NANA AKUA: Sir Keir Starmer’s apparently passionate support for women is almost farcical

What is a woman? This fundamental question is one that has famously vexed the Labour party leader Keir Starmer in recent times.

Last year he proved reluctant to say whether he believed a woman could have male genitals and stated it was ‘not right’ to say only women have a cervix.

Then, in April this year, he said 99.9 percent of women don’t have a penis – leading to the undeniable suggestion one in a thousand do. Clear as mud!

By July this year, at least, he seemed to have become more lucid on the issue, insisting during a BBC radio interview that a woman is an ‘adult female’.

He stated his party would not be following in the footsteps of Scottish Labour in their support for the heinous Gender Recognition Reform Bill, allowing trans people to self-identify their gender without a medical diagnosis. Yet two years earlier he had committed to do exactly that when he threw his weight behind plans to introduce ‘self-declaration’ into the Labour manifesto.

This endless flip-flopping sprang to mind on Tuesday when I saw that Sir Keir had created a video in support of a campaign to increase the number of female MPs in parliament and which he posted triumphantly on X (formerly Twitter).

This endless flip-flopping sprang to mind on Tuesday when I saw that Sir Keir had created a video in support of a campaign to increase the number of female MPs in parliament

The number currently stands at 224 out of 650, a figure the Ask Her To Stand campaign wants to see become a 50/50 balance of male and female MPs. To achieve such a scenario, they suggest we encourage the capable women in our lives to stand for office.

Of course, this is a message that most of us can get behind.

Placed against Labour’s current track record on women’s rights however, Sir Keir’s apparently passionate support for women – in his video there is no shortage of footage of women of all ages and ethnicities, beaming with hope and unfulfilled promise – is almost farcical.

For quite aside from the Labour leader’s own uncertainty about the importance of the primacy of female biology is the undeniable fact that many of his own MPs are openly in favour of self-identification – in my opinion one of the biggest single threats to women’s rights and safety that we face.

While Sir Keir has said he feels ‘very strongly’ about safe spaces for women, many of his own prominent MPs, among them Anneliese Dodds, chair of the Labour Party and shadow minister for women and equality, are huge proponents of self ID. Just three months ago she reaffirmed the Party’s commitment to make it easier for transgender people to transition.

Nana Akua 

While Sir Keir has said he feels ‘very strongly’ about safe spaces for women, many of his own prominent MPs, among them Anneliese Dodds, chair of the Labour Party and shadow minister for women and equality, are huge proponents of self ID

By way of chilling contrast, Rosie Duffield, Labour member for Canterbury and an outspoken opponent of self ID, felt her views were so unwelcome within her party that she chose not to attend the 2021 Labour Party Conference because she feared for her safety.

It was Duffield who announced that she would quit the party altogether if comedian Eddie Izzard, who uses she/her pronouns and goes by the name ‘Suzy’, was allowed to stand for a seat on an all-woman shortlist after announcing last year an intention to become a Labour MP.

That has yet to happen, but I certainly would not rule out that Eddie/Suzy gets to do just that.

Indeed, as I watched Sir Keir’s saccharine Twitter video, I half expected Izzard to pop up at the end.

It is worth mentioning too, that while Starmer speaks of his ‘pride’ at running a party which ‘hopes to have Britain’s first female chancellor’, his party has yet to produce a female leader. Contrast this with the Conservatives, who have had three female prime ministers in Margaret Thatcher, Theresa May and Liz Truss – even if the latter’s tenure at number 10 was somewhat short-lived (and turbulent).

I would argue that has done more for women’s rights than anything Labour or Sir Keir have yet to come up with. And for all his undoubtedly sincere desires to promote equality, I believe that his flip-flopping on one of the most basic principles of human biology means that a future Labour government would be a threat to the safety of all women.

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