Labour runs scared of protest, political resistance and legal action
Keir Starmer’s Labour has cancelled its women’s conference citing, according to party sources, the “political risk, security risk and legal risk” of proceeding with the conference after the High Court’s ruling on transgender issues. All Labour’s women are deprived of their conference in order to exclude trans women.
The decision comes as the remaining left-wingers on the party’s national executive (NEC) report what they call a ‘bonfire of the equalities’ forced through by the party right to disempower trans members. Left member reps Jess Barnard, Gemma Bolton and Yasmine Dar reported of the recent NEC meeting that:
With 19 votes, the NEC voted to exclude transgender women from positive action measures relating to women, including All Women Shortlists, Women’s Officer positions, being included in gender-based quotas, National Women’s Committee, and Women’s Conference. Twelve members of the NEC including the left CLP Reps and representatives of key trade unions did not vote for this.
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Meanwhile, the Labour Women’s Declaration…..
https://labourwomensdeclaration.org.uk/lwd-statement-on-postponement-of-national-womens-conference/
…have this to say:
“We welcome the Labour Party’s decision to change its policies in light of the Supreme Court’s clarification of the meaning of sex in the Equality Act 2010. We now call upon the Government to show leadership and instruct all public bodies, including local authorities, government departments and NHS Trusts and Health Boards, to follow our Party’s example and update their equality policies with immediate effect. There is no need to wait for the new EHRC guidance. The law is the law. It has been confirmed by the highest court in the land, and this is not going to change…….
However, the postponement of this National Women’s Conference 2025 “pending a wider review of positive action measures” is short-sighted and wrong. Many other women in the Party share our dismay at this decision.
The Annual Women’s Conference is constitutionally the policy-making Party event which focuses on issues specifically affecting women. As a result of this postponement, women members have been denied the right to put forward two conference policy motions to this year’s Annual Conference and to elect new representatives on the National Women’s Committee, which is constitutionally responsible for overseeing the overall direction of the Labour Party Women’s Organisation, including the Annual Labour Party Women’s Conference.
Along with many women in the Party, both within and beyond our own networks, we continue to call for a two-day stand-alone annual policy-making Women’s Conference to be held each Spring, in line with our Party’s rule book: “There shall be an Annual Labour Party Women’s Conference which shall wherever practicable be held in the spring”.