Police officers have launched a “gender-critical” network to push back against what they claim are pro-trans ideologies pushed by police chiefs.
Named the Police Sex Equality and Equity Network, the group accused the police of “actions that embed gender ideology” across the UK. They accuse this ideology of creating a “culture of fear” among those not supportive of trans rights.
The grassroots network claim police forces risk undermining public confidence, as they say they are focusing on gender issues.
The group said in a statement: “Police SEEN warns that the influence of lobby groups and activists within UK policing has created a culture of fear which prevents officers and staff who believe there are two sexes and that sex is real and immutable, from speaking out, for fear of disciplinary action.
“They believe a formal internal network is desperately needed, not only to provide a voice and support for those who want to ensure the law is upheld, but also to restore political impartiality to policing.”
The group sites a number of examples which they say represent gender ideology in the police service.
One such instance includes recent guidance to allow transgender police officers to strip search people of the opposite gender to that which they were assigned at birth. It stated that transgender officers can “search persons of the same gender as their own lived gender”.
The guidance was retracted by the National Police Chiefs’ Council following concern from the Government.
The group went on to claim that police recorded crime data based on gender self-ID instead of biological sex, including in reports of rape.
Charlotte Cadden, a Detective Chief Inspector with Greater Manchester Police, said: “While we have respect for those whose views differ from our own, and their right to express those views, for the sake of public trust and confidence in our policing service, we have to ensure that there is a space where officers and staff know that sex realist views will also be respected and not subject to cancellation or harassment.
“We cannot sit back and do nothing; we feel that public confidence is being lost as a result of very clear mistakes that are being made.”
Current laws require those who want to change legal sex to provide a medical report with a diagnosis of gender dysphoria – defined by the NHS as a “sense of unease that a person may have because of a mismatch between their biological sex and their gender identity”.
They must also give evidence of having lived full-time in their gender for at least two years.
Trans rights campaigners say the requirements are prohibitively invasive and bureaucratic, and massively delay the process by which someone can transition and live happily.
An interim report of His Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary into activism and impartiality in policing cited a “lack of clarity in how police forces understand and interpret this evolving legal framework”, the Daily Mail reported.
It said the “lack of clarity” arose “in particular” in “sex and gender reassignment” – as as well as “what constitutes a genuinely held belief, and when such beliefs are themselves protected under the Act.”
“Without greater clarity, there is a risk that officers and staff may make the wrong decisions and, in so doing, undermine public trust and confidence.”, the report said.
