes real political courage to put one's head above the parapet. Even some of the deputies who supported the proposition failed to vote in favour of it. Deputy Bailhache made two key points during the debate: Schools should not be affirming or supporting social transition. Deputies expressed outrage at this, defending the guidance for its supposedly inclusive, “be-kind” approach. Yet the proposed alternative closely follows England's new draft guidance (now heading into statutory form), and Guernsey has already adopted guidance that keeps gender identity out of schools. Research and evidence have moved on. Jersey is lagging behind — it's hubris to think CYPES can "do better" than England. The current guidance is unlawful. The UK Supreme Court ruling on 16 April 2025, ruled unanimously that the definition of "sex" in the Equality Act means biological sex. Consequently, access to single-sex facilities—toilets, changing rooms, and sports—must be based on biological sex, not gender identity. This ruling applies to Jersey. Top legal professionals confirmed this in the Jersey and Guernsey Law Review (June 2025). Jersey’s schools guidance is therefore breaking the law by basing access to single-sex facilities on gender identity. When boys who identify as girls are permitted to use girls-only facilities and residential accommodation, the law is being ignored. And girls are being put at risk, despite the government’s stated priorities to address Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG). Unlawful guidance cannot be allowed to stand. What will it take to have it struck down? The fear of lawsuits? A change in leadership? Or a slow return to common sense? Several points made by deputies in support of the current guidance are noteworthy. Chief Minister Lyndon Farnham said this is not happening in Jersey schools. But parents have contacted me with direct evidence that contradict this: A primary school where children under ten use whichever toilets they want, leading to girls regularly seeing boys’ genitals. A secondary school where these issues arise regularly and had been presently dealing with a request that a male student share residential accommodation with girls because he identified as one. Entire friendship groups, mostly girls, identifying as the opposite sex—sometimes with their parents' knowledge, and sometimes not. This is happening in Jersey, and it is being exacerbated by a lack of clarity and common sense in the official guidance. A number of deputies stood up to talk about prioritising “inclusion”. It is deeply concerning that none of them seem to appreciate that the inclusion of boys, however they may identify, in girls’ facilities and sports, often results in the exclusion of girls: girls will opt out of sport, they will avoid going to shared toilet and changing room facilities. Is girls’ inclusion less important? Deputy Louise Doublet suggested that groups questioning the guidance could be characterised as "hate groups." She later backtracked after being challenged, potentially to avoid legal concerns regarding her public statements. Claims that this is “hate” or "imported bigotry" is a convenient way to ignore local concerns. Every person who has reached out to me is from Jersey. Having lived here for twelve years and seen three children through the island's school system, I know this is a local issue—dismissing it as an outside influence is a convenient tactic to silence critics. Some deputies have asked why, if people are unhappy, they aren't writing in to say so. The truth is that some have taken the care and time to write, but they are largely ignored. Deputy Sam Mezec sent derisory and openly hostile responses to some who wrote, even when they requested "no response". For the majority, however, they remain silent because they are scared. They see what happens to those who speak up: some have lost jobs, careers, friends. Most face harassment in some form or another. I have been on the receiving end of abuse and threats right here in “be-kind” Jersey. When speaking up makes you the target of a torrent of abuse—including from elected officials—is it any wonder people are frightened? Just because Jersey’s politicians rejected this proposition does not mean they are on the right side of the argument, or that the public stands with them. It would be a mistake to underestimate the level of anger and frustration growing in Jersey. Especially in an election year.

By Cathy Larkman So you receive a call. It’s from the police. Your 14 year old daughter has been arrested. They think she has drugs on her and intend to strip search her. There is a social worker with her as an appropriate adult. Yes, all this is bad enough, but there’s more. She will be strip searched by two male police officers because your 14 year old daughter has been going through a phase where she ‘presents as a male’. This may seem like an unlikely scenario because the law clearly states that such searches must  be carried out by an officer of the same sex only. Unfortunately, it isn’t. It’s exactly what Merseyside police have put into practice. Ironically, they have done this following their own review into improving practices relating to child searches, following a previous traumatic child strip search that provoked public outrage. And they aren’t the only police force to do so either. Our police forces have lost sight of the law, and been overtaken by ideological fanatics. We expect the police to follow the law and protect us. We certainly don’t want them to abuse their powers, or to be influenced by ideology. We want our police officers to act impartially and professionally and ‘without fear or favour’. Young girls, who are growing up in a society with increasing numbers of predatory males targeting them, need to know that the police officers they may turn to will have these high standards. And police leaders always reassure us that they have. So why is the police force allowing our children to be strip searched by officers of the opposite sex? The use of searching is a necessary, but highly intrusive tactic used by police officers, both after arrest when a person is in custody, but also when a member of the public is suspected of carrying controlled drugs, weapons, or items used for criminal purposes. Searching might be needed in order to protect the person being searched, it can prevent crime, and it can stop other members of the public being exposed to wider harm too. Its use is carefully regulated under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, particularly so when it comes to strip searching, which necessitates the removal of clothing exposing intimate parts of the body. These searches must be completed out of public view and only in the presence of an officer of the same sex as the person searched. In the case of children, an ‘appropriate adult’ must be present too. The consequences of getting this wrong are devastating. In December 2020, a 15 year old girl, referred to as ‘Child Q’ was strip searched at her school by two police officers, when staff expressed their concerns and suspicions that she was carrying cannabis. This child, for a 15-year-old is indeed a child, had no appropriate adult present as is required by law, and was also menstruating.  