Connect with us

Published

on

JK Rowling has said she will “struggle to support” Labour if Sir Keir Starmer keeps his current stance on gender recognition.

The Harry Potter author has authored a 2,000-word essay in The Times in which she outlines her dissatisfaction with the Labour Party‘s current position.

In the piece, she criticises Sir Keir, as well as shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper, shadow equalities secretary Anneliese Dodds, shadow foreign secretary David Lammy and shadow attorney general Emily Thornberry.

Election latest: Starmer makes ‘Swift pit stop’

Rowling has been outspoken in her belief that biological women should be able to have separate spaces, and trans women – who were born male – should not be allowed access.

She has been criticised for her position, being widely condemned in recent years for her views on transgender rights, for example claiming that she would rather go to jail than refer to a trans person by their preferred pronouns.

Transgender newsreader India Willoughby recently responded to comments by Rowling as “genuinely disgusted”.

She added: “Grotesque transphobia, which is upsetting. I am every bit as much a woman as JK Rowling.”

Daniel Radcliffe, who became a worldwide star after playing schoolboy wizard Harry in the blockbuster adaptations of the novels, has also criticised her views, and said in an interview last month that the fallout with Rowling “makes me really sad“.

JK Rowling and India Willoughby
Pic: Reuters/PA
Image:
JK Rowling and India Willoughby. Pic: Reuters/PA

JK Rowling and Daniel Radcliffe at the UK premiere of Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkaban in 2004.
Image:
JK Rowling and Daniel Radcliffe at the UK premiere of Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkaban in 2004. Pic: PA

In the article, the author speaks about how she thought she “misheard” Sir Keir in 2021 when he criticised Labour candidate Rosie Duffield for saying only women have a cervix.

Sir Keir was asked about this statement in a recent leaders debate, at which point he said he agreed with Sir Tony Blair that women have vaginas and men have penises.

Rowling says she felt the Labour leader gave “the impression that until Tony Blair sat him down for a chat, he’d never understood how he and his wife had come to produce children”.

She added that she “really wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt”.

In her article, Rowling claims to “have been a Labour voter, a member (no longer), donor (not recently) and campaigner (ditto) all my adult life” – and she wants to see the end of the Conservative government.

According to Electoral Commission records, she gave £1m to the party in 2008, and £8,000 in 2015.

Read more:
Troll who threatened to kill Rowling and Duffield avoids jail
Rowling accuses Starmer of ‘misrepresenting equalities law’
Starmer says 99.9% of women ‘haven’t got a penis’

In the article, the author highlighted Ms Dodds for saying what a woman is “depends on what the context is”.

Ms Cooper is criticised for saying she was “not going to get into rabbit holes on this”.

Rowling points to Ms Thornberry for saying: “some women will have penises. Frankly, I’m not looking up their skirts, I don’t care”.

And Mr Lammy draws ire for saying women like Rowling are “dinosaurs hoarding rights”.

David Lammy MP calls for immediate humanitarian ceasefire
Image:
David Lammy is among those who Rowling criticised

The Harry Potter author also claims Mr Lammy said that a cervix is “something you can have following various procedures and hormone treatments”.

Rowling wrote: “It’s very hard not to suspect that some of these men don’t know what a cervix is, but consider it too unimportant to Google.”

The NHS definition of the cervix is the opening between the vagina and the womb.

Rowling says the debate for “left-leaning” women like herself “isn’t, and never has been, about trans people enjoying the rights of every other citizen, and being free to present and identify however they wish”.

Instead, she says it is “about the right of women and girls to assert their boundaries”.

She adds: “It’s about freedom of speech and observable truth.

“It’s about waiting, with dwindling hope, for the left to wake up to the fact that its lazy embrace of a quasi-religious ideology is having calamitous consequences.”

The author says she met a mother of a girl with learning difficulties who was “smeared as a bigot and a transphobe for wanting female-only intimate care” for her.

“I cannot vote for any politician who takes issue with that mother’s words,” Rowling adds.

Follow Sky News on WhatsApp
Follow Sky News on WhatsApp

Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News

Tap here

? Listen above then tap here to follow the Sky News Daily wherever you get your podcasts ?

She concludes: “An independent candidate is standing in my constituency who’s campaigning to clarify the Equality Act.

“Perhaps that’s where my X will have to go on 4 July.

“As long as Labour remains dismissive and often offensive towards women fighting to retain the rights their foremothers thought were won for all time, I’ll struggle to support them.

“The women who wouldn’t wheesht didn’t leave Labour. Labour abandoned them.”

