AHRC transgender rights inquiry ‘biased, waste of taxpayer funds’: experts

A national inquiry into transgender rights has been branded a ‘misuse’ of taxpayer funds by experts wanting a balance with the rights of women and girls.

A national inquiry into transgender human rights has been branded ‘biased’ by some experts.

A national inquiry into trans­gender human rights focusing on “anti-trans mobilisation” and “disinformation” has been ­branded a “serious misuse of taxpayer funds” by experts concerned it fails to balance the rights of transgender people with the rights of women and girls.

Specialists and lobby groups have also flagged a possible “bias” exhibited in the Australian Human Rights Commission’s ­inquiry because it restricts submissions to experts “in trans and gender diverse matters”.

As part of the inquiry, the commission will probe “discrimination, harassment, vilification and violence” levelled at trans and gender diverse (TGD) Australians, and investigate “extremism and radicalisation”.

The inquiry, which will also examine how “education, employment, healthcare, housing, migration, service provision and the law” affect transgender Australians, is open for submissions but will only accept the opinions of experts “in TGD matters”.

Senior Queensland child psychiatrist Jillian Spencer said the inquiry fails to focus on how the rights of transgender people ­intersect with the rights of women and children.

“All they seem to want is for the transgender community to voice any bad experiences they’ve had, and they don’t want to look at the whole rights issue for the whole of the community,” she said.

Dr Spencer made headlines last year when she was stood down from Queensland Children’s Hospital because of her concerns about the treatment of children with gender dysphoria, and after voicing opposition to gender affirming care – a largely contested medical approach in which a child’s perceived gender is unquestioningly endorsed by doctors.

In her submission to the inquiry, Dr Spencer said one of the greatest threats to Australians experiencing gender dysphoria was gender-affirming care.

“Some doctors providing the affirmation model lack the clinical skills to successfully engage a young person in therapy to help them explore and overcome their gender dysphoria,” she wrote.

“These unskilled health professionals instead collude with the young person to ignore the underlying issues driving the gender dysphoria and they sell their patient a pretend solution of body modification.”

Child psychiatrist Jillian Spencer.

The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists at the end of last year became the first medical body in the country to decline to endorse gender­ affirming care as the key intervention for children who ­believe they may be transgender, reflecting an increasingly cautious approach in some European countries amid a cited lack of evidence for the medical pathway.

Christian Schools Australia ­director of public policy Mark Spencer said the AHRC inquiry was an “activist discussion” ­attempting to “shut down debate around what is in the best interests of young people”. “The concerning element of the inquiry is its skewed focus, only looking at threats to one small group, which is then exacerbated by the gatekeeping around who they will take submissions from,” he said.

Emeritus professor Bronwyn Winter suggested the inquiry exhibited a “bias” because it “explicitly talks about anti-trans mobilisation and restricts calls for submissions to certain groups”. She accused the AHRC of “pre-determining an outcome by saying there are these threats”.

The Free Speech Union of Australia wrote to the AHRC and commissioner Lorraine Finlay this week claiming the inquiry was not “neutrally worded”. “It appears that those with gender critical views are being cast as spreading misinformation, being extremists and even violating human rights,” the letter reads.

University of Queensland law professor Patrick Parkinson said the inquiry’s terms of reference “nail the AHRC’s colours firmly to an ideological mast” and indicate the commission has aligned with “particularly active and powerful lobby groups”.

Professor Patrick Parkinson.

“To launch an inquiry which is intended to gather evidence to support the claims and talking points of one lobby group is in my view a serious misuse of taxpayer funds,” he said.

Transcend Australia CEO Jeremy Wiggins, however, welcomed the inquiry, saying there “is significant evidence that tells us that trans and gender diverse Australians experience disproportionate rates of discrimination, violence and abuse”.

“All Australians deserve to live their lives with safety, dignity and respect and no minority group should be under threat,” he said.

“We hope that this process will better inform governments, human rights groups and civil society organisations about the real and present dangers faced by trans and gender diverse people and their families in their everyday lives and lead to a set of recommendations on how to increase protections and manage the actual threats.”

In a statement, the AHRC said the aim of the inquiry was to “ensure a comprehensive understanding of the challenges to the full enjoyment of human rights by trans and gender diverse individuals and to identify strategies for addressing them”.

“The project scope is to ensure the focus remains on objective analysis and safeguard the integrity of the project’s findings. This is due to the nature of the debate surrounding trans and gender ­diverse people’s rights,” the statement reads.

“Demonstrated experience and in-depth understanding of these issues is crucial due to the complexity of the subject matter.”