Thread by @joannaccherry

🧵 My @ScotNational column on the co-operation agreement & how to make its worthy aspirations meaningful. Both parties have signed up to “doing politics better” “constructively & respectfully” & with “transparency & candour” 1/12 thenational.scot/politics/19541…

If we are to have respectful politics & transparent processes, then these values must apply across the board. There can be no areas carved out where anything goes & people can be abused and traduced for seeking honest debate and scrutiny of policy. 2/12

So far, in relation to the most totemic and controversial legislation in their policy programme , the approach of the partners to the co-operation agreement hasn’t lived up to the values they have now so clearly set out in writing. 3/12

Like many people I support reform of the GRA to make it less traumatic for trans people to get a gender recognition certificate. This reflects the SNP manifesto commitment. What I, and many others, do not support is self-identification of sex for anyone. 4/12

This would negate the importance of sex in the legal protections afforded by the Equality Act, in the criminal justice system, in medical research and in many other important areas of public policy. 5/12

We are where we are now because “reform” has come to mean self-identification & self-identification has already been introduced by stealth in many areas of public life with anyone who questions it branded a bigot. This is no way to do reform or change. 6/12

Much of the vitriol and the shouting down of dissenting voices in the media, on social media and in our parliament is designed to prevent debate, because when light is shone on the proposals for self-identification of sex it becomes clear 7/12

that there are very real risks to hard-won rights to women-only spaces, to vulnerable women including those in prison and to the health of women, men, and indeed trans people, if sex disaggregated data is not collected. 8/12

We are now only days away from the publication of a legislative programme that will include a bill on GRA reform, but the responses made to the consultation on GRA reform carried out between December 2019 and March 2020 have yet to be published. 9/12

It’s not too late to reset the debate on this troubled issue. The consultation responses and the analysis of them which was commissioned last autumn & delivered in May of this year should be published without further delay. 10/12

Then we need to find a way to facilitate scrutiny & debate where the voices of all those affected by these reforms can be heard respectfully in line with the values espoused in the co-operation agreement. 11/12

So today I am renewing the call for a #CitizensAssembly which I first made 2 years ago. As this is wholly in keeping with the values of the co-operation agreement & shared policy programme I hope it will finally receive the consideration it deserves. 12/12