This is a statement written by Strath Union’s LGBT+ Student’s Rep, and outgoing and incoming Disabled Student’s Reps, in response to the transphobic Supreme Court Ruling and EHRC Guidance in April this year. 

Last week, we attended the NUS Trans Rights Action Day in Manchester as representatives from Strath Union. We had the opportunity to meet many students from across the UK who were equally outraged by the recent Supreme Court ruling and the following guidance that the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has published. As such, we wanted to take this opportunity to express our immense disappointment at the recent attempts to undermine and discriminate against trans people across the UK. 

We call on the EHRC to withdraw its hastily drafted and politically biased interim guidance immediately. It is harmful, unworkable, and based on the erroneous belief that the trans community poses a danger to society. 

Let us be clear: this is segregation. An attempt to paint a vulnerable community as a danger. We all know that this has happened before. We all know the consequences of marginalisation. As students striving for knowledge against ignorance, we ask you not to turn your backs, and to not allow this segregation to be done in your name. 

Historical evidence of trans identities dates back centuries, and through many periods and cultures we have been accepted and respected in public life. However, trans people are currently being demonised in the UK. At once we are stigmatised as both too strong and too weak. However, we are just like you. We want to live full, long lives. We want to spend time with our friends. We want to change the world for the better. We are not a danger that must be managed; we could not be further from pathetic. 

We ask you to open your eyes to the lies painted about the trans community in the mainstream media, and the powers used by political groups to discriminate against us in our everyday lives. The Cass Report, a powerful authority on access to medical treatment for trans people, has been shown by multiple authorities to be a scientifically illiterate political document containing myriad errors that deviates significantly from best practice. Senior civil service members who drafted the Equality Act 2010 have publicly said that its intention was entirely at odds with the interpretation that the judges of the Supreme Court came to in their judgment. A judgment which privileged the views of an anti-trans campaign group while making virtually no attempt to understand how trans lives were lived and would be affected by their decision. 

Over the coming weeks and beyond, we will be working closely with Strath Union, NUS, and other organisations to challenge the harmful misinformation that is spreading because of the recent Supreme Court ruling and EHRC guidance , and ensure that the fight against this attack on human rights extends beyond the end of the conference. For any students who are keen to get involved, please get in touch at strathunion.dem@strath.ac.uk. 

We ask you to be part of our movement as we stand against the ongoing discrimination towards trans people in the media and the attempts to suppress our presence in society. 

We stand against hatred. 

We stand together in pride. 

- Ash (LGBT+ Students' Rep), Jay (incoming Disabled Students' Rep) and Jo (outgoing Disabled Students' Rep)