Tory MP demands BBC censor transgender TV shows
Conservative MP, Peter Bone, addresses the audience during the launch of the “Grassroots Out”, a new cross-party group that will campaign for the UK to leave the European Union, in the Kettering Conference Centre in Kettering, north of London, on January 23, 2016. An in-or-out referendum on Britain’s membership of the bloc will be held by the end of 2017, with British Prime Minister David Cameron hoping to strike a deal on renegotiating Britain’s ties, before campaigning to stay in the union. AFP PHOTO / LEON NEAL / AFP / LEON NEAL (Photo credit should read LEON NEAL/AFP/Getty Images)
A Tory MP has demanded the BBC censor a show about transgender kids.
The ultra-conservative MP for Wellingborough, Peter Bone, made the extraordinary claim after the Mail on Sunday ran a misleading story about a kids’ TV show.
The CBBC show, Just A Girl, follows 11-year-old Amy on her journey to get hormone control and begin her transition.
The newspaper claimed the show was “‘sowing the seeds of confusion” into young viewers’ minds and encouraging children to get “sex changes” – even though under-18s do not receive hormones or gender surgery in the UK. Teenagers can receive drugs to delay the onset of puberty, but their effects are entirely reversible.
In response to the article Mr Bone, who has been an MP since 2005 and consistently voted against every single LGBT rights measure, called on the broadcaster to censor the show.
He said: “It beggars belief that the BBC is making this programme freely available to children as young as six. I entirely share the anger of parents who just want to let children be children.
“It is completely inappropriate for such material to be on the CBBC website and I shall be writing to BBC bosses to demand they take it down as soon as possible.”
Another Conservative MP, Julian Brazier, fumed: “This programme is very disappointing and inappropriate. Children are very impressionable and this is going to confuse and worry them.”
