Shaneel Lal: Winston Peters’ transgender women’s bathroom ban is a vibes for votes policy

Winston Peters becoming a champion for cisgender women’s safety is news to me, says Shaneel Lal. Photo / NZME

OPINION

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has announced a party policy to pass legislation prohibiting transgender women from accessing women’s public toilets and bathrooms.

When peeing with the door closed became a genuine issue is lost on me, but here we are, the man who could become our deputy prime minister again (good grief!) treating how and where people pee or poop as the issue that will make or break our country.

Peters insists his policy is about “standing up” for cisgender women’s “safety”.

There has been a concerted effort by some conservative politicians to portray transgender women as a threat to cisgender women. The reality is that these politicians have put forward zero evidence to support their suggestion that transgender women compromise the safety of cisgender women in public toilets and bathrooms.

A hint: it’s because they don’t.

Peters becoming a champion for cisgender women’s safety is news to me. Just three years ago, as the deputy prime minister, he voted against the Abortion Legislation Act which gave people unrestricted access to abortion within the first 20 weeks of pregnancy. It repealed sections of the Crimes Act relating to illegal abortions.

The inability to access safe abortions is a real and significant threat to cisgender women’s safety. Transgender women using the same toilets and bathrooms as cisgender women has always been and is a non-issue.

Peters’ selective memory and hypocrisy aside, how Peters intends to enforce his policy is unexplained. Will he assign a police officer to every public toilet in the country who will demand women present an ID before entering?

Even if people were required to present an ID, the Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Act allows transgender men to identify as men and transgender women to identify as women on their ID without undergoing surgery. The only way to enforce Peters’ policy is to strip people naked and inspect their body parts.

It’s so poorly thought out it will have the impact of hurting all cisgender women who aren’t feminine.

There are numerous reports of incidents overseas of masculine cisgender women being harassed in public toilets as a result of transphobia. In one incident, a policeman removed a cisgender woman from a women’s toilet because she was masculine, dressed in baggy clothes and did not have an ID. Other women were not checked for their ID.

In his policy announced on X (formerly Twitter), Peters claims it is his position that the “Government has no business in the nation’s bedrooms”. Apparently, it does in our bathrooms. Peters justifies his encroachment into the nation’s bathrooms by declaring it “commonsense, safety, and fairness for everyone”.

I feel obliged to ask: was Peters’ common sense and self-proclaimed desire for safety and fairness grazing cows when he voted against decriminalising homosexuality and allowing same-sex civil union and marriage? History shows us Peters has no issue with making exceptions to his stance on state non-interference when passing laws against the queer community.

We do not pass legislation restricting people’s liberty without any concrete evidence of its necessity. Peters has put forward zero evidence for the need for his policy. In my opinion, all Peters is doing is vibes for votes.

The upcoming election demands serious contenders who will address real issues like the soaring cost of living, the climate crisis and the unignorable impact of disinformation on our social cohesion, not politicians concerned about the nation’s genitals. Peters needs to crawl out of the nation’s bedrooms and bathrooms and back into the cave he is pulling his ideas out of.

Shaneel Shavneel Lal (they/them) was instrumental in the bill to ban conversion therapy in New Zealand. They are a law and psychology student, model and influencer.