Rosie Duffield: The brave MP shunned by Starmer for defending women

As Rosie Duffield becomes the fastest MP to quit after a General Election in modern history, here’s a look back at her time in office and the controversies surrounding it.

Duffield has served as MP for Canterbury since 2017 and has been a vocal supporter of women’s rights, particularly concerning the debate on gender and what it means to be a woman.

In August 2020 Duffield published a post on X, formerly Twitter, stating: “I'm a 'transphobe' for knowing that only women have a cervix....?!”

Keir Starmer later criticised Duffield for the post, saying that her comment “is something that shouldn’t be said. It’s not right”, but the current Prime Minister has since doubled down on this in an interview that took place earlier this year.

When asked on ITV’s Good Morning Britain back in April whether Duffield’s statement was right or wrong, Starmer stated: “Biologically, she of course is right about that.”

However, he declined to apologise to the Canterbury MP but stated the pair get along “very well”.

Duffield has said she believes there should be protected spaces where people who were born male are not allowed access, like domestic violence refuges and prisons. She is against people being able to self-identify as trans to gain access to those spaces.

Her position on transgender rights has put her in the firing line of a lot of criticism, and even death threats.

In 2023 Glen Mullen, 31, posted audio clips on X in which he threatened to kill the gender-critical author JK Rowling "with a big hammer" and said he would see Rosie Duffield "at the bar with a big gun".

Mullen admitted the offence and was given two eight-week prison sentences suspended for two years.

In August 2020, a lesbian woman and staff member quit Duffield's team, citing the MP’s stance as transphobic and claiming it had brought an influx of transphobic and homophobic mail to the MP's office in support of the remarks. In October 2020, a second member of Duffield's team resigned saying Duffield had "overtly transphobic views".

This morning Duffield was asked whether she thought the Prime Minister had "a problem with women", to which she told the BBC: "I'm afraid I do, yes.

"I mean I have experienced it myself, but most backbenchers I'm friends with are women and most of us refer to the men that surround him, the young men, as 'the lads' and it's very clear that the lads are in charge.

"They have now got their Downing Street passes, they are the same lads who were briefing against me in the papers and other prominent female MPs and I was really hoping for better but it wasn't to be."

Now Duffield finds herself at the centre of the latest scandal to impact the government, resigning from the Labour Party and issuing a damning resignation letter in the process.

In the letter she states: “The sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice are off the scale. I am so ashamed of what you and your inner circle have done to tarnish and humiliate our once proud party.”

She also cited the government's decision to keep the two-child benefit cap “which entrenches children in poverty” as a reason for her resignation.

In an interview with the Sunday Times this weekend she denies that her gender-critical views have anything to do with her resignation.

She said: “With my [gender critical] views, all I wanted was for those views to be taken seriously and discussed and I think as a movement the Labour Party has shifted and we are talking about those things now.”

“I and others put it on the agenda by basically being very loud about women’s rights and I am glad it is now a mainstream discussion, but that’s not why I am leaving the Labour Party. The Labour Party has left me.”