Coffee House Shots
Labour's women problem
The stage is set. Get a front row seat in the run up to the election by subscribing to the spectator for just three pounds for three months. We'll even send you a free election mug. Go to spectator.co.uk/mug. (upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to Coffee House Shops, the spectators daily politics podcast. I'm Meghan McElroy and I'm joined by Katie Bulls and Sonia Sader, chief leader, writer and columnist at The Observer. The election is now just days away. This is the last full week of campaigning. And before we get to July the 4th, we thought we might look at the very naughty issue of gender. So Katie, how is this issue played out on the election campaign so far? - So bigger picture, Labour clearly look as though they're doing very well. Yes, their vote share has dropped a bit during the campaign but the Tories have not improved, hence they have less of a problem. But I think if we look back over this six week campaign, what are their areas where his starman, his party have been under the most pressure is on gender. And then I think perhaps more punchy than anything Rishi Sunak himself has said, you had JK Rowling who we know has long been a campaigner in this, right for the times, effectively saying that she is not sure she trusts his starmas judgment. And parallel to this, you have various stories coming out about what Labour might do on gender. Now I think just to bring listeners up to speed. I mean, his starma inherited a self-ID policy from Jeremy Corbyn, one that he's stuck with for some time. And he faced opposition from women's rights groups but also some around a shadow cabinet table. They would say they were going to battle with him but you know, figures such as Shabana Mahmud, the shadow justice secretary, had been among those who wanted a stronger line on biological sex. We now have a position where Labour has changed their guidance so you would need a medical opinion. There was talk of making it so it was just one doctor, one medical figure who would need to do that. That's no longer happening because of pressure on GPs. But I think there are some other ways I think Sonia can go into, whereby it will clearly be a different approach to the Tories and one I think, which is raising some concerns amongst women's groups as to what a Labour government mean for protections around women's only spaces. An area where the Tories have been pretty strong on in terms of plans and government but also plans they had about their equality at if they were to win a fifth term. And Sonia, I think some Labour MPs, as Katie said, haven't always been happy with Labour's position. Why is this issue so naughty for Labour? Well, I think there's two issues. So first of all, there's a substantive issue around what the law says on single-sex spaces, services and sports and the protections for sort of women-only spaces. And then the second issue is that the tone that the Labour Party is striking on it. So first, on the substantive issue, the Conservatives have said, and I think they're substantively right, having spoken to lots of different lawyers about it, the Conservative position is in the Equality Act, it's not clear when it refers to sex as a protected characteristic, whether that means biological sex or whether it means biological sex. And if you're somebody who's changed your sex for most legal purposes and got a gender recognition certificate, whether that means, you know, if you're male and you've got one of these certificates, that means that for the purposes of discrimination or you need to be treated as though you were female. Now, that is really unclear. It's because when the legislation was designed, this kind of wasn't a big issue. There've been loads of campaign groups who've tried to say, well, actually the law does mean that people have to be treated as though they were off the opposite sex. So there's a total lack of clarity and there is a big case that's working its way through the courts on that. So every lawyer that I spoke in to says it needs clarification. In fact, the Equality and Human Rights Commission says that the law could do the clarification on this point and you've got this big case. So the conservatives have said, look, we're going to do this. We're going to clarify the law. So it makes it clearer exactly when it's fine and lawful for services to operate on a female-only basis. And that I think, you know, I'm not a conservative politically, but that I think substantively is exactly the right position. Labour have come out and said, no, actually, the law doesn't need clarification. It is clear and we will sort this out through guidance. And that is a bit of a legislative nonsense because if you've got law that's unclear, guidance that's issued by the government cannot overturn what parliament has passed and what the courts go on to interpret the law as meaning. That just can't happen. So I think the issue is, is that a lot of women's groups sort of feel like, well, first of all, Labour's sort of trying to say that the law is clear when it really isn't. And so you get these noises from the shadow cabinet saying, look, of course, we're going to protect spaces for biological women and sports, et cetera. But then actually, when you look at the detail of the policy position, there are issues with it. And the reason why this is an issue is that