This petition was submitted during the 2019-2024 parliament

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Petition Increase funding for NHS Transgender Services.

With unprecedented demand for transgender services, users are forced to wait an unreasonable amount of time to access the services they need. Additional funding to drop the waiting times (Stretching into years) is required and for local services to be able to care for transgender people.

More details

Recent data released by Gender Identity Clinics suggests that some transgender people are waiting in excess of 4 years to access services to give them a pathway to being comfortable in who they are. No other treatment pathway has waits this long for treatment and it is unacceptable. A move to localized treatment as well as additional funding can reduce the waiting times that transgender people have to endure.

This petition is closed This petition ran for 6 months

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Government responded

This response was given on 26 January 2021

The Government is providing additional resources and funding to help reduce waiting times for gender identity services, this includes the opening of more services in local health settings.

Both the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England (NHSE) have recognised that waiting times for gender identity services, driven by increasing demand, are unacceptably long, despite a £6 million increase in yearly funding since 2016/17.

To address this increase in waiting times for Gender Dysphoria Clinics (GDC), NHSE has concluded that a new delivery model was necessary; one that could offer access to specialist interventions in primary care and other local health settings. Three sites were identified to run as pilots for the new delivery model. These are in, London, Manchester, and Cheshire and Merseyside.

The first of these new services in London began seeing patients in July 2020. The service is run by Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trust and is sited alongside a specialist sexual heath service run by the trust. The second new service in Greater Manchester began seeing patients in December 2020 and the third service in Cheshire and Merseyside began seeing patients in January 2021. All these services will be assessed as pilots for 3 years, and planning is underway to establish further clinics in other parts of the country.

Alongside the procurement of new GDCs, additional surgical services have been secured - increasing clinical capacity for chest reconstruction surgery so that there is now sufficient capacity to meet the planned national case load. Due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the emergency suspension of elective procedures, this additional funding was not deployed in this way in 2020. However, NHSE will continue to set aside additional money in 2021/22 to fund the increased number of surgical procedures.

Whilst funding is important for services, it is recognised that having the right workforce is vital. To enable this the NHS has, in 2020, established the UKs first accredited post-graduate training credential in gender medicine. The course is delivered by the Royal College of Physicians and University of London with the aim to increase the professional workforce.

Department of Health and Social Care

Report on Reform of the Gender Recognition Act published by MPs

The Women and Equalities Committee has published a report looking at Reform of the Gender Recognition Act, and related areas.

Read the Committee's report: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5802/cmselect/cmwomeq/977/report.html

Among the recommendations made in its report the Committee has said that the Government should:

  • Remove the requirement of a 'gender dysphoria' diagnosis from the process of obtaining a Gender Recognition Certificate, thus de-medicalising transition.
  • Remove the requirement for trans people to have lived in their acquired gender for two years, as well as the need for spousal consent.
  • Clarify what the barriers are preventing non-binary people from gaining legal recognition
  • Urgently publish new guidance, incorporating worked examples and case studies, which would clarify where single-sex and separate-sex exceptions can be applied to the 2010 Equality Act.
  • Develop a specific healthcare strategy for transgender and non-binary people, including training for GPs around treating trans and non-binary patients and improved access to support services.

The report looks specifically at transgender healthcare, including issues raised with the Committee about capacity and waiting times, and the functioning and staffing of them. Read the chapter of the Committee's report about transgender healthcare: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5802/cmselect/cmwomeq/977/report.html#heading-6

Read more about the report, including a comment from Caroline Nokes MP, Chair of the Committee: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/328/women-and-equalities-committee/news/160020/gender-recognition-process-urgently-in-need-of-reform-say-mps/

What happens next?

The Government now must respond to the Committee's report, which was published on 21 December 2021, within two months. The Committee will publish the Government’s response here: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/328/women-and-equalities-committee/publications/

What is the Women and Equalities Committee?

The Women and Equalities Committee is a cross-party group of MPs appointed by the House of Commons to examine the work of the Government Equalities Office (GEO). It holds Government to account on equality law and policy, including the Equality Act 2010 and cross Government activity on equalities. It also scrutinises the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Find out more on their website: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/328/women-and-equalities-committee/

You can get updates on their work by following the Committee on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/Commonswomequ

This is a ‘select committee’. Find out how Select Committees work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_2RDuDs44c

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