Stella Creasy hates questions

There are some MPs whose contribution to the democratic process often seems to consist largely of asking, “Does my ego look big in this?” on social media. Stella Creasy is one such specimen.

Earlier this week, the Walthamstow MP posted a video where she valiantly attempted to explain parliamentary procedure, the use of statutory instruments and to justify her decision to sponsor an Early Day Motion aimed at blocking the EHRC’s revised Code of Practice. Unfortunately, her grasp of the subject was somewhat less secure than her confidence. 

Proposed by Nadia Whittome, once the Baby of the House and now its stroppiest toddler, the EDM calls on Parliament to “disapprove” guidance for business and charities on how to comply with the Equality Act (2010). In essence, it is a piece of administrative virtue signalling: a way for a handful of Labour, Liberal Democrat and SNP MPs to reassure activists that they are every bit as dim or deranged as the Greens. 

Lawyers, constitutional nerds and hundreds of better-informed X users swiftly descended to explain to Creasy that not liking the law, and specifically the single-sex exemptions, is not grounds for attempting to derail the guidance. Among them was the formidable former EHRC commissioner Akua Reindorf KC, who posed a simple question:

Stella, simply put, the Code is not law. Therefore it’s not apt for parliamentary scrutiny.

Please could you tell us what your objections to it are? It must be either that you think the Code has got the law wrong, or that you think the law is wrong.

This did not dent Creasy’s resolve or breezy confidence.

“Well clearly I think the code isn’t right because I am supporting measures to prevent its application,” she explained to another sceptical lawyer, Dennis Kavanagh. To date, despite multiple attempts to extract an answer on X, Creasy has not managed to explain what it is about the code she thinks “isn’t right”.

The logic of the EDM is a bit like shouting at a map because you don’t like where the road goes. As journalist Sonia Sodha astutely observed:

If you don’t like what the law says, you need to advocate for changes to the law to enable single-sex facilities and services to operate instead as single-gender-identity facilities and services…

But the last couple of weeks have made painfully clear that there are MPs who are either not bright enough to understand this, or too dishonest to say they disagree with the law as it stands, and so who resort to attacking the EHRC instead.

Creasy belongs to a class of politicians that treat criticism not as evidence they might be wrong, but as proof they must be right. Having decided her detractors are nasty people, she takes their mockery, superior knowledge or probing questions as confirmation of her own virtue. The fact that she is a public figure with huge responsibility, and therefore subject to scrutiny, appears not to trouble her. To Creasy, comments are not about her politics, they are all, always, personal.

What Whittome, Creasy and their fellow EDM signatories are doing is about more than the EHRC Code. It is a struggle for anti-establishment kudos. It is the political equivalent of cringe-inducing dad dancing at the school disco (something for which Creasy has form). Or perhaps, in their cases, ballot box botox. 

Whittome arrived in Parliament as its youngest member. Today she’s thirty and sits on the Women and Equalities Committee. Creasy has been in Westminster so long she probably has parliamentary stationery older than some of her supporters. Neither can plausibly present themselves as ingenues, outsiders or disruptors any more.

This is what the EDM is really about. It’s a mating display — an attempt to woo prospective Green voters through video content and pointless administrative shots. It is doubtless also a way for these middle-aged politicians to fend off the suspicion that they might be out of touch.

Look at me, says the EDM. I’m still one of the good ones. I’m still resisting power. I’m still sticking it to the man. The problem, of course, is that after years in Parliament they are the self-identified man.

Which is perhaps why the whole thing feels so desperate. The EHRC Code reflects the law. Blocking it wouldn’t change the law. The Supreme Court judgment would still stand. Single-sex services would still be lawful. The only thing the EDM can realistically achieve is a few approving nods from activists and perhaps the faint hope that Zack Polanski won’t come for your seat.