In October 2021 a team of BBC journalists blew the lid off the controversial lobby group Stonewall and its influence on public institutions across the UK. Eighteen months of investigative work has now been broadcast in a series of 10 podcasts.
The new evidence and personal testimony contained within this series needs to be widely shared and easily accessible to as many people as possible. So a team of volunteer supporters at Fair Play For Women have transcribed the key contents of each episode for people to read and quote from.
You can listen to the full podcast on BBC Sounds here.
Or click the links below to read a condensed transcript from each episode
Episode 1: The brief
This first episode set’s out why these podcasts are important “It’s not about the rights and wrongs of what Stonewall are doing. They’re entitled to lobby. It’s about the process. And is it right that in a democracy, a lobby group can have so much influence within government on government policy. And if Stonewall can have it, who else can have it?”
Episode 2: Stonewall’s Schemes and the BBC
The team introduces the Work Place Equality Index and Champion schemes. Stonewall have created a league table, and organisations around the UK are trying to climb up this league table in order to say to the public they are LGBTQ friendly. Not only are the public bodies paying a lobby group to be marked by a lobby group, but then this lobby group is also saying, well, you’re not doing well enough. Pay us some money and we’ll tell you how to get up higher next year.
Episode 3: Self-ID and Gender Identity
Stonewall is campaigning to make it a societal norm, that rather than just male and female, human beings can have lots more genders, including genderqueer, queer, non-binary, two-spirit, many others. That is controversial territory. In this episode we hear what this means from different perspectives. We hear from Ben Cohen of Pink News and Rosie Duffield MP.
Episode 4: Being non-binary in the UK
In this episode the team speaks to a non-binary person, Owen Hurcum, about gender identity and why it matters. “Some women have penises. Some men have vaginas, some non-binary people have penises, some non-binary people have vaginas, and people can change that if they feel they need to.”
Episode 5 – A gender clinic insider speaks out
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. An in-depth interview with consultant Psychiatrist Dr David Bell about the treatment of children with gender dysphoria. “We’re at risk of taking the things at the manifest or surface level and acting too quickly on what is being said. And therefore in danger of doing irreversible damage to a child who might have desisted, and that’s very, very important”.
Episode 6 – Is Government Too Close to Stonewall?
In this episode the team sets out the evidence showing how governments and civil servants across the UK have been influenced by Stonewall.
Episode 7 – Lobbying and the Law
Stonewall’s advice to employers is to go above and beyond the law. The team presents the evidence that Stonewall are giving advice based how they want the law to be, and not as the law stands.
Episode 8 – The Debate
Not all trans people think the same! In this episode we hear a discussion between two trans people with very different views on sex and gender identity; non-binary Owen Hurcum and transsexual Debbie Hayton. “I’m still as male as I was when I was born. It’s simply the surgery has helped me become more comfortable with my own body. That’s the only thing that changed”.
Episode 9 – How close was Ofcom to Stonewall?
The team cast serious doubts over the impartiality of OfCom. In this episode we hear the evidence that shows how OfCom has cited its own judgements on BBC broadcasts to impress Stonewall in an attempt to climb its equality league table.
Episode 10 – Is the BBC too close to Stonewall?
And finally we discover the extent of policy capture within the BBC. We hear what its been like from an ex-BBC employee and how Stonewall has influenced editorial content through the BBC style guide. “when I queried this stuff, I was told that the BBC kind of checked this with Stonewall and Stonewall were fine. They were fine with it, and therefore the BBC was fine with it.”