Earlier in the day, Sir Keir ruled out lifting the block on the Scottish government’s controversial gender reforms.

Sky News has approached the Labour Party for comment.

Continue Reading

Politics

Sir Keir Starmer could be ousted as PM within months, two senior Labour MPs tell Sky News

Published

on

By

No 10 backs Chancellor Rachel Reeves and says she 'is going nowhere' after tearful appearance in Commons

Two senior Labour MPs have suggested the prime minister may have to go within months if the government continues to perform poorly.

Sky News’ deputy political editor Sam Coates said his sources – a member of the government and a prominent politician – have “put Sir Keir Starmer on notice”.

Both warned that, if Labour performs badly in next May’s elections across Wales, Scotland and London, it could mark the end of his time in Downing Street.

Coates added: “The level of unhappiness and despair in parts of the Labour Party is so striking that right now, on the first anniversary, I am hearing from ministers in government that Starmer might have to go in months.”

Reform UK is surging in the polls in Wales, while Labour faces a threat from left-wing parties such as the Greens in London.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Why was the chancellor crying at PMQs?

It comes as the prime minister made it clear that Rachel Reeves has his “complete support” as chancellor and remains integral to his project, Sky News’s political editor Beth Rigby understands.

She looked visibly upset during Prime Minister’s Questions, with a spokesperson claiming she had been affected by a “personal matter”.

A day earlier, Sir Keir’s controversial welfare bill was passed despite a sizeable rebellion from Labour MPs, with major U-turns meaning a new £5bn black hole has appeared in the country’s finances.

One senior figure told Rigby that the pair were as “as close politically” as any chancellor and prime minister have ever been.

“She is going absolutely nowhere,” they added.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Welfare vote ‘a blow to the prime minister’

Ms Reeves’s tears sent markets spiralling, with the value of the pound and long-term government bonds falling sharply.

Later in the day Sir Keir, said Ms Reeves will be chancellor for a “very long time to come”.

The prime minister said it was “absolutely wrong” to suggest her tearful appearance in the Commons related to the welfare U-turn.

“It’s got nothing to do with politics, nothing to do with what’s happened this week. It was a personal matter for her,” he said while speaking to the BBC’s podcast Political Thinking with Nick Robinson.

“I’m not going to intrude on her privacy by talking to you about that. It is a personal matter.”

Read more from Sky News:
Just 25% of public think Starmer will win next election
Analysis: Emotional Reeves a reminder of tough decisions ahead

Asked if she will remain in post, he said: “She will be chancellor by the time this is broadcast, she will be chancellor for a very long time to come, because this project that we’ve been working on to change the Labour party, to win the election, change the country, that is a project which the chancellor and I’ve been working on together.”

He said Ms Reeves has done a “fantastic job” and added: “She and I work together, we think together. In the past, there have been examples – I won’t give any specific – of chancellors and prime ministers who weren’t in lockstep. We’re in lockstep.”

Continue Reading

Politics

Starmer to set out 10-year vision for NHS

Published

on

By

Starmer to set out 10-year vision for NHS

Sir Keir Starmer will set out his 10-year vision for the NHS in what the government says is “one of the most seismic shifts” in the health service’s history.

He will pledge three main facets of the plan: moving care into the community, digitising the NHS, and a focus on sickness prevention.

The prime minister will announce neighbourhood health services will be rolled out across England to improve access to the NHS and to shift care out of overstrained hospitals.

PM ‘might have to go in months’ – politics latest

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

What will the NHS 10-year health plan focus on?

Sir Keir has already promised thousands more GPs will be trained, and to end the 8am “scramble” for an appointment.

He also previously said his government will bring the NHS into the digital age, with “groundbreaking” new tools to support GPs rolled out over the next two years – including AI to take notes, draft letters and enter data.

And he will promise new contracts that will encourage and allow GP practices to cover a wider geographical area, so small practices will get more support.

Unite, one of the UK’s largest healthcare unions, welcomed the plan cautiously but said staff need to be the focus to ensure people are better looked after.

Read more:
Hundreds of NHS quangos to be axed

How pilot scheme from Brazil is helping NHS

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Do you want AI listening in on chats with your doctor?

‘Reform or die’

Sir Keir said: “The NHS should be there for everyone, whenever they need it.

“But we inherited a health system in crisis, addicted to a sticking plaster approach, and unable to face up to the challenges we face now, let alone in the future.

“That ends now. Because it’s reform or die.”

He said the government’s plan “will fundamentally rewire and futureproof our NHS, so that it puts care on people’s doorsteps, harnesses game-changing tech and prevents illness in the first place”.

