A Girlguiding leader who was expelled for saying she believed boys could not become girls is starting legal proceedings against the organisation.
Katie Alcock, a feminist and lecturer in developmental psychology, was removed from the volunteer group along with fellow leader Helen Watts last year.
“You can’t say the Guides is a single-sex movement and yet take in boys and men as members”, Alcock told a national newspaper at the weekend.
‘Protections’
Writing on a legal funding website, Alcock said her membership was still “withheld” despite her no longer being accused of breaching social media rules.
She wants the courts to acknowledge that she was discriminated against over her “gender critical beliefs”.
Solicitor Peter Daly said: “If Katie is successful, it may establish legal protections on which other people who share her beliefs can rely.”
‘Self-identify’
According to Girlguiding, if a child “self-identifies as a girl or young woman then they are able to join any of our youth sections”.
The same rule applies to adult helpers.
Alcock says the organisation has now amended other pro-transsexual policies, following pressure.
Safeguarding
She said the issues are “particularly important around safeguarding” as parents are still not allowed to know if their daughter is sharing changing or sleeping facilities with men identifying as women.
Alcock added that boys who act in non-stereotypical ways do not ‘become girls’.
And she wrote: “Girlguiding’s 100 year history as a single sex organisation has been overturned and replaced with the belief system of gender self identification”.
A Girlguiding spokesman said it was unable to comment on an ongoing legal case.
‘Difficult’
In September last year, when news broke about the expulsion, Helen Watts said she was angry and upset that serious issues on safeguarding were side-lined.
She added that the rule on not informing parents “puts all leaders in a really difficult position”.