Help & Advice - Transgender and transsexual

a:gender is the support network for staff in government departments / agencies who have changed or need to change permanently their perceived gender, or who identify as intersex.

The numbers of TS/TG staff in individual departments are relatively small and some LGB networks in the civil service will not support TS/TG staff who identify as heterosexual, the issue being one of gender identity and not sexual orientation. This can reinforce feelings of isolation and exclusion. A group of originally Home Office staff decided to form a network that embraced TS/TG and intersex staff across the whole civil service, and its agencies and associated departments/offices.

Proud2Serve.net is wholly inclusive of all TS/TG personnel and is very firmly an integrated LGBT resource.

Drawing on its pool of inter-departmental trans expertise, a:gender have worked to raise awareness and understanding through presentations and training and have also developed guidance on a variety of issues such as: gender transition related workplace absence and on securing privacy of trans personnel records.

They also won the 2006 Civil Service Diversity and Equality Award for Inspiration, recognising the "passion, personal risk, courage and inspiring way in which the network has conducted itself over the last few years in lobbying persistently for trans-rights and equality in the workplace. For the leadership of a:gender, this has meant forsaking the privacy they sought and volunteering to face potential discrimination, as they challenged entrenched prejudice and misconceptions regarding transsexual or transgender people."

http://www.agender.org.uk/index.asp