LGBT+ History Month 2024: Trans Rights are Human Rights

I was proud to move a motion on trans rights and allyship as the representative for UNISON’s National LGBT+ Committee at the UNISON Higher Education Conference in Milton Keynes in February 2024. Below you will find my speech to move the motion as well as the text of the motion that was passed by conference.

7 min readFeb 1, 2024

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Trans rights are human rights.

And yet there is not a day that goes by without there being transphobic commentary in the media.

Imagine you were trans and how that almost constant onslaught must make you feel. Imagine how it must feel to have the value of your life questioned at almost every turn. Imagine how it must feel to fear being your true authentic self because of the reaction you might receive.

I’m standing here as a gay man, who came out in his first year at university at the age of 19. I am not trans, but I am proudly a trans ally. I’ve even got the T-shirt!

Described as one of the mothers of the trans and queer liberation movement, Marsha P Johnson is reported to have said: “No pride for some of us without liberation for all of us.”

I firmly believe that I — with all the rights and privileges I enjoy — need to stand alongside people in my community and in our society whose voices are being shouted down and not being heard.

When you aren’t able to be your true authentic self, life can be exhausting. This is also true in our workplaces — and I am so incredibly thankful that I do not have to hide any parts of my identity from my colleagues at Middlesex University. I am accepted and included for who I am, and that is invaluable.

When I came out in 1997, the infamous Section 28 was still in force, which prohibited local authorities from “promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material”.

My school life was made so much harder by Section 28, and I still feel thankful that I managed to come out when I did — with little to no support. My first Pride marches were to protest against Section 28, and it was finally repealed in England and Wales in 2003.

Equal marriage — that my relationships would be recognised by the law and treated with the same validity as heterosexual relationships — was still a far-off hope and dream back then.

As a gay man, I am now protected against discrimination in the workplace and in accessing services by the Equality Act 2010. And a few years later, in 2013, came equal marriage.

Today is the first day of LGBT+ History Month. I think it’s striking when we look back at what happened to lesbians, gay men and bi people in the 80s and 90s, something very similar is now seemingly being repeated but with trans, non-binary and gender diverse people being the target.

As a history graduate, I know there is so much truth to this Mark Twain quote: “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.”

It is the same old tired and divisive rhetoric from the government and our right-wing media that we are hearing about trans, non-binary and gender diverse people.

It works like this: find a group in society to scapegoat, whip up a frenzy about them with misinformation, half-truths and even downright lies, and then sit back and watch as the focus is taken off your failings as a government.

Conference, freedom of speech is not an excuse for hate speech.

As a society, and as a group of people helping to educate the brightest minds, we can and should be so much better than this.

We can make efforts to do what we can to hear from trans, non-binary and gender diverse people themselves about the barriers they face in our workplaces, in our communities and in society. And then crucially we can make efforts to tackle those barriers.

We can adopt policies and promote training to support trans, non-binary and gender diverse people working and studying in higher education not just to be accepted and included, but to thrive.

And then if I were to write to my 19-year-old self when he was just about to come out at uni as gay, I would be able to write with all my heart: “It gets better — not just for you but for all of the LGBT+ community.”

Conference, in UNISON’s Year of LGBT+ Workers, please support the motion.

Cassie Burn and Ant Babajee at the UNISON Higher Education Conefence 2024

Motion 9: Freedom of Speech is not an excuse for Hate Speech

Conference notes that the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 is seen as a tool to ‘safeguard’ free speech and academic freedom in universities. It places a responsibility on Higher Education Providers and Students’ Unions to actively promote freedom of speech, including making venues available to groups or speakers regardless of beliefs. This effectively means they can no longer de-platform speakers where debates are centred around gender and the rolling back of rights of trans people in our society.

Under the Act, universities will be fined by the Office for Students (OfS), if they fail to uphold legal responsibilities to free speech on campus. It further means that individuals will be able to seek compensation from Higher Education Institutions and Students’ Unions which they believe have breached their legal obligations to facilitate free speech.

In a recent British Social Attitudes survey, it was revealed that hate crimes against trans people had risen by 11% in the last year compared with a drop of 6% against lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people in the same period. However, it is important to note both are hugely up overall when comparing the last five years. 186% increase in hate crimes against trans people and 112% increase in hate crimes against LGB people. This rise could be in large part attributed to the apparent constant steam of anti-trans disinformation made by the mainstream media and the government.

Conference recognises that many barriers to challenging discriminatory behaviour can be caused by a lack of education, information, support and robust policies in workplaces and it is essential that workplaces are allies for those with trans identities. Conference further notes the work already done by the National Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender+ Committee on development of the UNISON Trans Equality campaign. A key component of this campaign is the trans ally training programme which gives LGB and non-LGBT+ members the opportunity to explore what it means to be a trans ally. The campaign also has a growing network of trans, non-binary activists, many of whom are Higher Education members, who are active and campaign on a range of trans issues.

Conference therefore calls on the Higher Education Service Group Executive, working with the national LGBT+ committee as appropriate, to:

Encourage the negotiation of trans inclusive language in Higher Education agreements and policies, and of inclusive practices and procedures, across our Higher Education workplaces.
Urge branches where employers have no trans equality policy to seek to negotiate the adoption of UNISON’s trans equality model policy.
Promote UNISON’s trans ally training programme, across the service group and encourage all branches to run it for both activists and members.
Promote UNISON’s trans, non-binary and gender diverse network and encourage Higher Education members to join if they identify as trans, non-binary and gender diverse.
Raise trans equality with employers and employer bodies and seek reviews of relevant policies and procedures in relation to Freedom of Speech.

UNISON is the UK’s largest trade union, with more than 1.3 million members working in the public services, including the NHS and higher education, as well as the private, voluntary and community sectors and in the energy services.

LGBT+ History Month 2024: Trans Rights are Human Rights

Motion 9: Freedom of Speech is not an excuse for Hate Speech

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Written by Ant Babajee | he/him