Wes Streeting threatened with legal action over trans sex hormones failure

A legal letter, threatening High Court action comes from detransitioner 28-year-old Keira Bell, campaigning group Bayswater Support and a parent known as EF, who accuse Mr Streeting of “dragging his feet” while children continue to receive life-altering drugs through private and overseas clinics.

It follows High Court proceedings in which judges explicitly flagged the seriousness of the issue.

At a hearing in May, the court said: “The Secretary of State will no doubt treat those issues with the urgency and the intensity of review which they require.”The claimants say that urgency has not materialised.

Mr Streeting established a working group in April to examine the risks of cross-sex hormones being prescribed to under-18s outside the NHS. It was meant to report within eight weeks. According to the claimants, nothing has been published and no ban has been announced.

Keira Bell, who previously took the Tavistock gender clinic to court, says she was given puberty blockers and testosterone as a teenager - decisions she now deeply regrets. She says the drugs have left her with facial hair, a deepened voice, sexual dysfunction and possible infertility.

She said: “I’m mortified at the damage that I was allowed to inflict on myself from the age of 16, all under the care of medical professionals. These cross-sex hormones lead to irrevocable damage. Children cannot properly consent to their use. Wes Streeting has rightly banned puberty blockers: this is the logical next step.”

She added: “The court recognised in May the need to urgently review their use in England. Wes Streeting agreed to do that review. We’re now months over the due date - why is he dragging his feet? While he delays, more children are being put on a life-changing path which leads to poor health outcomes and mental distress.”

Paul Conrathe, partner at Conrathe Gardner LLP, acting for the claimants, said the delay is indefensible.

He said: “The Court mandated this review and recognised its urgency, but the Secretary of Health seems to have put it on the back burner. We must not stand by and allow our children and young people to continue to be medicalised in this way.”

He added: “Private GP practices are specialising in the provision of cross sex hormones, assuring children they can receive them in ‘just 2–3 weeks’. This negligent treatment of our young people is a scandal, but a scandal Wes Streeting can stop if he puts his mind to it.”

The Bayswater Support Group, which represents parents of trans-identified children, says private prescribing is putting vulnerable young people at risk.

A spokesman said “Cross-sex hormones turn healthy children into medical patients, with lifelong consequences. Altering the body is not an effective way to treat psychological pain. Our children deserve safe, compassionate support rather than exploitation of their vulnerability.”

They added: “It is well past time to recognise that the unregulated supply of such drugs to children is criminal.”

Another claimant, a parent known as EF, said: “I have watched a healthy teenage girl sacrifice herself to a gender cult that has promoted the taking of life-changing medication, the undergoing of irreversible surgeries and potential sudden death.”
The case reignites the national row over how children with gender distress are treated.

While the Government has already moved to restrict puberty blockers, campaigners argue there is still a loophole allowing cross-sex hormones such as testosterone and oestrogen to be prescribed privately to under-18s.