The Telegraph reports that Government agencies and public bodies are paying hundreds of thousands of pounds a year to become ‘Diversity Champions’ for Stonewall, an organisation which campaigns to remove single-sex spaces.
The report notes that a teenage girl is seeking a judicial review against the participation of the Crown Prosecution Service in Stonewall’s ‘Diversity Champions’ programme, on the basis that it cannot participate in this and still implement the law impartially.
Our spokeswoman Tracy Shaw is quoted in this piece as saying that there is a duty on public bodies to remain impartial, objective and balanced and that could be compromised by membership of a lobby group.
The full quote which she gave to the paper is here:
“How can you be impartial when you are part of a champion programme which compels you to do certain things and behave in a certain way that contravenes women’s and girls’ rights to safe spaces?
Tracy Shaw, Safe Schools Alliance UK
No public body should align themselves with a lobby group, especially one that has been so open in their desire to remove single sex exemptions which are there to protect women and girls. Public bodies should be free to talk to lobby groups, but not work with them in a way which means that a group has an influence or asks them to sign up to a code of conduct.
All of these organisations should have to answer to how they spend public funds.”