Just Plain Sense

This week we begin the first of a new series of recordings taken from a conference held in Leicester at the beginning of June. “A Life in a Day” was hosted by Leicester’s Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Centre at Leicester City Football Stadium on the 5th June and promised “Practical ways to make public services LGBT friendly”. In this episode you can hear the welcome address given by one of the City's MP's, Sir Peter Soulsby. Next week I'll then be featuring the keynote address by noted BME and lesbian campaigner Linda Bellos.

This week's episode features the speech by EHRC Chair Trevor Phillips to business leaders from the North of England at a working luncheon organised recently in Leeds. The media's stereotype of business attitudes to equality and diversity issues is a crude one, which tends to emphasise opposition towards regulation and any moves that might impact upon profits or flexibility. The reality is more complex. Many businesses understand already that embracing diversity is a good thing, and that private or corporate enterprise cannot pretend to exist in a bubble somehow divorced from larger issues about the kind of society we have. Trevor's speech reflected the former sensitivities whilst reaching out for a more sophisticated dialogue.

A few days ago I was invited to an event at the Royal Armouries in Leeds, organised by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. It was billed as a working lunch with business leaders from the North of England to talk about what Equality and Rights developments mean to the private sector. In the next episode I'll be presenting Trevor Phillips' speech to that audience. But first, in this item, Trevor spoke to me about the commission's first nine months of operations, the initiatives already underway, and his hopes for the future. In addition to Trevor I also speak to EHRC's Director of English Regions, Tim Wainwright.

This week I'm presenting the third and final part in a series of episodes based on the recent Department of Health conference on LGBT Mental Health, which took place at the end of May in Nottingham. (For more details see part one) I entitled my own presentation "Transgender Realities" and proceeded to pull very few punches about research-based evidence of trans people's experiences of health discrimination, in a factual approach aimed directly at the 130 healthcare professionals present. I regrettably had to publicly criticise Nottingham PCT itself, having adopted a commissioning policy which is clearly discriminatory and unlawful in my view. If you wish to follow the presentation slides then you'll find these here.

This week I'm presenting the second of three episodes in which you can hear the speakers at the recent Department of Health conference on LGBT Mental Health in Nottingham. (For more details see last week's part one). Tim Franks is the Chief Executive of PACE, a leading London-based charity which promotes mental health and well-being within the lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans community there. In his presentation Tim talks about the different reasons that LGBT people may have for connecting with Mental Health services. Like many of the day’s speakers he emphasises that whilst being different in these ways is not a mental illness, people have the experiences of discrimination to deal with and, of course, they can experience conditions such as depression or psychotic illnesses like anyone else. Tim also raises interesting perspectives about the way therapeutic relationships can benefit when service users don’t need to explain aspects of their identity and simply feel that their sexual orientation or gender presentation is accepted. He says that in PACE the service providers ‘come out’ about their position so that the service user doesn’t need to.

On 28th May the Department of Health organised a major conference on LGBT Mental Health in Nottingham. The event was attended by well over 100 health professionals and the day was led by Professor Clair Chilvers, who is the Chair of Nottingham Healthcare NHS Trust. In this and the following two episodes the speeches of some of the main presenters will be featured in full. For this first programme we hear the introduction from Surinder Sharma, National Director of the Department of Health's Equality and Human Rights Group. Surinder is then followed by Professor Anne Rogers, who holds the chair in Sociology of Health Care at the University of Manchester. Both of these speakers paint a progressive picture of the understanding of the role of mental health, and how thinking is changing (or needs to change) to meet the true needs of people without unnecessarily pathologising their difference. Copies of Powerpoint presentations and other materials from this conference are now online here.

Next week things will be returning to normal with a series of episodes based on presentations from a recent Department of Health Mental Health conference that took place in Nottingham. For now, however, I'm offerring an opportunity to hear another full length interview with one of the grand old men of British trans campaigning, Mark Rees. Like Stephen Whittle, featured in the previous episode, Mark transitioned from female to male role in the early 1970's. He became the first trans person in the world to take a case to an international human rights court in the mid 1980's. Although this bid for privacy and marriage rights was unsuccessful, he then went on to be instrumental in the creation of the UK campaign group Press for Change in 1992. Postscript: Shortly after publishing this episode I learned from Mark that he has finally (somewhat belatedly) received his own Gender Recognition Certificate.