She was made to remove her underwear and to bend over exposing her genital area. No drugs were found. The resulting outcry in 2022 later lead to the dismissal of the two Metropolitan police officers involved for gross misconduct. Child Q’s comments afterwards, released via her solicitors, cut to the very heart of the impact of this unlawful and undignified police overreach upon her; “ Someone walked into the school, where I was supposed to feel safe, took me away from the people who were supposed to protect me and stripped me naked, while on my period." “I can’t go a single day without wanting to scream, shout, cry or just give up. I don’t know if I’m going to feel normal again. But I do know this can’t happen to anyone, ever again". The understandable fury and concern arising from this led to a series of reviews by Dame Rachel de Souza, the Children’s Commissioner for England. [1] The Metropolitan police service, scorched by the criticism, rushed to review its child searching practices and to issue new guidance for officers. And of course, there were the usual platitudes of ‘lessons have been learnt’. But they weren’t the only force to do so. Merseyside police were found by Dame Rachel, to have carried out 150 strip-searches of children aged between eight and 17 years old from 2018 to mid-2022. And this force, under its Chief Constable Rob Carden also scrambled to carry out a review of its practices in light of the understandable national concern. So were the lessons actually being learnt? In February 2025, a representative of the Women’s Rights Network, made a request under the Freedom of Information Act to several police forces for “any internal work, research and evaluation regarding strip searching, carried out in response to the issues raised, and learning from, from the Child Q incident”. Responses quickly came in from all the forces involved, but Merseyside’s response [2] was odd to say the least, providing only the following short comment;  “ Merseyside Police, on receipt of the Children’s Commissioners recommendations following the review of the treatment of Child Q, instigated an independent review of our practises and are ensuring the recommendations and findings are implemented through an action plan. The action plan is waiting for approval and to be signed off by the Command Team ”. Further correspondence with them promised the action plan by April 2025 at the latest, but that didn’t transpire. And when challenged, the staff member providing the information denied that there was any internal material, other than the still withheld action plan, despite originally claiming that the force had carried out an ‘independent review’.  All correspondence chasing them up was then completely ignored. What were they hiding? Well, now we know. And we can guess why they were so reluctant to disclose it. After a successful appeal to the Information Commissioner’s Office and the issue of a compliance notice to the force, the action plan was eventually produced over a year later, along with an apology. The really shocking part of that action plan is recorded here: “All searches in custody are conducted by officers the same sex as the DP. This is documented on the CR and forms part of the SS review. Trans policy now in being to support this. In essence how the child is presenting and how they predominantly live their life is how they will be treated. Part transition is a case by case assessment”. (CR – Custody record, SS – Strip search, DP – detained person) Put simply, this means that Merseyside police will arrange for a male officer to strip your daughter naked and peer up her genital area, if she is ‘presenting’ as a boy, and is ‘living her life’ as a boy. The fact that she remains female no matter what clothes she wears, what hobbies she has, or what she calls herself, will make no difference to that. A parent may think they can stop all this as the required ‘appropriate adult’ of course, but what if social services are there in this function? Will they stop this abuse of power, and exploitation of a young girl’s confusion about her sense of ‘identity’? Or will they just go along with it? And the same applies to your son too. If he tells them he is living as a girl, he may be stripped by a female officer. Of course, all of this is an offensive nonsense. The police should not be applying highly contested adult ideologies to children, they should be protecting them instead. Protection means an officer of the same sex searching them, in a sensitive and professional manner, and only when absolutely necessary.  Protecting them means realising that a child cannot possibly consent to what is essentially an unlawful search and is therefore a sexual assault on them. Unfortunately, this is not the only time that the police have become somewhat giddy on gender ideology and imposed it on policies and practices, conveniently ignoring the law they are meant to uphold. In 2022, the Women’s Rights Network exposed a decision made by the police chiefs of forces across the UK to allow opposite sex strip searching in contravention of the law, and to criminalise any woman who dared object. Scores of WRN women wrote to their Chief Constables to object and this was written about in our report State Sanctioned Sexual Assault [3] . The decision was withdrawn by the National Police Chiefs Council in January 2024 after an embarrassing exposure in a Home Affairs Select Committee and the EHRC letting them know it was likely to be unlawful (as we had been telling them all along). But national police leaders then came back for another crack at it. In May 2025, they responded to the historic Supreme Court judgment made the previous month at the High Court in London, which clarified that sex was always biological sex, with their ‘Draft Interim Guidance on Searches of the Transgender Community’ [4] This document, known to have already been adopted by most police forces, allows members of the public to request to be searched by an officer of the opposite sex, if that officer consents to do so. By consenting of course, that officer would step outside of the current legislation protecting them. Bizarrely, that Interim Guidance also allows for the prospect of ‘half and half searching’ where a male prisoner, for instance, can ask for a male officer to search their bottom half and for a female officer to search their top half. And vice versa. And various combinations thereof. Perhaps the simplest example would be a so called ‘transgender woman’ who has retained his penis, wanting his bottom half to be searched by a male officer, but his top half with hormone induced ‘breasts’ to be searched by a female officer. Whatever the combination, it is a recipe for coercion and pressure on young officers, regardless of the pretensions of their senior leaders. It’s also a recipe for sexually predatory behaviour. This Interim Guidance makes no distinction between adults being searched, and children being searched, so applies to all age groups. Little wonder then, that Merseyside failed to consider the protection that children so clearly need, when national police leaders have also taken leave of their safeguarding senses and are allowing this. I am minded again of the words of Dame Rachel De Souza when it comes to strip searching. “Too often police are forgetting that children are children. The primary duty of the police, as with all other professionals, should be to safeguard them from harm [5] ”. Sadly it seems that children now need to be safeguarded from the police.   [1]   Strip search of children in England and Wales | Children's Commissioner for England [2]   Internal work and research on strip searching - a Freedom of Information request to Merseyside Police - WhatDoTheyKnow [3]   https://www.womensrights.network/_files/ugd/18f02a_e6a74d90ef174fb49f0a270e2734902e.pdf [4]   Police search guidance following Supreme Court decision [5]   Strip search of children in England and Wales | Children's Commissioner for England

By Charlotte Revely I was recently in an on-line discussion with a few hundred largely progressive left environmental campaigners and activists from across the world. Some of the UK cohort were celebrating the recent Green party win in Gorton and Denton. I shared my concerns about the Green Party with regard to their stance on women’s rights and pointed them to this excellent analysis by Paul Knaggs. https://labourheartlands.com/the-green-partys-war-on-reality/ After a bit of to and fro in the discussion, I was told that a feature of the trans debate is that both ends feel they can define womanhood on behalf of everyone, and impose that on everyone. What was required was a ‘pluralism of engagement’ that would accept that there are different people with different definitions of being a woman. The question becomes one of how we deliberate and listen together, and find a way of living forward.   I had a very strong reaction to this even though I knew it was written from a place of good intent. Fury would not be an exaggeration but I knew that wouldn’t help. There are many good people in this group and I am at least grateful that they are open to debate and haven’t silenced or cancelled me.   I responded with a thought experiment. I’ve expanded on my initial thoughts but I asked the question whether, in the scenario below, a pluralism of engagement should accept that different people have different definitions of being disabled?  Or would it be reasonable to protect the legal and social accommodations provided to enable wheelchair users to function in society for those with an inability to walk?   If the latter, why are the legal accommodations for women not equally worthy of protection? To date I’ve had no response.   A Thought Experiment on Disability   Let’s take a specific disabled category of wheelchair user. Imagine you are someone unable to walk who needs a wheelchair, an adapted vehicle and accommodation to enable you to participate in society. You get a special parking permit and your employer ensures your workplace is accessible and gives you time off for essential medical appointments.   Let’s say there is another category of people who have fully functioning legs but identify as disabled. They feel their healthy bodies are wrong and they long to be wheelchair users. Let’s call them transdisabled.   The transdisabled group declare they are no different to you. ‘Transdisabled people are disabled’ becomes the new mantra. Politicians across the spectrum start repeating it with monotonous regularity when asked about the impact on things like escalating levels of disability benefits. Students chant it at demos, schoolchildren are taught it as a basic truth. You feel a bit confused but get on with your life. You write a novel and enter a competition specifically for disabled writers only to find that the winner is someone transdisabled. They write about the hardships of their life as a disabled person, and how much tougher it is for them than for ‘cis’ disabled people because people accuse them of faking it. The Equalities Minister says in a TV interview that it is offensive to say transdisabled people are not disabled. No-one would ever pretend to be disabled for nefarious purposes. You turn on the radio to hear that crimes committed by disabled people are soaring, suddenly wheelchair users are committing serious sex crimes and even murders at percentages much higher than previous years. The presenter is puzzled, what possible explanation could there be for this? When the Paralympic medals are handed out, many of the gold medallists turn out to have functioning legs and run a victory lap around the stadium. When disabled people and others protest they are told not to be so hateful. Disability can be fluid. You get thrown off Facebook for using the term ‘able bodied.’ This is now classified as hate speech if referring to transdisabled people. Your local council gives out disability parking permits to anyone who identifies as disabled. The International Olympic Committee says that possession of a disability parking permit is now the qualifying criteria for the Paralympics. The Government Statistical Service decides it is transdisphobic to differentiate between disabled and transdisabled so government data on disability becomes meaningless. The NHS announces new data saying that there has been an increase in the number of wheelchair users but celebrates that there have been significantly improved health outcomes for disabled people as a result of far fewer co-morbidities within that category. The disability pay gap closes as more employees at senior level choose to identify as disabled. Some transdisabled people decide it is not enough to simply use a wheelchair, they insist the NHS should remove or surgically damage their functional limbs. The NHS sets up a series of clinics to perform such surgeries. There is a sudden increase of children who identify as transdisabled. NHS policy is that they should be affirmed and given drugs to stop their bones forming properly to ensure they will grow into disabled adults. No data is kept on the long term impact of this. Parents who resist their children being given these drugs have their children taken into care. When disabled people decide they’ve had enough of this and start protesting about able bodied people trampling on their rights, they are accused of being far right or fascist. They are labelled Trans Exclusionary Radically Disabled or TERDs. Transdisabled people and their allies start carrying signs saying things like ‘Decapitate TERDs’ and ‘The only good TERD is a dead one.’ Speakers at Transdisabled Pride, attended by thousands, tell the crowd that if they see a TERD they should punch them in the f**king face. Politicians and commentators wring their hands about the toxicity on both sides. You seek help from your Disability Rights group only to find your membership terminated because of your hateful views. You look elsewhere and find that only disability organisations that support the transdisabled community are given public funding. A plethora of transdisability charities and lobby groups are set up across the world. It is lauded as the new frontier in disability rights. A charity called Walking Wounded is established for those who identify as transdisabled but don’t want to use a wheelchair because it is inconvenient when going about their daily lives. You find other disabled people who feel as angry as you and join a voluntary network with no funding. You spend your evenings and weekends writing, talking, organising events, lobbying politicians, raising FOI requests, poring over policy documents, reading in depth consultations. Your contributions are unwelcome or ignored by politicians and you have to keep your involvement secret from your employer. A disabled person is sacked from their job at a disability support charity for saying that the transdisabled movement is actively harming disabled people.’ You donate to her legal costs. She loses. You get arrested and held in a police cell for 12 hours because you put stickers on a lamp post saying ‘No such thing as transdisabled’ and ‘Wheelz not Feelz.’ The police release you and send you home in your wheelchair alone at 3am. You rely on social media for information because the mainstream media channels do not report on the issue and when they do it is generally hostile to the ‘TERDs’. You realise the general public are largely unaware of what has been happening to disability rights so you organise street stalls and protests. Transdisabled people and their allies like Antifa turn up to silence you. They drown out disabled voices and sometimes even assault them. The police say there is nothing to be done and politicians wring their hands again about the toxicity on both sides. You watch aghast on a livestream as a brave disability rights activist travels the world talking about this global social contagion. She is violently attacked, tipped out of her wheelchair and almost crushed underfoot in New Zealand. Antipodean politicians call her a Nazi. Your neighbour’s child starts identifying as transdisabled and demands surgery to remove her legs. The NHS won’t provide this surgery for those under eighteen but a private doctor in Spain agrees to go ahead on her 16th birthday. Her parents are interviewed about their journey by Lorraine on national TV and an award winning TV drama called Salamander is made about the difficulties she faced in her quest to be her true self. Libraries are full of books about transdisability for children with advice on different types of limb surgery and growth blocking drugs. Schools start encouraging children to consider whether or not they might be transdisabled. They are taught that they are probably transdisabled if they’ve ever felt any discomfort about their bodies, if they enjoy being on wheels such as cycling, skateboarding or go karting, or if they have ever thought about skiving off PE. There is a 3000% increase in the number of children identifying as transdisabled. Following concerns about the impact of NHS interventions, a medical trial is set up to see if children who are given drugs to stunt their bone growth are happier than those who are not. The CEO of the Walking Wounded charity is appointed as Disability Tsar by the government. Welfare spending on disability benefits and support more than trebles. The government cuts back on health spending saying that hip and knee replacements are transdisphobic interventions and no longer necessary. You give as much as you can afford to a group taking the government to court to protect disability rights. Disabled people raise millions in crowdfunding despite being one of the most economically disadvantaged demographics in society. You celebrate when, after many years of legal wrangling, the Supreme Court says that it makes no sense for able bodied people to claim disability rights and that it is perfectly lawful to refer to transdisabled people as able bodied and healthy. The government, and most of the opposition parties, ignore the Supreme Court ruling and bemoan the impact of the judgment on the transdisabled community. The government proposes to shut down selected social media sites, including X, for spreading hate speech on transdisability and votes through an amendment to the Equality Act to include a new protected characteristic of Disability Reassignment. You are still unable to walk.   This is not an entirely imaginary scenario. The charity Inclusion Scotland  facilitates internship opportunities specifically for disabled people, often using the phrase "self-define" to encourage applicants who might not have a formal diagnosis but experience barriers.  Is transdisability going to become the new frontier in trans rights?   Here is a notable example of a man who identifies as a disabled woman. https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/23101806.issue-day-able-bodied-norwegian-identifies-disabled-woman/   If there is a sexual component involved e.g an amputation fetish it is known as apotemnophilia.There have been numerous cases in the press of people (usually men) practising self amputation so strong is their desire. Here are some fairly recent examples. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yvpx20le2o https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/12/man-disability-benefits-leg-amputated-court-marius-gustavson-eunuch-maker   Everything imagined here for disabled wheelchair users has a direct parallel with what women and children have experienced. However this doesn’t even touch on issues like privacy and dignity in single sex spaces and services. The cruel and unusual punishment of housing violent sex offenders and murderers with vulnerable women or forcing women to undress in front of male colleagues as a condition of employment. It doesn’t cover the impact on children of trans parents, the hell endured by so many transwidows or the shock of seeing BBC News informing the nation that the galactorrhea produced by male lactation fetishists is even better for babies than their mother’s breastmilk. Although it touches on compelled speech it doesn’t go as far as the reality of women being forced to refer to their male attackers or rapists as she/her in court. We are living through insane times and must never ever lose sight of just quite how insane this ideology is.

