TRANSforming Futures publish two reports

TRANSforming Futures, a five-year project which is a partnership between Be:North, CliniQ, Galop, Gendered Intelligence, GIRES, LGBT Consortium, Mermaids, Sparkle and Stonewall Trans Advisory Group, launched findings from two reports last month which aim to create lasting change for trans communities in the healthcare and criminal justice systems.

Funded and supported by the National Lottery Community Fund, and drawing on a survey, community workshops and contributions from health, criminal justice and community experts, the research details trans people’s experiences of problems in both healthcare and criminal justice settings. They highlight participants’ proposed solutions to some of these problems.

Key Findings from the Criminal Justice System report:

• Trans people reported not knowing their rights, and experiences of discrimination when reporting violence or abuse. Ideas for solutions to this problem included: Trans community skill-sharing and survival workshops, and creating resource packs for incarcerated trans people.

I’ve not had the best experience. I was verbally abused and almost attacked so I called the police, but I believe they only saw me and my colour and they wouldn’t do anything to the person who was bothering me, but I stood my ground and said that isn’t right, it’s hate crime but they didn’t care and ended up arresting me. [...] I’m almost always racially profiled and now that I’m trans it’s even worse. – Participant, Trans People of Colour Workshop

• People were uncertain about whether their experiences amounted to hate crimes, and whether trans people – and non-binary people specifically – were protected by the law from hate crime.

• Trans people experiencing homelessness and black trans people and trans people of colour (TPoC) stated they are more likely to be treated as a suspect/criminal. Ideas to address this included: training trans people as advocates, decriminalising sex work, and creating TPoC services.

• Participants highlighted fear and distrust of the police as a key failure of justice systems and saw prison as particularly harmful and dangerous to trans people. Their ideas to combat this included: creating community based non-carceral processes for accountability and justice.

Key findings from the Healthcare report:

• Many participants identified experiences with gender clinics as one of the hardest parts of their transition, mainly because of long wait times and difficult experiences with clinic staff. Problems included a lack of communication while waiting, administrative errors leading to people waiting longer, and many struggling with mental health breakdowns during the long wait.

I’ve been out as trans for 10 years and it’s a rarity to feel like I’m being taken seriously by the police when I’ve reported hate crime. I’ve pretty much given up now. – Participant, Criminal Justice Workshop

• Trans people of colour reported avoiding healthcare far more often than the white trans people they know.

• Participants reported often facing invasive and inappropriate questions, physical exams being conducted outside of standard procedure, and being repeatedly misgendered.

• Participants highlighted how difficult they found it to access information about trans healthcare, getting most of their information online from trans forums or informally from friends.

To get healthcare, someone has to see you as a whole being, if you’re white, cis, straight, male, it’s easier to see that someone as a whole. When you’re anything that deviates from that category, they start nit-picking at everything. You can’t be autistic and trans. You can’t be queer and have mental illness. These things are pitted against each other. They can’t see the complete person. – Participant, TPoC Workshop.

TRANSforming Futures aims to fund and create projects designed by the trans community, for the trans community. A similar community consultation will be conducted with under 18s on their experiences of healthcare, state agencies, and violence.

The partnership encourages community organisations to use the ideas recorded and shared in the criminal justice and healthcare reports as a starting point in discussions about forming their own projects that are for trans communities, by trans communities.

To learn more & to download the reports in full: www.transformingfuturespartnership.co.uk

For more info on Stonewall Trans Advisory Group: www.stonewall.org.uk/trans-advisory-group