Ms Braverman said police should do more to protect gender-sensitive women from violence. Photo: Joe Giddens/PA
Police should not call transgender rapists women because it is “offensive and factually incorrect,” Suella Braverman told women's campaigners.
The Home Secretary set out her views after holding a roundtable for police chiefs and women's rights campaigners amid concerns women feel the police are not protecting them.
Campaigners including the Women's Rights Network said , that gender-critical women were subjected to public harassment and violence, and the police failed to take adequate measures to protect them. .
The term “gender critical” refers to a person who believes that gender is binary and that someone born male cannot become a woman.
Their concerns are compounded by the practice of calling rape suspects female, which they say is said to be insensitive and insulting to victims.
Earlier this month, The Telegraph reported that police had handed over 260 “women” to the Crown. The prosecutor's office will consider charges of rape.
Another 209 suspects were recorded as being of “unknown” gender, which refers to those who identify as non-binary. By law, rape can only be committed by a biological male.
This comes after the scandal earlier this year over Isla Bryson, a trans rapist who was first sent to a Scottish women's prison and then protests transferred to a men's prison.
'Only men can be rapists'
A Home Office source said: 'Only men can be rapists and official police information should reflect this where appropriate, and everything else – nonsense.”
Ms Braverman also believes the police need to do more to protect gender. critical women from harassment and abuse.
It tells the case of Sarah Baker, a transgender activist who told the crowd at London Pride to “punch Turf.” “Terf” is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a term used to describe people who believe that trans women's gender identity is illegitimate.
When a complaint about the speech was made to the Metropolitan Police, the sergeant decided no further action was required. But that decision was later overturned following public outcry and Ms Braverman's intervention.
Barker, 54, was later cleared of encouraging violence after she told the court her outburst was a publicity stunt progress.
A Home Office source said: “The Home Secretary is clear that those who advocate for women's rights must be protected from harassment and abuse. This is unacceptable and she called on police partners to do everything possible.”
Campaigners also complained that police were using non-criminal hate incidents to target officers who argued that a man could not be a woman. “This is a waste of police resources and gender critical views are protected by law,” one person present told the Home Secretary.
Among the groups represented was Fair Cop, which championed Harry's case. Miller, a former police officer who was investigated by police for retweeting a poem that said transgender women are still men.
One of the participants, Heather Binning, founder of the Women's Rights Network, said police training had been hijacked by gender activists. “They should give up all this training,” she said. “They are twisting the law that if someone says they are a woman, you must treat them as one.”
In her tweet, Ms Braverman wrote:
Yesterday I chaired a roundtable with key partners in policing & Women's rights activists will discuss women's confidence in policing, police impartiality, etc. the role of single-sex spaces.
It was a valuable meeting with many recommendations to consider. pic.twitter.com/mctA1qP23R
— Suella Braverman MP (@SuellaBraverman) October 24, 2023
Fiona McAnena, from Fair Play for Women, said: “The police seem to think it is a crime for a woman to hurt the feelings of a man with a transgender identity. Instead of policing impartially, they appear to have taken sides. They make themselves look ridiculous, and this undermines their credibility, and not just among women. Men see it too.”
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