By Claire Loneragan Wednesday 18 February 2026 and I'm getting ready before dawn to go to the final regional consultation in Bristol organised by the Women's Resource Centre which describes itself as the umbrella organisation for the women's sector. It's hard to be sure about the governance and funding for the WRC, but their intent is clear. They aim to be the voice of women's voluntary sector and community organisations, taking our observations and issues to funders and decision makers . This series of consultations is being run by WRC so that they can deliver their CEDAW shadow report  which is used to measure the UK Government's progress on implementing CEDAW. It's a pretty big deal. I'd noticed that for the Bristol consultation, WRC are working with Bristol Women's Voice, an organisation that opens its membership to all who self-identify as women . Although the session doesn't kick off until 10:30, it's an early start for me because Bristol is a two-hour drive away and I just know parking will be a pain. It's not how I want to spend my day, but we can hardly complain that taxpayers' money is being spent on the wrong things if we don't engage with the organisations that are funded by and/or have the opportunity to influence the government. As a Director of Women's Rights Network and lead coordinator of the Somerset and Dorset group, I have gathered up the evidence of what matters to our women both nationally and locally. We have been asked for anecdotal evidence, but WRN have gathered a lot of hard facts too and published reports  on sexual assaults in hospitals and in leisure centres, as well as some of the discrimination women are subject to by the police. I park in Cabot Circus shoppers' car park and walk 17 minutes (according to Google maps) to the Malcolm X Community Centre where the consultation is to be held. In the St Paul's area of Bristol, the community centre is cold and in serious need of redecoration. Chairs and tables are arranged in a rather-too-big room with dreadful acoustics, but I see a few friendly faces and make myself a cup of tea. A teabag in a paper cup. Using one of the 5 teaspoons provided for all the attendees to share but without any means of cleaning between uses. Nice. The 20 or so attendees spread ourselves around the tables and jump with alarm when the fire door slams, which it does every time someone comes back from the toilet. I check them out before we start – clean, but only three of the four cubicles have a working lock, and I use the last of the paper hand towels. There is no hot water. I remind myself that this is one of just six consultation events on behalf of the UK women's sector and intended to surface all the issues for Wales and the West of England. This consultation will inform the UN assessment of the UK government's implementation of CEDAW. It's important. The facilitator calls for our attention and we are warned to use respectful language before watching a three-minute animation purporting to explain CEDAW . It suggests the UN will fix everything if we tell them what's going wrong and say "CEDAW" a lot. We introduce ourselves and find that a lot of different organisations are represented – including Women's Rights Network, LGB Alliance, Children of Transitioners, Women's Aid, Feminists Against Antisemitism, SARSAS and, of course, Bristol Women's Voice. The atmosphere is flat, and the organisers unenthusiastic. The vibe is not improved when the woman from Children of Transitioners explains how Bristol Women's Voice had dismissed concerns raised months ago about the complete lack of single-sex rape crisis provision in Bristol. She's clearly very upset by this and shares her paperwork with the WRC facilitator. Then the work starts in earnest although it's by no means clear what the expected output is from each table. We have a pile of post-its that are "for later" and we're asked to write our local issues on small white rectangles of paper. After 30 minutes of discussion, each table reads out a few of the notes we have made and the facilitator records two or three comments from each table on her phone. The white rectangles of paper are set aside and not referred to again. Despite everything, there are a lot of excellent points, including the struggles women face in rural areas with poor and expensive transport, the cost of childcare, that shocking lack of ANY single-sex rape crisis provision in Bristol (the nearest is London), council run leisure centres converting to mixed-sex changing villages, and the need to help women – particularly in rural areas – to escape prostitution by criminalising the men who buy sex rather than exploited women. I talk briefly about the WRN reports and where to find them, but there's no interest in our findings, and no curiosity to follow up. Which is a shame because Women's Rights Network are properly grassroots and entirely voluntary. Our research is done in our own time, and the subject of our research is determined by our members, not by a government think-tank sponsored to deliver pet projects. We are entirely focussed on what ordinary women care about, and the discrimination ordinary women experience. Which is what I understood to be the purpose of this consultation. One woman asks if it’s realistic to expect a government to fully implement CEDAW – which is ratified by the UK but not incorporated into UK law – when that same government won't even implement the