I was at the ‘sex and gender’ debate in parliament. What I saw both horrified and depressed me

The SNP’s Joanna Cherry was caught on camera eye-rolling while Kirsty Blackman outlined the struggles of trans people, writes Robin Moira White. Why are we accepting such dishonourable behaviour from honourable members of parliament?

Joanna Cherry rolling her eyes is a shocking sequence, and has already gained over a million views on Twitter (Parliament TV)

I attended the Westminster Hall debate of the competing petitions calling for the Equality Act to be amended to redefine “sex” to mean biological sex (109,463 signatures), and not to do so (138,886 signatures). Around 30 MPs turned up to contribute to the debate, and there were some powerful speeches on both sides. In opening the debate Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour, Gower) called for respectful debate and at the end MPs congratulated themselves on how respectful the whole affair had been.

That wouldn’t be the impression you’d get if you were to look at social media, though. At one point SNP MP Kirsty Blackman was talking about the life struggles of a trans constituent. Caught on camera behind her, MP, lawyer and anti-trans campaigner Joanna Cherry MP KC (SNP, Edinburgh South West) gives the biggest eye-roll imaginable and then appears to mouth the words “What rubbish”. Rosie Duffield (Labour, Canterbury) puts her head in her hands and Neal Harvey (Alba, Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) plays along. It’s a shocking sequence, and has already gained over a million views on Twitter.