"Which Loo?" - Stories - Continued

What's all the fuss about London Pride?

Which Loo logo  London Pride 2008

Two and a half years after Aurora's "Which Loo?" document was endorsed by the Met Police, there were a series of problems with the loos in Trafalgar Square during London Pride (5th July 2008).

Trans women were prevented from using the Ladies loos and some were required to use the Gents.

Not all the facts are clear, but it seems that an off-duty LGBT liaison officer was called in and advised, wrongly, that the trans women would have to produce a Gender Recognition Certificate before they could use the Ladies Loo. (This persisted although an experienced trans campaigner brought a group of trans men, with beards and broken voices, but they were prevented from using the womens' loos.)

Both the police and the Pride organisers were very swift to correct things and to apologise. Many resulting issues emerged over the following weeks which are still being addressed at the time of writing (17-08-2008).

It is easy to dismiss the "Which Loo?" issue as if it was all sorted years ago, but serious problems can arise very easily. This incident lasted over many hours at a very well established LGBT event.

Probably many of the effects will never be reported but we know that they extended to sexual assault.

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