WOMEN'S RIGHTS NETWORK
STATEMENTS AND LETTERS
The Women’s Rights Network Northern Ireland (WRN NI) submission to the Committee for Education on Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) in Northern Ireland.
Press release
Submission
The Women’s Rights Network Northern Ireland (WRN NI) gave evidence to The Executive Office Committee on the Inquiry into Gaps in Equality Legislation.
WRN NI Submission:
Press Release:
Opening Statement:
Manchester City Council (MCC) passed a motion/resolution with the title, ‘Trans Rights Are Human Rights’, declaring that ‘trans men are men, trans women are women, non-binary people are non-binary and trans rights are human rights’. Akua Reindorf KC concludes that MCC did not comply with the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED) in applying this motion to Council policies and services and is therefore at risk of acting unlawfully. Her advice is available to download below, along with other relevant documents.
See our blog post for full details: A Captured Council
WRN statement on motions calling for the de-criminalisation of the sex trade:
WRN letter to Annette Mansell-Green Chair, Women’s TUC Committee
26 January 2025:
Read about Prostitution and Its Impact on Women in a blog post by Nordic Model Now.
Call to Action:
Write to the TUC email info@tuc.org.uk and get these awful motions off the table!
WRN wrote a thread on this on X which is copied below for those not on X.
WRN has been alerted by several of our members to two draft motions intended to go to the TUC Women’s Conference in March, calling for the complete decriminalisation of the sex trade. Although the exact wording is not yet public, we understand that this means that ALL aspects of the industry would be legalised – pimping, brothels, advertising, trafficking. No age limits are specified.
The two unions calling for this motion to go through are the @GMB_union and @ASLEFunion. The GMB is of course the union described by a former regional president as “riddled with misogyny”. ASLEF is the union in which only 6.5% of train drivers are women. It seems no coincidence that these are the unions to call for legalisation of sexual exploitation of women.
Prostitution is exploitation of women by men. It is men using (usually young) women as objects, for their own pleasure, demanding that whatever they want be provided, regardless of how unpleasant, degrading or harmful that is for the woman. Please see our blog Prostitution and it’s impact on women.
In the context of public concern about the systematic exploitation of young girls by rape gangs, and of the horrific story of Gisele Pelicot, raped by large numbers of her neighbours, it is astonishing that these unions are making this call and, to add to the insult, to the Women’s Committee. This motion is in direct opposition to their stated aims of ending ‘gender based violence.’
For an insight into the reality of the legalised sex trade have a look at some of the customer reviews from German punters collated by @EllyArrow. These are extremely disturbing and you’ll need a strong stomach to read them all.
We know from experience of failed projects like the ‘Managed zone for prostitution’ in Leeds that decriminalising prostitution leads to all women and girls being more unsafe.
WRN considers that these draft motions conflict fundamentally with the TUC’s core values, its position on male violence against women, on modern slavery and on sexual harassment.
Decriminalising prostitution does nothing to help women escape poverty and exploitation which ought to be the fundamental goals of the trade union movement.
Julie Bindel @bindelj, a lifelong campaigner on the left against prostitution, spells out the dangers of decriminalisation in this article and, oh look, it’s the GMB again, back in 2002 pushing the notion that so called ‘sex work’ is just like any other employment.
If our TU brethren won’t listen to the voices of women perhaps they’ll listen to a former Detective Superintendent, Alan Caton, who investigated the murders of five women in Ipswich.
We are writing to the Women’s Committee to ask for the draft motions to be held inadmissible on this basis, our members are doing the same and we call on all union members to do everything possible to oppose them. Please email info@tuc.org.uk to let them know how women feel about this betrayal.
These motions are about men’s wants, not women’s safety. They must be struck out.
Finally, we’d like @The_TUC, @ASLEFunion and @GMB_union, to consider this from Rachel Moran @RachelRMoran, a sex trade survivor and campaigner, who said:
WRN letter to Care Inspectorate Scotland setting out concerns about the ‘Guidance for children and young people’s services on the inclusion of transgender including non-binary young people’ published by the Care Inspectorate in May 2023.
A statement from WRN addressing attempts to normalise male 'breastfeeding':
Read our blog post on Reflux Mum and the Fetish Feeder.
WRN welcomes new human rights guidance which protects single-sex spaces. Read our press release:
WRN statement on girls being placed in mixed sex facilities:
Read about the unannounced inspection of HM Young Offender Institution Wetherby in our blog post.
The WRN has taken part in a consultation by the press regulator IPSO to update its guidance on reporting of transgender issues Gender Identity Ideology.
Learn more about the WRN’s position and what to do if you think a media outlet has got its coverage wrong.
If you are a working journalist and have a media inquiry, please email our Press Team.
You can read our submission here:
IPSO Update Most newspapers and magazines in the UK are members of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) and follow its Editors’ Code and guidance for editors and journalists. New guidance on reporting transgender issues is about to be published. The current guidance was written in 2016 and is not fit for purpose — as headlines such as ‘Woman exposes penis…” and reporters being directed to call rapists women have shown. Last year, Dr Amy Binns and Sophie Arnold — lecturers in journalism at the University of Central Lancashire — published a paper looking at court reporting specifically. This detailed problems with the current guidelines and proposed remedies. The paper was withdrawn from the university’s website after complaints that it was ‘transphobic’, but you can read it in full here. The WRN was one of a number of groups the UCLan researchers invited to make a submission, which you can read in full here. We were subsequently contacted by IPSO — which regulates most of the newspapers and magazines in the UK — to take part in its consultation to update its guidance on transgender reporting to editors and journalists. You can read our submission by downloading the document above. IPSO’s guidance is due now.
Headline and Image: Tom Morton, The News, 27 Sept 2022
What can you do if you think the media has got something wrong?
Sex Matters has set up a Bad Media Watch to log bad reporting and also has useful links on how to complain
Print Media:
Write a letter to the editor setting out your complaint.
If the publication is a member of IPSO, complain to the regulator stating referencing the relevant clause of The Editors’ Code of Practice (Accuracy, Reporting suicide etc.)
The Editors’ Codebook – The Handbook to the Editors’ Code of Practice
Broadcast Media:
Headline and Image:Daily Mail 3 Feb 2023
WRN Statement on the Family Justice Council Guidance on responding to a child’s unexplained reluctance reluctance, resistance or refusal to spend time with a parent and allegations of alienating behaviour (December 2024)