End the secrecy: transsexuals call on Evangelical Alliance to publish report

Leaders of Press for Change, the UK’s transsexual rights campaign, today called on the Evangelical Alliance to publish in full its secret 50-page report to the Home Office, in which the christian group opposed any move to correct the birth certificates of the UK’s 5,000 transsexual people.

The Evangelical Alliance has announced that its “internal policy paper and full home office submission are not being made public and are not available for journalists”.

Press For Change vice-president Claire McNab said today:

“Why the secrecy?  Why will the Evangelical Alliance not publish its report?”

“The Evangelical Alliance calls for ’informed debate’, but transsexual people have been debating the issues for years.  If the Evangelical Alliance believes it has something to add, it should publish in full its recommendations to government.”

She continued:

“Many transsexual people are practising Christians, warmly accepted and supported by their congregations.  If the Evangelical Alliance wants to speak on their behalf, and oppose their claim to equal recognition in society, the least it can do is to publish its case in full.”

“Press For Change’s patrons include several senior churchmen, as well as two Rabbis.  We can find no biblical condemantion of transsexual people.”

Last summer, Press For Change made a detailed submission to the Home Office-led inter-departmental working group on the status of transsexual people. It has promptly published the submission, and placed it on its website.  Since then, it has made further representations in co-operation with other groups representing transsexual people in the United Kingdom, offering detailed answers all the legal and social issues raised.  These documents have also been published on its website.

Claire McNab added:

“We would love to add the Evangelical Alliance’s report to our collection of publicly available documents on the internet.  We believe that the British public, and especially the Christian people of this country, support our claim for justice.  I have written to the Evangelical Alliance asking them to publish in full their arguments for opposing our claim to legal recognition for our families, our right to personal privacy, and our existing legal protection against discrimination in employment … or to let us publish their report for them.”

“Transsexual people welcome informed debate. We challenge the Evangelical Alliance to join in that debate openly, and to tear off its veil of secrecy.  What are they afraid of?”

Background information:

The UK remains one of only four out of 39 countries in the Council of Europe which fails to provide full legal recognition in their new gender for transsexual people: the others are Albania, Andorra, and Ireland.  This failure causes countless problems for transsexual people in their everyday lives.

Despite being issued with corrected passports and driving licenses reflecting their true gender, transsexual people remain legally in the gender assigned to them at birth.  Apart from being unable to conduct a valid marriage, their tax and social security records retain the original gender, and insurance policies may be invalidated if they do not declare their legal status.  If convicted of a crime, they risk being sent to a prison for the opposite sex, and any situation requiring the production of a birth certificate guarantees a breach of personal privacy.

The government insists that a birth certificate is not an identity document, yet civil service and public sector employers insist that it accompanies job applications.  Ministers have confirmed to parliament that many government departments use the birth certificate as an identity document.

In April 1999, Home Secretary Jack Straw established an inter-departmental working group to “To consider, with particular reference to birth certificates, the need for appropriate legal measures to address the problems experienced by transsexuals, having due regard to scientific and societal developments, and measures undertaken in other countries to deal with this issue.”  The working group was due to report to ministers by Easter 2000, and we believe that ministers are now considering its recommendations.

Contacts and information