The PM said it would not be an “overnight fix”, but claimed Labour are “already turning the tide on years of decline”, pointing towards more than four million extra appointments, 1,900 more GPs, and waiting lists at a two-year low.

“But there’s more to come,” he promised. “This government is giving patients easier, quicker and more convenient care, wherever they live.”

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Why has Starmer axed NHS England?

Neighbourhood health services

The newly announced neighbourhood health services will provide “pioneering teams” in local communities, so patients can more conveniently access a full range of healthcare services close to home.

Local areas will be encouraged to trial innovative schemes like community outreach door-to-door to detect early signs of illness and reduce pressure on GPs and A&E.

The aim is to eventually have new health centres open 12 hours a day, six days a week to offer GP services as well as diagnostics, post-operative care and rehab.

They will also offer services like debt advice, employment support, stop smoking help or weight management.

More NHS dentists

Dentists will also be part of the plan, with dental care professionals part of the neighbourhood teams.

Dental “therapists” will carry out check-ups, treatments and referrals, while dental nurses could give education and advice to parents or work with schools and community groups.

Newly qualified dentists will be required to practice in the NHS for a minimum period, which they have said will be three years.

Continue Reading

Politics

‘Trust and confidence lost’ over grooming gang failures in Manchester, watchdog warns

Published

on

By

'Trust and confidence lost' over grooming gang failures in Manchester, watchdog warns

Despite making “significant improvements”, Greater Manchester Police (GMP) has lost the “trust and confidence” of some victims of grooming gangs, according to a report by the police watchdog.

Michelle Skeer, His Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary, said that since 2019, when GMP started to review its non-recent child sexual exploitation investigations, “the force has improved its understanding and approach to investigating allegations of child criminal and sexual exploitation”.

The document, published today, said police have live investigations into “multi-victim, multi-offender” child sexual exploitation inquiries, involving 714 victims and survivors, and 1,099 suspects.

Grooming gangs scandal timeline

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

‘Our chance for justice’

But despite recording improvements, a report by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) also identified:

• Various training gaps within the investigation team
• Lack of consistency in evaluating case files between social care, health and police
• Failures to initially support victims meant they had “lost trust and confidence” in police

The report was commissioned by the Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham in 2024 to evaluate whether police, councils and health services can protect children from sexual exploitation in the future.

More on Andy Burnham

Its release comes days after Sir Keir Starmer announced he was launching a new national inquiry into grooming gangs after previously arguing one was not necessary,

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Starmer to launch new grooming gang inquiry

The findings were issued as the final part of the CSE (child sexual exploitation) Assurance Review process which started in 2017. The first three reports examined non-recent child sexual exploitation in Manchester, Oldham and Rochdale.

Mr Skeer said that the force has been trying to improve its service to those who have experienced sexual exploitation, but previous failings have badly affected trust in GMP.

He said: “For some, trust and confidence in the police had been lost, and the force would not be able to rectify their experiences.

“It is vital that improvements are led by victims’ experiences, and if they do come forward, they are supported, protected and taken seriously.”

A recent report by Baroness Casey found a significant over-representation of Asian men who are suspects in grooming gangs in Greater Manchester, adding though authorities are in “denial” more needs to be done to understand why this is the case.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Teen caught in child sex exploitation

Inspectors also said there were “training gaps” in some investigation teams and issues with data sharing, with local councils sometimes not willing to provide detectives with information, leading to “significant delays in investigations” into grooming gangs.

It cites problems with intelligence provided by Manchester City Council, which took months to arrive and “was so heavily redacted that some pages contained only a few words”, the report said.

Read more from Sky News:
Analysis: Badenoch’s grooming gangs outrage
Grooming survivor wants apology from Starmer

GMP is the only force in the country to set up a dedicated team to investigate grooming gangs. Called the Child Sexual Exploitation Major Investigation Team (CSE MIT) it has about 100 staff and a ringfenced budget.

In October 2024, the force told inspectors there were 59 live multi-victim, multi-offender child sexual exploitation investigations, of which 13 were being managed by the CSE MIT.

The report adds: “The force fully accepts that it made mistakes in the past.

“It has taken positive and effective steps to learn from these mistakes and improve how it investigates recent and non-recent child sexual exploitation.”

Separately, the Baird Inquiry published in July 2024 found officers at GMP were abusing their power – making unlawful arrests, unlawful and demeaning strip searches, sometimes treating victims as perpetrators, and traumatising those who have suffered sexual abuse or domestic violence.

Continue Reading

Trending