Labour also say they want to make it easier for people to change their sex for most legal purposes through getting a gender recognition certificate. And Katie kind of hinted at some of that debate. And the issue for women's groups who are campaigning on single-sex services is that if you don't change the equality act to make it clear and you make it significantly easier for someone to get a gender recognition certificate, actually, that starts to water the law down. So it's not even just not strengthening protections on single-sex spaces. You're actually kind of effectively watering those protections down. There's also this issue around tone. And we can sort of go on to talk about that. But it is very clear this has become a toxic debate. I don't think anyone would deny that. But as part of that toxicity, women have lost jobs. They've been bullied. They've been physically attacked on the way into conferences. These are women who are sort of trying to talk about their rights and the need for single-sex spaces. That has happened to women in the Labour Party as well, including Rosie Duffield. And when Keir Starmer answers questions on this, he seems to sort of imply that the toxicity is all on one side. And I think that doesn't help build bridges with women who care about this issue, too. And Sonia, I just wondered, I mean, I think when we imagine, and it hasn't happened yet, a lot could change in perhaps six days. But if we do imagine this, the Labour majority of 200, do you think this is one of the areas where there's at least, I mean, it's what I pick up from some Labour women. There is, I don't know, some doubt as to what Keir Starmer would actually decide on some of these policy areas. If he has the authority and scope, and if you think about some also, you know, the fact this does divide the Labour Party much more than the Tory Party, in terms of lobby groups, stone wall and others, and what various stakeholders are going to want. One thing I would say is, I think it has divided the Conservative Party in the past, but it does so less now. So if you're totally right on that, where is it still dividing the Labour Party? I think the issue is, is that the Labour position just isn't that clear. So it is absolutely true to say, as you said at the start, that there has been a shift in Labour's position. So it is not one of Self-ID anymore. And I think there are some very clear reasons for that. If you look at what happened in Scotland, and, you know, I don't think everything that went wrong in Scotland around Self-ID, that wasn't the only thing that led to Nicholas Durgen's downfall, but it was certainly one factor. And I think the Labour Party looked at that, and they learned from that. So the position has changed, but it's still not clear. And while they say they're not for Self-ID, some of the proposals that they've got around making it easier to get gender recognition certificates. So for example, they say they're going to get rid of the quasi-judicial panel that reviews, you know, they tend to review these applications just in a written form. But Labour saying they would get rid of that, and it would just basically, once you get a diagnosis from one doctor, it would get signed off. You know, that is quite a significant watering down of safeguards. And so it's not Self-ID, but could it work like Self-ID? So I think that's where the issues are going to come. It's not exactly clear. And then one of the things I think that you've seen in recent days, you know, there hasn't been that much focus on sex and gender in this election campaign until JK Rowling sort of came out and wrote that article. And then it really does feel like it's been an issue in a lot of interviews with Labour front ventures. I think one of the things you've seen is actually these lines that they developed that they thought were going to hold. So, for example, say, "Oh, look, we will protect biological spaces." You know, the equality act doesn't need clarification. It's under heat and under pressure from interviewers. Some of those lines aren't holding, and it becomes quite clear, actually, that their policy isn't clear, and shadow cabinet members aren't 100% comfortable, you know, talking about the details and the specifics of it. So I think if anything, actually, these last few days, we'll have sort of reinforced to some shadow cabinet members that, you know, if we're in government and this issue comes up, and there's more scrutiny on us because we're the government and we haven't got a conservative government that's falling apart, maybe we are going to need to be clearer and sharper on this. And I think that probably applies to a few things for Labour, which is 'Kiz Dharma keeps talking about how, in government, you know, he won't differ, he won't let ministers misbehave.' And I think that the level of pressure and scrutiny they're going to immediately come under will, despite as much preparation as you can do, come as a bit of a surprise. So I wonder, you know, are there figures that Kiz Dharma can take soundings from? I wonder in the sense that I think it was about a week ago in this campaign, we had Tony Blair come out, and Tony Blair in an interview said, you know, a woman has a vagina and a man has a penis, and it's very simple, and he didn't quite understand my politicians had got themselves in such a muddle. And I think if we think about