Government Response to petition

[Alison]

The PMs office have finally published a response:
http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page20139

Thank you for your e-petition which calls on the Government to ensure that information pertaining to the transgender community to be recorded on the National Identity Register (NIR), is kept secure.

Where individuals who have registered with the Scheme and subsequently obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC) notify the Identity and Passport Service to update their details on the NIR, there will be protections in place in our systems and procedures to ensure that the record of their previous gender is then protected from being disclosed in line with the provisions of the Gender Recognition Act. The Identity Cards Act makes unauthorised disclosure of information from the Register a criminal offence with a sentence of up to 2 years if convicted of a breach.

However, in line with the provision of the Gender Recognition Act, there may be occasions, for example for the prevention or detection of crime, where the disclosure of a person's gender history may be necessary. However, it is expected that such cases would be exceptional.

As such, when an individual is using an identity card to prove their identity to an employer and a confirmation of their details is requested from the Register, their gender history would not be revealed. While a record of the person's birth gender is kept as part of our fraud prevention measures, a person's gender history will be very well protected within our systems and, as previously described; there is a criminal offence that reinforces our initial procedures against unauthorised disclosures.

I am not sure this actually addresses the petition.

Alison

[Pollik]

I am not sure this actually addresses the petition.

They never do. Nor do I recall ever having seen a petition overtly change anything.

[Holly1948]

I am not sure this actually addresses the petition.

They never do. Nor do I recall ever having seen a petition overtly change anything.

Perhaps we should have a petition to ask that Government responses to petitions address the issue raised in the petition instead of the present practice of addressing other issues.

[emma]

Unfortunately, such a petition with 800 signatures has little chance of ever being acted upon.

Imagine the number of issues in the UK which stir up groups of 800 people to write to the government.

Real action will only be achieved by pressure from groups with large numbers or by fully understood flagrant injustices.

Get full understanding of the reasons for our difficulties...which are also the reasons for homophobia, and the lobby suddently becomes much bigger...

The understanding is there...but are people willing to open their minds to a society which includes diversity, rather than continuing to embrace division?

The fundamental issue is political will...and power sharing.

[Swarmy]

I think these petitions can make a difference sometimes. For example, the hurried press release suggesting a (limited) change in direction regarding trans people and ID cards may well have been written in response to the fuss kicked up by the trans community after materials such as this petition raised awareness of the issue. Of course, there's no way of really knowing...

Either way, it seems that Gender Recognition Certificates are once again being regarded as necessary for treating (binary idenfitied) trans people with any kind of dignity.

[Pollik]

Either way, it seems that Gender Recognition Certificates are once again being regarded as necessary for treating (binary idenfitied) trans people with any kind of dign

A battle still to be fought. We have been given 'assurances' about a number of aspects, some of them in writing...the GRC is not the 'be all end all'. Mind you, we also had assurances from early campaigners that the GRA would not be abused.