¶ Alasdair Henderson
Alasdair Henderson is a UK lawyer and Christian anti-trans activist who has served as an EHRC commissioner since 2018. As early as 2020, leaked emails show him actively seeking anti-trans cases for EHRC to participate in. He's been involved in a number of prominent anti-trans campaigns, representing Bell in the Bell v. Tavistock (2019-2021) case that stripped trans children of access to puberty blockers in the NHS. At least some of his time at EHRC overlaps with his other anti-trans activism.[1]
¶ Known Anti-Trans Activism
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He was involved in the Bell v. Tavistock court case on the plaintiff's side, which removed access to puberty blockers from trans children on the NHS. [2]
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He wrote positively about anti-trans court rulings the Gender Critical movement achieved, advising employers not to take sides. [3]
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He was vice-chair of the Lawyer's Christian Fellowship, at a time they were partnering with the ADF, an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group.[4]
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On September 20, 2020, he emailed two associates at the EHRC (Alasdair Pringle and Adam Sowerbutts) asking for cases the EHRC might intervene in on the basis of free speech in relation to trans rights. He suggests Forstater, which the EHRC does intervene in.
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Some EHRC staff apparently didn't know about his involvement in the Bell v. Tavistock case, but on at least some occasions, he disclosed the conflict and was none-the-less allowed to continue to work on it.
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The EHRC claims that they were investigating him for his homophobic and transphobic activity on social media. There is, to date, no evidence that these investigations ever went anywhere.[6]
¶ Other Notable Work
- In addition, Alasdair recently led the investigation into antisemitism in the Labour Party[7][8], which has been widely discredited as overstated[9][10].
- After he was appointed to review sex education, OpenDemocracy revealed that he had worked for Christian Concern, and anti-LGBTQ+ hate group that also opposes abortion and contraception.[11]
- He's also been caught liking racist and sexist posts.[12]
¶ Contact Details
Email: Alasdair.Henderson@equalityhumanrights.com
¶ Further Discussion
At surface, Alasdair Henderson seems fairly unimportant, a boring functionary. But when you look at all the different things he's been involved in, you start to realize that he's at the center of the advance of right-wing Evangelical Christianity to a unique degree. He was appointed by the Tories to the EHRC, and he then used that appointment to investigate the opposition Labour Party, which resulted in that party's leadership gaining the basis to entrench their control over the party and siffle dissent. Which means that the new leadership and Prime Minister Keir Starmer are considerably in his debt. He got puberty blockers taken away from trans kids for a time, appears to support the gender critical movement and actively seeks their engagement, and suddenly so does the Labour Party's leadership.
Understanding the infiltration of anti-trans functionaries into institutions in the UK starts with recognizing his role.
¶ Clear Hypocrisy and Double Standards
As early as November of 2020, Henderson was caught liking Tweets that were deeply transphobic and homophobic, undermining any confidence that he could be trusted to protect the trans rights that it is supposed to be his job to protect.[6:1] The EHRC was aware of these allegations, and yet to this day, there is no evidence that these investigations have gone anywhere or resulted in any kind of penalties for Henderson.
An EHRC spokesperson said it will “be looking into [Henderson’s] use of social media and the issues raised.”
But all the more glaring is the hypocrisy in the allegations he leveled against the Labour, which included the allegation that they failed to adequately investigate social media Tweets and shares that were deemed antisemitic. This reinforces the reality that there is a hierarchy of protections, with trans people being entitled to no protections. In fact, at virtually the same time he was making these allegations against Labour, he was seeking to justify transphobia on the grounds of free speech using his official EHRC email from other EHRC staff and commissioners.
If Labour under Corbyn was systematically antisemitic, the EHRC is systematically transphobic. When will the EHRC open an investigation into itself?
¶ Apparent Ethics Breaches
Despite his massive history of clear anti-trans animus and activities, Henderson has been involved in a number of EHRC actions on the subject of trans rights. When the commissioners were contemplating rolling back trans right in the EA2010 and the GRC process, there is no evidence that he ever declared a conflict of interest or recused himself from those deliberations, despite the fact that at least his other gender crtical collegues did. His work on Tavistock alone should have raised questions on his fairness and eligibility to trans people should have been enough to disqualify him. So should the fact that he faced an EHRC investigation in 2020 for homophobia and transphobia. And yet, the meeting minutes of the relevant board meetings suggest he did participate.
Trans people will never be able to trust a human rights regulator that allows such people to decide on their rights.
Profile of Alasdair Henderson Commissioner at Equality and Human Rights Commission ↩︎
Vice-Chair of the trustees of the Lawyer's Christian Fellowship ↩︎
Equality watchdog commissioner liked tweet saying homophobe is a ‘highly ideological propaganda term’ ↩︎ ↩︎
Labour responsible for harassment and discrimination, EHRC antisemitism inquiry finds ↩︎
Legal analysis blows apart EHRC's "Labour anti-Semitism" report ↩︎