Charity accused of pushing children on to puberty blockers
Mum ‘faced with social services’ after challenging transition
A CHARITY with £220,000 taxpayer funding has been accused of targeting vulnerable young people and encouraging them to use puberty blockers.
Space Youth Project said it “supports young people who are or may be LGBT+” and aims to “facilitate freedom of expression”.
But Chris Loder, Conservative MP for West Dorset, said an increasing number of parents have told him how exposed and vulnerable their children have been with discussions around gender identity with third parties.
Criticising the Dorset-based Space Youth Project and similar groups for having “unfettered access” to schoolchildren without parental knowledge or consent, he said: “Publicly funded activist organisations are targeting young people and children.”
It comes as a landmark review released this week said children have been let down by a lack of research and “remarkably weak” evidence on medical interventions in gender care.
Criticised
The Cass Review, by paediatrician Dr Hilary Cass, calls for gender services for young people to match the standards of other NHS care.
One mother has spoken out about Space Youth Project, claiming that the group had encouraged her daughter – who had questioned her gender at the age of 12 – to transition despite her not having been assessed by a medical professional.
The mother said: “In 2017, my daughter wrote me a letter to say that she wanted to be a boy. I started to question where this came from because it was out of the blue.
“I challenged it because I didn’t think it was right. And I was met with social services.
“They said that I was neglecting my daughter, and they were going to bring a group to me and my husband to talk about gender dysphoria – it was Space.
“Space came with the social worker, and they were really forceful. They came into our home and told me and my husband that if my daughter decided that she wanted to be a boy, then we’d be discriminating against her if we didn’t go along with it.”
The mother said that since speaking out about the “parent blame”, she has been met with bullying and a hate campaign against her.
She added: “My daughter was never seen by a medical professional.
“Now she’s 19, she’s realised that this gender questioning was down to past trauma.
“She now thanks me for never taking her to a gender identity clinic, but I’m concerned about how many children are being influenced by Space.”
The mother said that after her daughter had decided transitioning was not the right decision for her, Space visited her school.
The mother added: “They were teaching her about puberty blockers, confusing her further – and I had no idea about it.”
Theresa Leavy, executive director for children’s services at Dorset Council, said: “We have a statutory duty to provide advice to young people about gender identity. Any referrals to gender identity development service clinics are carried out by NHS Dorset, not by the local authority.”
It comes just weeks after NHS England banned the prescription of puberty blockers to children as there is “not enough evidence” they are safe or effective.
Space Youth Project was contacted for comment.