The UK’s Government has launched an LGBT action plan, in which it wants to deal with issues facing the LGBT+ community in the UK, including how people can self-identify, ensuring LGBT people know their employment rights.
“This Government is committed to making the UK a country that works for everyone. We want to strip away the barriers that hold people back so that everyone can go as far as their hard work and talent can take them”.
Big words, so what exactly are they promising?
Penny Mordaunt, the Minister for Women and Equality has outlined 75 points she wants her office to push in order to achieve better rights, equality, safety and visibility for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex people of the UK.
The LGBT action plan offered the following for LGBT+ policing and safety.
We also want to ensure that LGBT people are aware of the rights they do have already.
We will consult on how best to reform the gender recognition process. Last year, the Government Equalities Office announced the intention to consult on the Gender Recognition Act 2004 to see how the legal gender recognition process can be made less bureaucratic and intrusive. The consultation will be published alongside this action plan, and we will use the results of the national LGBT survey and the consultation to bring forward proposals for reforming this public service.
We will consider ways to make it easier to tell the government if you have changed your gender. The Government Equalities Office will investigate whether the ‘Tell Us Once’ service – which is currently used to notify government departments of bereavements – can be learned from so that transgender people who are transitioning and want to update their name and gender across multiple departments only have to do so once.
We will improve our understanding of issues facing non-binary people. The Government Equalities Office will launch a Call for Evidence on the issues faced by non-binary people, building on the findings from the national LGBT survey.
We will also improve our understanding of the issues facing people who are intersex. The Government Equalities Office will launch a separate Call for Evidence to improve the evidence relating to intersex people’s experiences.
We will ensure that LGBT people can easily access information they need about their rights. The Government Digital Service will review the existing content on GOV.UK aimed at LGBT people, and improve the content to ensure that it fully meets their needs.
Here’s what the government plans are in other key areas:
Education | Healthcare | Representation | Workplace | International | Safety