Supreme Court ruling on the meaning of sex in the Equality Act. She gets a round of applause from most of the attendees, and scowls from the rest. We have a tea break. Another paper cup but no clean teaspoons now. The two packs of biscuits that were provided are mostly eaten but I brought my own anyway. Smart move. The second session is intended to link the local to the national issues, but there's no clarity as to how, or the appropriate level of detail. Being resourceful women, we do our best to identify national policy issues including the lack of appropriate accountability and the lack of any ombudsman so that complaints can be recorded and assessed. We note that the Public Sector Equality Duty is rarely adhered to and that nobody seems to understand what Equality Impact Assessments are for or how to write them. The facilitator sits at our table as we discuss accountability and she puts forward the proposition that the main problem is that the commissioning system for services is too onerous for small organisations, whilst private companies such as those that run children's homes are largely unregulated. We discuss the idea that better regulation and reporting of outcomes would be a solution, but she insists that tearing down the whole commissioning process and starting from scratch is the only solution. And something about capitalism being a problem. At the end of session readout the facilitator records a couple of key thoughts from each table on her phone. The feedback from our table is that that the whole commissioning system needs reforming. Which is a surprise. The phone recording feedback moves on before anything else can be added. As a thank you for our time we were promised lunch but it's already lunch time and there's no hint of food. Not much of a thank you either. After a few minutes milling around I decide I'm not hungry enough to wait – I'd brought my own biscuits, after all. On my way out I hear one of the organisers from Bristol Women's Voice talking to caterers about the lack of lunch. She seems resigned to the fact that there won't be any. Which pretty well sums up the day for me. I feel like I've been played. And I'd like to know what the post-its were for.

By Georgia Testa After the Supreme Court ruling, we all expected that the only work left to be done on single sex spaces and services was to be watchful. The sunny uplands were here. We had won! Councils and all organisations would now fall in line, obey the law and start implementing the ruling. In the case of Councils, at least, why wouldn’t they? They are public bodies. But, as we all know, we were wrong. The story from Leeds is not unique, unfortunately. Leeds WRN wrote to Leeds City Council in August 2025, requesting confirmation that they were amending their policies and services to comply with the law, and received a brush off - yes, they were aware of the ruling, were continuing to follow the law, but were awaiting the updated Code of Practice. Let’s leave aside the condescending comment ‘we are aware of the law’, and the frankly inaccurate statement they continue to follow the law, inaccurate because they knew they would need to amend at least some of their services and practices in order to comply with the law. Let’s focus on their need to wait for an updated Code of Practice. They thought it was their trump card. Leeds WRN replied to point out that the EHRC’s position was that: "Employers and other duty-bearers must follow the law and should take appropriate specialist legal advice where necessary." And asked them to provide details of the review they were undertaking. And then…silence. So, in January this year, we were given permission for a deputation to the Council. We reminded them that the “ Prime Minister confirmed that the law must be upheld, and the EHRC had reminded public bodies that duty-bearers must follow the law. Waiting for a new code is not a lawful position .” We expected heckling or people walking out, as had happened with other Councils. Instead, we had a minority who gave us a standing ovation. I was there. I delivered the deputation speech. And I had hope. But we know what hope does! Their response came in February, and it was the same as their response to us in 2025. We are aware of the ruling, we continue to comply with the law, we are awaiting the updated Code of Practice. So, pointing out, again, that waiting was not a lawful position, had no effect. I was deflated. It hurts when you bang your head against a wall. But then I listened to Akua Reindorf who was the guest on the weekly WRN zoom. And I got angry and motivated. And I wrote a letter. It’s measured but doesn’t pull any punches. There are professional ways of saying - stop fannying around! And Bridget Phillipson came to our rescue by stating on Sky TV that organisations didn't have to wait for the updated Code of Practice and that the Supreme Court ruling was crystal clear  - who’d have thought it? Read the letter here . Will the letter have the effect of changing their position? Probably not, immediately. They are digging their heels in. But it’s part of a chipping away that will eventually bear fruit. They must know that we won’t give up. If other local groups send something similar to their Councils, it will add to that cumulative effect. Let’s do it! After all, our unlikely ‘saviour’ Bridget Phillipson has said that waiting is not an option. Let’s stamp all over their trump card.

