Mick Hartley

More excitement from brave new Scotland:

Writers in Scotland have warned that a code of conduct imposed by a national book charity threatens to infringe on the free speech of authors and poets who disagree with “gender identity theory”.

The Scottish Book Trust sent the code to 600 writers on its Live Literature register, advising that they must sign up in order to keep their listing. Inclusion on the register is essential for writers, poets and spoken-word artists who want to earn a living from public events in schools and libraries.

Magi Gibson, a poet whose collections include Wild Women of a Certain Age, said she had previously signed up to the code but was “deeply troubled” by the new version. In a letter to Marc Lambert, the trust chief executive, she said the code “states you will not tolerate bigotry and transphobia. Certainly in the mode in which these terms were used many years ago I would have agreed.

“This is not many years ago, and you are using these terms as if there is still a safe, neutral application. Yet both these terms are weaponised day in, day out, not to achieve fairness and equality but simply to damage someone — usually a woman — who has legitimate beliefs protected under the Equality Act 2010.”

The trust is a national charity whose mission is to promote literature, reading and writing. Its income for 2020-21 was £4.8 million, 86 per cent of which came from the Scottish government. Critics of the trust fear it is toeing the government line.

That would appear to be a very reasonable assumption, considering where the money comes from.

Gibson, 69, who was appointed Stirling’s makar in 2019, said she feared the code “discriminates against those writers, especially women, lesbians and gay men, who do not believe in gender identity theory.”

She said: “I fear this code . . . is an infringement on the free speech of authors and poets in Scotland, and inadvertently provides to bad-faith actors a licence to harass writers who may be deemed to have breached it.”

She was supported by Gillian Philip, an author and gender critical campaigner who has left the trust. She said: “This code . . . is an attempt to compel thought, belief and speech.”

That, again, would appear to be a very reasonable assumption.

It's turning into quite the one-party state.