Perhaps the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth believed that announcing another round of handouts to activist NGOs might go unnoticed if he did so on Halloween – especially given the current reports of internal Cabinet tensions over his generosity on our behalf to others.
The latest tranche in the giveaway is €985,482 and 52 cents to 25 “LGBTI+ Community service-based projects.”
Welcoming his own decision, the Minister expressed his delight at how this will help to “support LGBTI+ persons in a range of ways, including health, counselling services, and celebrating Pride.”
Which is all very well and good if you believe that the state, via the pockets of the taxpayer, ought to be financially supporting political activism, which is what this mostly is.
The fact is that not only is the state funding this activism, it is facilitating it by seemingly pushing for a whole range of state departments and subsidiary bodies to host groups such as BeLongTo and the TransGender Equality Network (TENI).
As we have previously reported, these events, apart from having a clear ideological intent, have in at least one instance been the occasion for activists to make highly contentious statements. Both BeLongTo and TENI have again been successful in attracting funding from this new pot where they provide “training” to a seemingly large range of bodies.
BeLongTo has netted €70,000 to promote the “LGBTQ+ Quality Mark for Schools”, despite the controversy surrounding the revelation that the State funded organisation produced a handbook for teachers and youth workers which specifically instructs those professionals to lie to parents/guardians about their children.
What is the Quality Mark then? It would seem that it is another means by which people, in this case schools, teachers and pupils, are effectively compelled to participate in a programme and which is another invention of activists in other countries which has been adopted here. It appears to have begun in Britain within local authorities in 2012.
Incidentally, one of the key movers in all of this here was the Gay and Lesbian Equality Network (GLEN) – the recipient of more than $4 million from Atlantic Philanthropies – and which was effectively forced to close down in 2017 following revelations over the misuse of state funding.
Another item that jumps out is the €59,718.42 given to TENI for “Trans Inclusion – Sport for All.” There is already a Sport Ireland policy that seeks to support “transgender and non-binary participation in sport and physical activity,” and concerns have been expressed by women involved in sports including women’s gaelic football that Ireland will witness similar attempts to force the opening up of women’s sports to biological males as has happened in other countries.
TENI itself makes it quite apparent that it supports moves in that direction. Which it is perfectly entitled to. However, others are entitled to know why the state ought to be supporting an organisation which is pushing this agenda. The state does not fund, much less invite them to train state employees, groups which wish to preserve the integrity of women’s sports.
TENI’s reference to “gold standard” training, and the fact that so many state departments and public bodies appear to be obliged to accept being “trained” by TENI and others raises another spectre. Will such training and certification as we have seen with Athena SWAN become a Trojan Horse in which extremist ideology is smuggled into such bodies? Will TENI’s approval be necessary to ensure funding, or even appointments?
Who would then be the targets of this? Will schools be obliged to accept training from TENI?
Will your local GAA club or women’s soccer club or athletics club be compelled to accept that biological men should be allowed tog out with women and girls? Because, that is exactly what “transgender participation in sport” means. There is nothing preventing someone with gender dysphoria from playing any sport that is graded according to biological gender.
Also included in the list of successful grantees is Children’s Books Ireland who get a cheque for €10,000 for compiling another list of books for their Pride Reading Guide. It will be recalled that earlier this year that Children’s Books Ireland removed Juno Dawson’s This Book is Gay from that list. They reviewed the decision to include the book after complaints from parents and others, and agreed that much of the content was unsuitable for the age groups at which the list was directed.
There was a time when outgoing governments used to appoint lots of party loyalists to plum jobs for two purposes. First of all, it would ensure that said loyalists would remain loyal and perhaps ensure their re-election. Secondly, it would also ensure that even if the governing party or parties were to lose the election that their influence in key areas would continue.
Both of those considerations remain of course, but the increasing power of the NGOs means that looking after them has acquired a major significance. The massive funding of this sector, and particularly the prominence of the advocacy groups, will mean that no matter who wins any election that their power will remain.
This is especially the case given that not only are they receiving large amounts of public funding, but that they have been fully incorporated and embedded into the policy making and even administration of large parts of the state, from Government departments to schools.
Another part of this appears to have been revealed by a Parliamentary Question from Rural Independent TD for Laois/Offaly, Carol Nolan. Following a series of inquiries regarding the engagement of various government Departments with advocacy NGOs, Deputy Nolan received a response from SOLAS, the state agency which operates under the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science.
SOLAS informed Deputy Nolan that BeLongTo had conducted a webinar last February as part of an ‘Engaging with Diversity’ series. They also said that TENI had taken part in their ‘Civil Society Validation process.” That is a new one on me, I have to say.
Apparently this validation process forms part of a Public Sector Duty Implementation Plan. This has to do with government departments and agencies striving to eliminate discrimination and ensure equality and such like. All very well good, but why does any public body require that what they do be “validated” by an activist NGO?
We shall be making further enquiries.