We’ve had a recent issue here in Wales. By Cathy Larkman We happen to think that women fleeing domestic violence, who are accessing a service that they believe will consist of female workers only, should not be gaslit. That they should feel safe and secure that when they are told that a woman will support them. That their case worker will be an actual woman.  That they should not be confronted with a man pretending to be a woman. But that is exactly what has been allowed to happen here. We think that is unlawful, immoral and a betrayal of vulnerable women. Domestic abuse charities do great work. They were, after all, originally established by the hard work and dedication of grassroots women who had themselves experienced or witnessed domestic violence. They knew from bitter experience what was needed – supportive services for traumatised women to escape violent, abusive relationships and to rebuild their lives, and those of their children. They also knew how important it was that traumatised women were supported by fellow women, and that a woman-only service could be assured. As these services have developed from grassroots organisations (funded by women out of their own pockets, in their front rooms and in broom cupboards in the students’ unions) into funded organisations with CEOs at the helm and multiple employees on the payroll, that dynamic has remained constant. Traumatised women need the support of other women. Inflicting men on them at such a time is unthinkable and cruel. To ensure this horror doesn’t happen, Schedule 9, Part 1 of the Equality Act 2010 helps out such organisations applying for staff with an occupational requirement exception, which permits such jobs to be applicable for women only. Otherwise, job applications for sensitive roles like this would be open to men too who could sue for discrimination if prohibited from applying or taking up these roles. Schedule 9 Part 1 is explicit in stating that there is no ‘get around’ this exception by virtue of being transgender. This makes good sense for domestic abuse organisations because the statistics in terms of which sex are primarily the victims of domestic violence, and the sex that are primarily the perpetrators, are overwhelming. Victims are mainly female , perpetrators are mainly male. Welsh Women’s Aid acknowledge this fact : “The ONS 2020 reports that in year ending March 2020 that 92% of defendants in domestic abuse related prosecutions were male. Further evidence from the Crown Prosecution Service shows the disproportionately gendered nature of these crimes.” So earlier this week, when we were alerted by a deeply concerned former domestic abuse support worker of an email she had received from the Indeed jobs recruitment site, encouraging her to apply for one of three ‘Road to Recovery Project Worker’ roles that cited Schedule 9, Part 1 incorrectly, we felt we had to look into it. The advert had been placed by Carmarthenshire Domestic Abuse Services, who are in partnership with West Wales Domestic Abuse Services. The relevant section of the advert is below. Spot the very obvious problem. Yes. They are including men. Despite the fact that they were citing Schedule 9, Part 1, they were including men ‘with lived experience of being a woman’. What does that mean exactly? Calling oneself Daphne? Wearing a dress? Getting paid less? Doing the majority of the housework? We could picture job applications going in with a rapidly approaching deadline, and the said ‘Daphne’ being recruited with all his ‘lived experience’ and being allocated to a vulnerable abused woman. Not acceptable. We were also having flashbacks to the Edinburgh Rape Crisis fiasco of Mridul Wadhwa, a man who was Chief Executive there who talked of raped women ‘reframing their trauma’ when confronted with a man pretending to be a woman . A long exchange of letters was not an option. So we immediately gave this public exposure via a short, polite and to the point X post thread , tagging in the WWDAS CEO. We pointed out the unacceptability of the advert and that the exemption cited is the reason for excluding ALL men. Perhaps we were a little optimistic in expecting a professional response along the lines of ‘This is an error and will be rectified forthwith. Thank you for bringing it to my attention’. Ahem. Instead, we were met with a flurry of responses from the CEO starting with – you are so wrong, you don’t understand the oppression of women, you aren’t ‘truly feminist’ and then morphed into – it’s not us anyway, that advert was placed by our partners. We were also told we weren’t being ‘kind’. Where have we heard that before? We asked many times if she thought men pretending to be women should be allowed to apply for these jobs, but perhaps she missed these questions, as she certainly didn’t answer them. Then eventually (at our own suggestion), she appeared to very grudgingly take on board the need to look into the advert the next morning and potentially correct it. Phew! The next morning brought corrected adverts (yippee! Well, there is one that hasn’t been corrected yet, but we’re on it). And a tweet from the CEO saying that " conversations have been had in a very thoughtful and kind way and the highlighted issue has been looked at and has been changed. Thank you to those who pointed out this mistake. " Gosh, that’s better, isn’t it? Although we were still being tone policed. But we all know about the Bananarama thing, don’t we? It’s not what we said, it’s the way that we said it. (This is not WRN Wales) This brief but heightened exchange took place against a background of total ideological capture in Wales at the very highest levels of government. The Welsh Government have still not made changes to any policies in light of the Supreme Court judgment and claim to be ‘waiting’ for the EHRC.  In the meantime, their own policies continue to piously state their belief that TWAW. And of course, they provide vital funding to the very domestic violence organisations needed to support abused women. So it should come as no surprise at all when these very organisations parrot the same ideological nonsense of ‘lived experience of being a woman’. Their funding likely depends on it. These local domestic abuse services come under the umbrella of Welsh Women’s Aid, who are funded by Welsh Government, but whose policies and statements on their website are unclear and contradictory at best. We have, of course, tried to clear this confusion up with them, writing to them (along with our fellow Welsh women’s group, Merched Cymru) in May 2025. Despite addressing the letter to the CEO, we have received no reply. Funny that.   Read the full letter here. Our concern is not just a precautionary one. Take a look at this statement by Welsh Women’s Aid in October 2023 . “This is not the time to stand back and be silent. We stand with all women and all victims and survivors of violence. We are inclusionary and when we discuss ending violence against women, we inherently include transwomen.”  It was good to win this particular battle and to make sure women escaping domestic violence in Carmarthenshire and West Wales won’t be further traumatised and gaslit. BUT. We will be checking each and every domestic violence service in Wales. Expect those still betraying the women they serve, and the women who worked so hard to set them up, to be called to account. Hopefully with a little less CEO drama.

