Ben Spencer: Ensuring health, safety and security in the collection of sex data is more important than concerns over causing offence

Dr Ben Spencer is Shadow Science, Innovation and Technology Minister and member of parliament for Runnymede and Weybridge.

The independent review by Professor Alice Sullivan on data, statistics and research on sex and gender published recently, highlighted serious failings regarding how sex vs gender identity data is being collected and used incorrectly.

Risks identified include to the delivery of health services, policing and security, plus the report identified concerns over the role and impact of political bias in the civil service and political interference from internal stakeholders.

Labelling issues around sex and gender identity a ‘culture war’ and trying to silence anyone raising concerns has prevented legitimate debate and undermined the Government’s duty to collect clear and accurate data, which is putting lives at risk. Professor Sullivan’s report, which coincides with the progression of the Data (Use and Access) Bill through parliament, provides the opportunity to address this now – one that must not be missed.

HM Opposition supported concerns raised by groups such as Sex Matters and amendments tabled by Lord Lucas to the Data Bill.  These aim to ensure accurate data is collected and used for services such as digital verification, ensuring that when sex data is needed to prove a person’s identity or eligibility to access a benefit or service, gender identity isn’t recorded and used instead. Without this, a self-declared gender identity on a council tax bill could be processed by a digital verification service as sex data that is used to obtain access to single sex services.

The position of the Government has been these amendments could undermine the human rights of transgender people by revealing how records kept by public authorities have been changed over time to record gender identity rather than sex at birth, with Ministers claiming this to be a breach of individuals’ right to privacy under the ECHR.

Yet they failed to acknowledge these are qualified rights, which do not take precedence over measures to ensure health, safety, and security of both individuals and the broader population.

When the leader of the Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch previously raised these concerns about the erosion of access to and protections for single sex services, opponents dismissed this as a ‘culture war’.  Issues like this need debate and I am grateful to everyone brave enough to discuss them publicly, many of whom suffered threats, criticism, and risk to their careers such was the institutional group think surrounding this issue.

It doesn’t take a medical background to know diseases such as cervical cancer can only affect women, prostate cancer only men, and that accurate recording of biological data is needed in order to screen for these diseases. Or take a security background to know the risks of not accurately collecting and recording sex data when tracking and managing criminals.

Ensuring health, safety and security through the collection of accurate sex data is more important than concerns over causing offence or embarrassment. It is great to see this view is supported by the Health Secretary, who has committed to act within the NHS, but this needs leadership taken across Government to provide clarity in law so these errors are corrected in all sectors and cannot happen again.

Every day enormous amounts of data is collected by public authorities, shaping the decisions and services available to the public.

The Government can’t sit on its hands and must act now.

In Parliament last week I asked the Secretary of State when he first had sight of the Sullivan Report, and when he will act on its findings. This must not be buried or put off until ‘tomorrow’, the opportunity to address this is now, and the Government would be failing in its duties if they do not respond to the report’s concerns and recommendations and take swift action to stop these harms.