A close family bereavement means that the schedule of recording and editing original interviews and other material for Just Plain Sense needs to be put on hold for a short while. During that time, and in order not to disappoint regular listeners, I am featuring a handful of the most interesting interviews that I've recorded in the past for another channel. Dr Stephen Whittle is perhaps the world's best known transsexual man. He is Professor of Equalities Law at Manchester Metropolitan University, the President of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and the Chair of Transgender Europe, in addition to being one of the founders of the UK lobby group Press for Change. He is also a committed family man, with a wife and four children. In this in-depth interview, originally recorded in summer 2007, we cover his own personal background growing up in Manchester, his transition in the 1970's, his work as a campaigner, and his views about the future for trans people. Please consider supporting the charitable appeal for the Alzheimer's Society set up in memory of my mother, who died last week. Details...

In Just Plain Sense it's my aim to feature every side of the enormous conversation around Equality, Diversity and Human Rights in British society. There are plenty of people who can talk about first hand experiences, or advocate on behalf of whole communities; in the last episode we heard from a senior civil servant; so in this episode I'm featuring a speech by an elected city council politician. Councillor Paul Fairweather represents the North Manchester area of Harpurhey. He's an out gay man and this speech is taken from a conference last year on LGBT Health strategy, so his comments about health and more general inclusion reflect that. Nevertheless his point about the role of local political influence -- using scrutiny powers, local area agreements and partnerships -- is just as valid for any group.

July 2008 sees the 60th anniversary of Britain's National Health Service. Much has changed in that time of course. It's a different world from the immediate post war era in which the idea of a universal public health service, free at the point of need, was born. Britain is far more culturally diverse. Public health emphasis is shifting from treating illness to preventing it. Health and well-being are increasingly seen as integral to wider strategy for encouraging and maintaining a socially equitable and economically successful society. As the Department of Health's programme director for equality policy, Barry Mussenden heads a team that's responsible for ensuring that health and social care services match everyone's needs equally and fairly. It's not an easy brief. The NHS is a federation of independent public bodies whose priorities can only be influenced, not commanded. The health service is Europe's largest employer, staffed by ordinary people who have just  the same blind spots and prejudices as the rest of society. In this short interview Barry explains how his team sees the challenge and takes it on. Department of Health Equality and Human Rights Group

In the 1970's school teachers could be dismissed if it became known that they were Gay or Lesbian. As a young teacher in those days Sue Sanders recalls that women were not even allowed to wear trousers. This was the environment in which the organisation "School's Out" was founded in 1974. In this in-depth interview Sue speaks at length about the organisation she has worked for during the majority of her adult life, the way things have changed in that time and the problem for the next generation of society when today's teachers are not equipped to teach about diversity. She also talks about LGBT History Month, which she helped to found in 2004.

For many people the journey of pregnancy and motherhood is a delightful and rewarding experience. Yet, for Elaine Hanzak, this wasn't the case. She developed baby blues, postnatal depression and ultimately puerperal psychosis. Elaine's story is told through her book, "Eyes Without Sparkle" -- and teaching people about the widespread reality of postnatal illness has become her life's passion. In this interview Elaine tells the story of how it was, and how such illness can affect anyone after birth... Even the kind who, like her, imagined that they're "not the type". Details of Elaine's book and how to contact her or obtain a copy can be found on her web site. She also has a regularly updated blog describing her constant efforts to educate more people about the seriousness of the condition.

A report published last week by the Department of Work and Pensions has poured cold water on one of the most popular arguments for promoting equality at work. “The Business Case for Equal Opportunities: An Econometric Investigation” was researched and prepared for the DWP by a team at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research. It says they could find no direct cause and effect link between businesses having Equal Opportunities Policies and having higher productivity and profits. But it says the reverse is definitely not the case too -- and that businesses that have one seem to have the other, even if the connection isn't clear. I look at the researchers' conclusions in more detail.

What do you do when your child exhibits markedly gender-atypical play behaviour almost as soon as they can walk and tells you, by the time they are four years old, that there's been a mistake? Susie is a Yorkshire mum with three young children. Two are very much boys, but the other, though born the same, has insisted since pre-school that a mistake had been made. In this in-depth interview she tells how she handled the challenge, sought help and has cared for her child at every stage in a remarkable journey through growing up. She also tells why she felt her child was not getting the right kind of treatment at Britain's only child and adolescent clinic specialising in this area, and why she turned, instead, to specialists in the USA and The Netherlands. As a mother, she also has advice for schools on how they could help parents and children avoid the bullying her child has experienced. For more information and support for parents and families in this position see Mermaids (UK) and Trans Youth Family Allies (US).

The inward migration of workers to Britain has always been a matter of contention -- yet never more so than in recent years when the concepts of economic migrants, unlawful immigration and asyllum have become confused and blended together. Denise McDowell represents an organisation, Migrant Workers Northwest, that was set up in 2007 to specifically address the reality of migrant working in Britain's North West Region. In this interview she explains about her organisation and the different kinds of people involved whilst answering common fears and suggesting the advantages that worker migration brings.