A British politician who pushed for gender-neutral bathrooms was charged with nine counts of sexually touching a child. David Smith,30, from Middlesborough advocated for gender neutral bathrooms in council buildings just last month. Smith pushed for Middleborough to become a gender-neutral town. He said his support for gender-neutral bathrooms came after he had positive interactions with transgender and non-binary people.
Smith said:
Through my time interacting with local transgender and non-binary people, I’ve seen first hand the difficulties faced by these individuals when accessing public toilets and changing rooms.
The feeling of humiliation is an experience that most of us don’t go through when visiting a public toilet and, in 2019, that is simply unacceptable.
Smith claimed his innocence and vowed to fight the nine charges.
BBC reported:
An English town councillor who hopes to make government-owned facilities gender-neutral has been charged with nine counts of sexually touching a child.
David Smith, 30, represents Coulby Newham, a suburb of Middlesbrough, in the Yorkshire town’s local government, or council. Since his arrest, he has resigned from membership in the Conservative Party, but not from his position.
…After charges of child sex assault were laid against him, Smith released a statement describing the work he had done as a Middlesbrough councillor, making special mention of his LGBT advocacy.
“I have worked hard to ensure I serve the people of Coulby Newham to the best of my ability,” he wrote.
“From tackling the issue of potholes, ordering bollards to be installed to ensure the public stop parking on a resident’s property, highlighting the ever increasing issue of drug use and being a very proud advocate of the local LGBTQ community,” he continued.
Smith is due for a court appearance on August 7th
