ALMOST everyone seemed united in their condemnation of Rishi Sunak’s anti-trans jibe at PMQs as the mother of murdered teenager Brianna Ghey (who was trans) was visiting Parliament.

While I’m glad that folk are rightly criticising the Prime Minister, the truth is, he has used his “you don’t know what a woman is” taunt almost every week at PMQs, which leads me to ask – why the outrage this week?

The jibe itself is cheap, unfunny, and downright transphobic. It is a neat and short little dog whistle, ringing out to bigots everywhere that the UK’s culture war is alive and well. Tory MP Lee Anderson himself said that the Tories are facing the next election without strong issues like Brexit, or defeating Corbyn, to motivate their supporters.

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Instead, they will focus on culture wars and the trans debate. He said the quiet bit out loud. He literally told us all that the Government’s focus on attacking the rights of trans people, a vulnerable group which makes up less than 1% of the population, is deliberate and purely because they are out of ideas. The worst part is – it’s working.

As despicable as that tactic is, no political party is innocent in this. I have sat in that Chamber and listened to transphobia from all sides of the house, and barely anyone bats an eyelid. To the point that mentioning anything LGBT+ is now either avoided altogether or is immediately labelled divisive and controversial. We are now either so ignorant of, or so desensitised to, the relentless targeting and questioning of trans people that we are more offended by bad manners than we are by bigotry.

By sinking to these depths, the Tories are re-inforcing all that is wrong with politics. They have become so careless with the power they hold that they will say anything to try to keep it. They will sink to any depths and risk dragging us all with them.

Even when we look to Labour, he may not quite have sunk to the levels of Sunak yet, but Keir Starmer has made clear that he too will say anything if he thinks it will get him closer to power.

Under Starmer’s leadership, it was announced this week that Labour have scrapped their £28 billion green investment plan. This is despite Starmer saying in an interview only days earlier that green investment was “desperately needed”.

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Environmental charities and groups across the UK have been quick to slam Labour on this latest change of direction and rightly so. There is no doubt that global warming is one of the – if not the – biggest threats facing every nation on Earth.

There is no doubt we are running out of time to prevent global catastrophe, yet we have the likely next prime minister of the UK scrapping investment that aims to avert it. I empathise, and often agree, that the things politicians say sound worthless. It is a perfectly understandable viewpoint given how often people are let down by governments and the people representing them.

However, expecting to always be let down should not mean accepting always being let down. Accepting it only feeds a vicious cycle. Never believing what politicians say tacitly condones politicians just saying whatever they think will work. If no-one believes them anyway, they can promise anything with no real accountability when they inevitably renege on it. Once they renege, the public understandably trusts nothing and so the cycle continues.

Our entire way of politics needs to change, and Westminster is at the heart of it. The next election is an opportunity to do it.

We need more humanity in the corridors of power. We deserve to have politicians held to the promises they make. We deserve politicians who make promises they truly intend to keep. Most importantly, we need to vote for it.