the journey Kiz Dharma has been on, because up until quite recently I think the worst question, and perhaps I still think it's a trickier question than one might expect, but one of the worst questions that Labour politicians would fear on the morning round is, you know, what is a woman? And then you'll see all this, kind of, not just Kiz Dharma, others kind of going round in circles as he's trying to square these various, you know, sides of the debate. And I think for Tony Blair to come in and say, no, actually it's very simple. Yes, you need to work out various guiding principles. I think, you know, when you have lots to talk about how the TBIs or the Tony Blair Institute could do a lot of the intellectual thinking, obviously sources close to the TBI like to advance the argument, but some others do as well, you know, it could be a sounding board for Kiz Dharma when he's trying to work out winning effectively, you know, a pretty large majority we currently expect, but not a particularly enthusiastic public. If you think about the vote splits and where they're all going. And in that, in the debate this week, Kiz Dharma was clearly talking much more sensitively about how you have to make sure the trans community feel heard, feel included. He brought up the example of the mother of Breonna Gates, who was obviously murdered, who was a trans pupil, and brought her up saying, well, Rishi's, you know, joked when they were in the gallery. And he got lots of whoops in the audience from somewhere else. But he's going to be thinking about how you keep the centre of opinion. And I think the centre opinion is pretty nuanced when it comes to some of the women's only space arguments, and there's going to be one where there'll be figures trying to pull him in a certain direction. They won't necessarily, I think, reflect a lot of the new labour voters that they're getting in this election. So I actually think it shouldn't be hard to come up with a good answer on this. In fact, I think it's pretty easy if you listen to a wide range of opinion. I actually think if you listen to somebody like West Street in the Shadow Health Secretary, he's been excellent on this issue. And I think it's really easy to give a good answer that says labour will stand up for the rights of women and understands why female-only spaces, services and sports are important to some women in some circumstances. That's absolutely legitimate and that labour will robustly support discrimination against trans people that are contained in the equality acting. It is very easy to say that. It's also very easy to say that there's been toxicity on all sides and that there's a lot of hurt on all sides and that women have suffered in this debate as well, including labour women. So I think it's hard to get at this answer, an answer that really works. And I think the fact that Kistama has struggled actually shows that he's not listening to the right people on this. But there are so many people that he could listen to within his own party, and that's because actually when you get down to it, a lot of senior women are moderately gender critical and hold exactly the views that I would hold, that I've written about for the observer and that we've been discussing today. So I think there's a lot of people that he could listen to. And I think even since he sort of gave that original debate answer and you saw the J.K. Rowling column, there are sort of some signs I think he's better able to strike a more considerate sort of approach. But one of the issues is that I think he has to demonstrate why some women care about this. And it's not because they just want him to say that women have a vagina and men have a penis. I mean, that, to just repeat those words from Tony Blair is almost to imply, you know, well, look, this is a gotcha question, I've got an answer for you, and then there's a whole big but. Actually, the reason why it's important, the definition of what a woman is is important is in relation to things like, for example, when you've got NHS nurses and they've got changing facilities at work and they're told that they have to share them with somebody who's biologic female but identifies as female because that is just, you know, they've got to get with the project, basically. Or when you've got a female rape survivor who wants to be able to access a female only rape crisis service and is told, no, sorry, that's just not available here. And in fact, maybe you're a bigot for not for wanting a female only service. So that's why it's important. And when you hear somebody like where Streetings speak about it, you can see that he understands why it's important. So I think, I think we're starting to see some evidence of that, that tonal shift, but there are plenty of people that care starma, plenty of women around him that he could speak to in order to get, you know, their thoughts on it, that would, I think, help him strike a tone. That actually is, you know, it's a correct tone because it acknowledges that this is a contested debate. We don't want it to be contested. Here's Prime Minister needs to rise above it. But as part of that, he has to acknowledge that there are women who've been bullied, who've been attacked, who've lost jobs over this debate as well, and that is wrong. Thank you, Katie. Thank you, Sonia. And thank you for listening to Coffee House shots. [MUSIC] (gentle music)