Chamber and committees

Thank you.

My last question for now is about the conversations that you have had in the commission, but also more broadly with the Scottish Government and other stakeholders. Are there any policies or proposals that are potentially red herrings, given the time pressures and what we know are going to be financially constrained times? Are there things that we may need to move away from doing because we know that we can get better impacts and outcomes from focusing on other things?

I have a final brief question. Jim Skea has spoken quite a lot about social infrastructure, and I am mindful of the task relating to having meaningful engagement with those who are most likely to be affected by the just transition, so that they have the opportunity to shape it. Is there a role for the committee in doing something that the commission has not done or is not planning to do in that regard, or vice versa? There is a need for engagement, particularly with people who are not the usual suspects—those who will be affected directly but who might not have an industry voice or be able to input into the structures that we have.

I am grateful to Pam Gosal for securing the debate, and I am glad to have the opportunity to speak on this topic, two days before the international day for the elimination of violence against women and the 16 days of activism. I also thank all those organisations and agencies that work day in and day out to support survivors. I refer colleagues to my entry in the register of members’ interests.

The existence of this official day is perhaps a sign of progress—that the reality of violence against women and girls is being recognised by institutions and decision makers—but how much of a picture are we really seeing? What image arises when we think of gender-based violence? Is the woman cis and straight, with all her papers in order, dressed and behaving appropriately? And her attacker: is he a stranger to her, a man without authority and not in uniform, visibly unreliable, criminal or monstrous? We know that not all violence against women follows that pattern; yet, the more it deviates from that image, the less sure we are of how wrong it is.

The UN web page for the day recognises that and identifies women who are particularly likely to be attacked—not the meekly respectable but the outsiders, including

“women who identify as lesbian, bisexual, transgender or intersex, migrants and refugees”.

It is no coincidence that people with such identities suffer societal prejudice and oppression, for the problem of violence against women is not one of isolated incidents that are perpetrated by individual men of intrinsic evil; such incidents are symptoms of a deeper disease, which is a disease not just of misogyny but of homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia and a visceral fear of difference and of sharing privilege and status. Worse than that is that such incidents are in reality a harvest—the expected outcome of seeds that are planted, watered and fed not only by men, not only by the tabloid press, not only by populist demagogues and not only in countries that we think of as regressive or repressive.

The UN recognises that violence against women is not perpetrated only by strangers. We know that it comes from intimate partners, families and lawfully constituted authorities. The women, including trans women, who are more likely to experience violence generally are also more likely to be survivors—or, tragically, not survivors—of these embedded, disguised and often hidden attacks.

Trans women are as likely as cis women are to be attacked, in any context, because they are women, but they are also highly likely, as are trans men and non-binary people, to be attacked because they are perceived as trans or as gender nonconforming. Domestic abuse in all its forms, including coercive control, is experienced by many trans women, and transphobia is yet another weapon in the abuser’s armoury. Trans women are not only more likely to be in precarious financial situations, unemployed or underemployed, and in legal limbo regarding their gender status; they also face huge barriers in accessing support and shelter, whether that is from medical, law enforcement or third sector agencies.

Those vulnerabilities, those precarities and those barriers are—make no mistake—the direct result of false and misleading narratives that are still being constructed and disseminated by mainstream media and by elected politicians. Those narratives do not have to be openly transphobic to be deeply damaging to all trans and non-binary people and to many cis women who do not conform to gatekeepers’ ideas of what a woman should look and sound like. While lip service is paid to the idea of a “genuine trans person”, the underlying message is that trans women are intrinsically unsafe and untrustworthy. There is, indeed, a danger, but it is one existing for, not created by, our trans sisters.

The theme of this year’s UN day and the 16 days of action that follow it is “UNITE!” During these weeks of our parliamentary business, my most heartfelt hope is that we can, indeed, unite in distinguishing reality from rhetoric and in recognising and combating both particular and structural forms of violence.

I will be voting against amendment 133. There is no evidence from other jurisdictions that operate similar gender recognition arrangements that gender recognition is being fraudulently applied for to facilitate the commission of offences. In any courtroom setting, a judge can always take all circumstances into account when deciding on sentencing, so there is no need for the proposed aggravator or any specific aggravating factor to be included in the bill. As Jamie Greene has just said, he hopes that the aggravator would act as a deterrent, which, in my opinion, is not something that it is appropriate to put in the bill.

If a person has fraudulently obtained a GRC, they can already be prosecuted and sentenced for that, in addition to any other offence. I do not believe that the amendment is necessary. Attaching aggravation to the application for and awarding of a gender recognition certificate is deeply problematic.

Does the minister believe that it is a fair work practice to in effect derecognise campus unions? What can he do through the SFC outcome agreement discussions with the University of Dundee to ensure that workers’ voices are heard and that workers are treated with dignity and respect—

—in work and in retirement?

The minister will be aware that effective voice is one of the five dimensions of fair work, as defined by the Fair Work Convention, which says that the gold standard of effective voice is employers having clear recognition of and respect for strong trade unions.

Yesterday marked the end of 12 weeks of strike action, and today is day 613 since the pensions dispute between Unite the union and the University of Dundee began. Workers are going back to work without any resolution. University management has comprehensively failed in its obligations—

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how further and higher education institutions that receive public funding via the Scottish Funding Council are expected to implement fair work first principles. (S6O-01558)

—under the fair work effective voice criterion. Management has refused to engage with the unions.