Report from the TUC LGBT Conference 30th June to 1st July 2011
From 30th June to 1st July I joined members of the CWU LGBT Advisory Committee, the NEC and the Equalities team at Head Office at the 14th annual TUC LGBT conference held at TUC Congress House in London. Conference was welcomed by Maria Excel in her role as TUC LGBT Committee Chair. Maria outlined the busy year the committee had, the tackling with homophobia and transphobia in education and sport remains a major focus, and said there are still many concerns with international situation in Uganda and treatment of LGBT asylum seekers by the UK Government. Maria advised that there was TUC to Lord Ali’s amendment to the Equality Act in relation to civil partnerships taking place in religious establishments. Maria announced that a Faith, Homophobia, Biphobia, Transphobia and Human Rights Conference will take place on 21st April 2012.
Maria introduced the first speaker, Frances O’Grady the Deputy General Secretary of the TUC who opened the conference. Frances said that the values that defend LGBT rights – the values of compassion, understanding, looking after each other – are also the values of Trade Union struggle. Frances reminded conference that on a day when teachers and public sector workers were out on strike defending their pensions, it is working people who will be paying the price. She said that LGBT services are not seen as a priority by the coalition Government and people who rely on those services are not seen as front-line – as Frances said ‘be in no doubt, cuts are an LGBT issue’. The budget for the EHRC is being cut, the health service is cutting non-essential surgery, and the police budget is being cut when hate crimes are on the increase. Frances called for us to get organised, active and campaigning. We need to take our issues to constituency surgeries. Frances also reminded conference of the situation worldwide for LGBT people – she outlined the situation of LGBT people in Uganda and Iran, and in South Africa with the corrective rape of lesbians. Frances highlighted the life and work of Ugandan LGBT activist David Kato who was murdered earlier this year.
For the main conference business a high number of motions were debated, a number of which were related to the defence of LGBT rights whilst fighting the coalition Government’s cuts in public services, and the effects of their policies on the LGBT community. Merlin Reader spoke on composite motion one on behalf of the CWU supporting the call to defend our vital services that meet the needs of the community.
Motion 4 called upon the TUC to ensure employers make informed business decisions to ensure LGBT employers do not suffer adversely or disproportionately if jobs are outsourced or off-shored under TUPE regulations. Whilst Motion 5 welcomed the election of Dominic Hannigan as the first openly gay Teachta Dala (an MP in the Republic of Ireland) and called upon the TUC to support the idea of Labour’s Chris Smith list with the aim of getting more LGBT candidates to stand in elections. .
Laurie Smith seconded Proposition 6 regarding the provision of goods and services for LGBT people following a recent case where hotel owners refused to provide a room for a gay couple. Laurie reminded conference to read his article in the current edition of OutTalk which had been circulated to conference.
Eileen Barrett-Harries from the Cutting Edge Consortium addressed conference. The consortium is a group of different organisations working towards eliminating faith based homo, bi and transphobia. Eileen called on everyone to get involved and challenge the cuts as 61% of LGBT organisations have insufficient funding, compared to 31% of other groups. Eileen reminded conference of the Faith, Homophobia, Biphobia, Transphobia and Human Rights Conference taking place next year.
Conference was also addressed by Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper MP. Yvette highlighted the changes the previous Labour Government had implemented for LGBT people and pledged her support for LGBT marriage equality. She also criticised the record of current Home Secretary Theresa May. Yvette was given a hard time by a hostile audience due to the stance the opposition had taken over the public sector worker strikes taking place that day, and for her failure to answer many of the questions delegates had asked about the lack of support for strikers, the funding of the sex trafficking charity, the Poppy Project which is losing its funding to the Salvation Army, and the issues for people transitioning.
Merlin Reader spoke on motion 7 who raised his concerns about the activities of the EDL and the propaganda they are espousing about gay people and Muslims. This motion called upon the trade union networks to work together to encourage counter demonstrations against the EDL and their Scottish and Welsh equivalents.
Other propositions backed by Conference were related to challenging homophobia, biphobia and transphobia in the news media; raised concerns with cuts in the Arts; called upon promoting equal opportunities though arts funding.
Motion 11 concerned tackling the invisibility faced by bisexual trade unionists. Sandie Maile from Prospect, who was a guest speaker on bisexuality at the CWU LGBT Conference in 2010 called on the conference to follow the CWU’s example by inviting bisexuality issues to be debated at their conferences. Motion 12 called for all LGBT trade unionists to be treated equally, to ensure the inclusivity of lesbians, gay men, transgender and bisexual people.
Conference debated International issues and discussed the shameful treatment of LGBT asylum seekers who are being deported; the protection of LGBT Ugandan and asylum rights; and the continued opposition to LGBT human rights at the United Nations following the removal and then restoration of the reference to the ‘killing due to sexual orientation’ clause from the resolution on extrajudicial executions.
LGBT rights in Education continue to be raised at conference with concerns raised about the increasing numbers of free schools which promote religious ideologies which conflict with LGBT equality, and called upon assurances to be sort to ensure free and independent are bound by the specific duties in the Equality Act 2010.
Dave Daniel moved the CWU’s motion on homophobia in faith schools where some schools are promoting a book by an American author, Jason Evert, called ‘Pure Manhood’. This book is disparaging about gay men and is full of homophobic falsehoods. The motion called for the TUC general council and unions to work to end the promotion of homophobia in schools that books like these have been going. This was proposition was well supported by conference and in particular by the teaching unions.
On a similar vein, an emergency motion from Unite discussed a recent one day conference in a church in Northern Ireland which promoted conversion therapy which claim they could help gays and lesbians change their sexual orientation, despite many medical associations and mental health charities objecting to and opposing these conversion practices. This proposition was also carried by conference.
Conference also had a plenary session about cuts affecting the LGBT communities. Speakers included Deborah Gould from GALOP, and Susie from the Trans community in West Kent. Deborah spoke about cuts in the EHRC budget and the affects that had on LGBT organisations that had grants from the EHRC that they would never get from other organisations. Cuts in Police funding has seen the unit for hate crime and domestic violence have had their staffing levels cut by half. LGBT monitoring services have been cut. Susie described how cuts affected the trans community. Primary Care Trusts (PCT) have had funding cut but there is also a lack of understanding about the important of gender reassignment surgery. Such surgery not seen as important. Additional speakers at conference included Marcus Morgan who discussed what could be done to help bisexual people in our community and the activities of the Bi-Con conference; and by Phyllis Opoku-Gyimah who raised awareness of Black Pride which is taking place on Saturday 20th August at Torrington Square Birkbeck University in London.
John Monk
CWU North West London Branch
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