Millions of women and children will be heading to swimming pools and leisure centres over the summer blissfully unaware of the dangers they face from sexual predators seeking victims in mixed-sex changing rooms. The trend towards so-called ‘family-friendly’ mixed changing rooms has put women and children (mainly girls) at serious risk of sexual assault and voyeurism. We know mixed-sex changing facilities are high-risk. In a 2018 FOI investigation  there were 134 complaints of sexual misconduct in sports centres and swimming pools in the UK, 120 (nearly 90%) occurred in mixed facilities. In January 2025 Swim England held an emergency safeguarding meeting. Cases of voyeurism and using mobile phones to photograph women and girls changing at swim competitions had DOUBLED.   The WRN Leisure Centre Report 2024  published in 2024 found that one-third of council swimming pools have only mixed-sex changing areas for swimmers , providing easy hunting grounds for predatory males seeking access to women and children. In 2025, WRN published a further report  that outlines police data on sexual violence in leisure centres. Figures reveal that in one year (2023) there were 16 rapes, 80 sexual assaults and 65 acts of voyeurism across 257 leisure centres in England and Wales. The Sports Councils (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland) recommend mixed-sex changing villages as a ‘cost-effective’ solution for swim changing without any thought to SAFEGUARDING. We know mixed-sex changing facilities are high-risk. We call on sports and leisure providers to make SAFEGUARDING the No.1 priority when building and refurbishing leisure facilities: The safest changing room is a single-sex changing room. The Red Flag Campaign  The WRN Summer Sport Campaign 2025 focuses on the risks to millions of women and children from using public swimming pools and leisure facilities. A street action and social media campaign. The red flag is the symbol for the campaign as it signifies a serious SAFEGUARDING risk and a failure to PROTECT women and children from harm. What you can do Contact your local council if you are concerned about using mixed-sex changing rooms. If a leisure facility in your town is being built or refurbished make your views known – consultations seldom ask for the public’s views on changing facilities but every consultation should. If you’re not happy speak to your local councillor or MP – they are there to serve you. Write to us and tell us what’s happening in your areas. Contact sports@womensrights.network The safest changing room is a single-sex changing room.

By Anonymous WRN member and journalist based in Afghanistan Last year, Sodaba, a 16‑year‑old girl, was forced into marriage with a Taliban commander as his third wife. Long before this marriage, while she was still in sixth grade, the commander had seen her on her way to school. Struck by her youth and beauty, he used his power to pursue her relentlessly until he secured the marriage.   Since the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, women and girls have endured systematic violence and suffocating repression, an unbearable environment that leaves them with no room to breathe. Within this climate, Taliban commanders have wielded authority to impose coercive marriages and polygamy, turning power into a weapon against women’s dignity and freedom.   Sodaba’s father had died long before, leaving her in the care of her mother. The commander promised her mother a large dowry, claiming it would bring them a better life. But he never paid a single coin. Instead, Sodaba’s new life became a prison, trapped with two older wives who subjected her to constant pressure, endless cooking and cleaning, and brutal violence. Whenever she resisted or voiced a complaint, she was beaten mercilessly.   Desperate, Sodaba tried several times to escape to her mother. Each time, the commander accused her mother of helping her flee. Eventually, he arrested her mother and threw her into prison.   The last time Sodaba was beaten so severely that her arm was broken, she fled again. With nowhere safe to go, she sought refuge in the home of a neighbourhood elder. The commander tracked her down and demanded she return. But Sodaba refused. She repeated only one sentence:   “Anywhere else I will go. But if I go back there, I will kill myself.”   She doesn’t have any family or relatives to escape and stay with them and when no safe house and shelter could be found for her, Sodaba was sent to prison, forced to share a cell with her mother, punished simply for seeking freedom.     The collapse of Afghanistan’s former government in 2021 was not only the collapse of a state, it was the collapse of human rights, justice, freedom, equality, and every basic protection for women. When the Taliban replaced the Ministry of Women’s Affairs with the so‑called Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, everything for women was destroyed. Their voices were silenced, their mobility locked inside their homes, and their defenders erased. With no independent human rights institutions, no women’s rights organisations, no shelters or safe houses, prison has become the only option for countless innocent women.   Sodaba, a child bride, is a victim of forced marriage. Her case exemplifies the widespread practice of child marriage under Taliban rule, an act that directly violates international conventions, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).   Her repeated beatings and coercion constitute grave violations of women’s rights under CEDAW (the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women). And her imprisonment alongside her mother underscores the reality of arbitrary detention, where women are punished simply for resisting violence and seeking freedom.   As long as women and girls like Sodaba continue to suffer, all the legal terms - gender apartheid, gender persecution, international conventions - remain nothing more than words. They fail to capture the true severity of the crisis and, more importantly, they do not save or protect the lives of women and girls.   Must Sodaba, and countless others like her, die before the world acts? How many more women must be sacrificed before the international community admits that this situation is not only severe but demands urgent, concrete, and real action?