A Good Start to the Month

Yesterday was quite spectacular.

First up we had the first ever debate on trans rights in the UK Parliament. (The debates on the Gender Recognition Act were limited solely to legal recognition, and were forced on an unwilling government by the European Court.) It was a huge thrill to be able to be in the public gallery of the House of Commons to watch the debate unfold. I’ll have more to say about that when I have more time, but it was a very special day. I note also that the majority of the speakers in the debate were women. Given how badly outnumbered we are in Parliament, that is quite interesting.

While I was in Parliament I heard from Juliet McKenna that the EU has thrown in the towel over VAT on digital products. Juliet has more details here, but the short version is that at some point in the next year or two digital trading by micro-businesses will be back to normal. It is worth noting that this is an issue that primarily affected women-owned and women-run businesses, and the work to sort it out was done almost entirely by women.

Finally we had the Richard Park by election. On the one hand we had a male candidate backed by the Tories and UKIP who was pro-Brexit and had run a vile campaign in trying to become Mayor of London. On the other we had a female candidate who was anti-Brexit and anti-hate. She was a LibDem but was backed by the Greens and WEP. The woman won.

If only all days could be like that. (And apologies to Farah and Edward whom I know had a very stressful day.)