Whitehall staff in strike threat over ‘transphobic guidance’

CIVIL servants could go on strike over government policies they say are transphobic.

The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, which represents Whitehall staff, is set to consider calls for ‘industrial and legal action’ over ‘any new anti-trans guidance’.

A motion over the issue has been tabled by two of the union’s branches for the PCS’s conference later this month.

It cites the Department for Education’s draft guidance which warns teachers against letting pupils identify as the opposite sex without parental consent as an example.

The motion says this ‘would make life harder for trans and non-binary school students’.

It also denounces the Government for blocking Scotland’s attempt to bring in gender selfID for people as young as 16.

And it claims that Cabinet Office guidance, which bans trans women from using female toilets unless they have a Gender Recognition Certificate, ‘ would have led to the harassment of trans and nonbinary people’.

It states: ‘In the context of a looming General Election, we will not allow trans and LGBT+ people to be used for

‘Women’s fears ignored’

point-scoring by reactionary politicians from any political party or organisation.

‘Political attacks on trans people are part of attempts to whip up so-called “culture wars” and to divide workingclass people, and our union has a duty to build unity and stand by our trans members and the wider community.’

If passed by delegates, the union will ‘oppose any guidance on trans and non-binary workers that would marginalise these workers’.

But Caroline Ffiske, of Conservatives for Women, said: ‘Dismissing the debate around trans rights as a “whipped up culture war” indicates they have paid no attention to the concerns and grassroots activism of literally thousands of women who have raised their voices about free speech, women’s single-sex spaces and sports as well as the safeguarding of vulnerable children.

‘If the PCS cares at all about these matters, it will give this motion the short shrift it deserves.’