Meghan Gallacher interview: I chose to break my maternity leave to vote on the GRR and I have no regrets

As most people began winding down for the Christmas break, MSPs began moving up a few gears, toiling in the Holyrood chamber late into the night as the Scottish Government strived to get its landmark Gender Recognition Reform (GRR) Bill signed, sealed and delivered ahead of the holiday.

Not everyone was happy with the timeframe they were given to get the job done, though. With members forced to sit past midnight to discuss well over 100 amendments in just two days, veteran Labour MSP Jackie Baillie made the point that exhausted politicians and good law-making do not go hand in hand.

For Meghan Gallacher, deputy leader of the Scottish Conservatives, there was an added issue. Having given birth to her daughter Charlotte in July, the representative for Central Scotland was coming to the end of her maternity leave when the debate was due to take place. She cut it short to take part, dialling in to proceedings from home, but as the time approached midnight on the first day of deliberations she was moved to make a point of order. Why, she asked the presiding officer, were members being forced to sit so late when many had other commitments outside the chamber to keep?

“In the run-up to the establishment of the Scottish Parliament, much was made of its proposed family-friendly principles,” she said. “As it stands, the parliament has today spent almost 10 hours debating the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill. Many MSPs, including me, have young families and they will have had to make last-minute arrangements for childcare. If the parliament is to conduct itself in such a way, Holyrood can no longer define itself as a family-friendly parliament.”

By the time we meet in Holyrood in the middle of January a lot has happened. Gallacher has returned to work full time and, though the GRR bill passed with a comfortable majority, the UK Government has used its powers under the Scotland Act to prevent it from being enacted, unleashing a constitutional battle in the process. Despite the controversy, Gallacher is clear that in using his Scotland Act veto, Scottish Secretary Alister Jack has made the right move, with the way now clear for the bill to be looked at afresh to turn “bad law that goes between cross-border issues into good law”. 

“Before I went on maternity leave I was the party spokesperson for this and looking at the bill I was instantly drawn, not necessarily to the intent of the bill, which I think is very honourable, but to the idea of bad-faith actors,” Gallacher says. “As we progressed through the committee sessions it became apparent that the issues being raised were not being addressed by the government. The amendment about convicted sex offenders was cross-party and we were really hoping that that one would pass [Tory justice spokesman Russell Findlay and Michelle Thomson of the SNP had tabled amendments that would have prevented those charged with or convicted of sexual offences from changing gender using self-ID, but they were dismissed in a series of whipped votes]. For me, I don’t think I’ll ever understand how that is appropriate.

"You’ve got the age argument as well in terms of 16-year-olds [the bill would lower the age at which people can apply for a Gender Recognition Certificate from 18 to 16]. We’ve not been very good in Scotland at defining when a child becomes an adult. It’s all over the place – you can get married at 16, but you can’t get a tattoo; you can’t buy alcohol, but you can vote. The GRR bill has muddied the waters more.”

A week after we meet, the Adam Graham/Isla Bryson story breaks and for days the news agenda is dominated by stories about how a convicted double rapist was briefly sent to a female prison by self-identifying as a trans woman prior to trial. Soon after, it is reported that another violent offender who began identifying as a trans woman after being convicted and incarcerated has been given permission to transfer to a female jail. Though there is an obvious point about both cases occurring without the GRR being in place, those who were against the bill stress they had warned it would embolden criminals such as Graham to act in bad faith and say the news proves their concerns were valid. 

I catch up with Gallacher in the wake of the initial reports. Things have moved on again since then, with the Scottish Prison Service putting a pause on the transfer of violent trans offenders and stating that newly convicted trans prisoners will now be put in an establishment “which aligns with their gender at birth” – something that is completely at odds with the spirit of gender reform as it will also apply to people who transitioned long before being convicted – but when we speak on the phone Gallacher is clear that the cases highlight areas of weakness in the GRR bill.

“The Scottish Government were told time and time again that these consequences could happen,” she says. “It’s disgraceful that we’re now in a situation where rapists have been able to access women’s safe spaces. Women prisoners are some of the most voiceless and vulnerable people in our society. To put them at risk is never acceptable and we did try to make sure this would never happen, but the SNP government knows better and now we’re in this situation. It shows they haven’t listened to the concerns of women or groups that brought forward evidence to say this would happen.

“When you go back to the voting, we were the only party that didn’t have a whipped vote. Given the concerns of politicians from all parties there should have been a free vote throughout. I’m wondering whether, if it hadn’t been whipped, that amendment [from Findlay and Thomson] would have passed or not. It should have passed – it related to a safeguarding issue that’s been raised again and again. The mechanisms are in place now [with the bill] for that to happen again. The amendment would at least have stopped that.”

The UK and Scottish governments appear to be in deadlock about what will happen next, with the former indicating it would lift its block if the GRR was reassessed and turned into something it was happy with, while prior to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announcing her resignation the latter vowed to take the matter to court. For Gallacher, the other issue she highlighted while the legislation was being debated remains live, though, and she tells me during our meeting in Holyrood that her own experience has led her to conclude that the Scottish Parliament is not a family-friendly place to work.

It was very late nights and people were tired. It doesn’t make for good law making.

“I chose to break my maternity leave to vote on the GRR and I have no regrets because I felt it was the right thing to do – I had to stand up for the multiple women who had contacted me,” she says. “It was difficult, though. At some points I had Charlotte in one hand and I was trying to vote with the other and because there were so many amendments they weren’t all voted on in one block. I had to be on the laptop for hours on end because you couldn’t guess when the votes were coming up.

“It was very late nights and people were tired. It doesn’t make for good law making. People are not at their best when they’re doing it for hours on end. The government needs to explain why this was brought in before Christmas. It wasn’t emergency legislation. It would have been more appropriate to have more time to scrutinise it and have the debate in the new year. I don’t understand why it had to be before Christmas. [Conservative MSPs] Jeremey Balfour and Roz McCall also spoke about their own disability needs and being family carers. It didn’t play out well in terms of public opinion and it didn’t reflect well on us as a parliament. It filled me with dread sitting up until that time when I had a five-month-old at home.”

When Gallacher entered parliament in 2021 it coincided with a number of other female MSPs standing down over concerns that their parliamentary commitments were not conducive to family life. Then communities secretary Aileen Campbell – the first member of government to take maternity leave – was among them, as were the SNP’s Gail Ross and Labour’s Jenny Marra. Gallacher says even taking maternity leave was hard, with no direct cover available for sitting parliamentarians. Returning to work has been challenging too, with no on-site childcare meaning she is often away from her baby daughter until late in the evening and has concerns about how quickly she would be able to get to her in an emergency. It is something the parliament must look at, she says, if it wants to prevent more parents of young children from shunning a career in politics.

“I am anxious as a first-time mum,” Gallacher says. “At the moment I’m an hour away from Charlotte and I’m fortunate in that, but it would still take me an hour if something happened to her to get to her and there is a bit of anxiety in that. I think that’s a mum thing, but it’s a lot to think about if you compare it to the hours you work because it’s not a normal nine to five – you can be in from eight to eight. If there was something put in place it would make life easier and it would allow any working MSP who has a child at home that flexibility.

“It’s a huge area we have to look at, especially in the Scottish Parliament. If you don’t look to provide support for people who are looking to start a family or have more children then history will repeat itself and MSPs will stand down. Previous MSPs decided their children came first – they couldn’t find the work-life balance to stay on as an MSP and we lost a wealth of talent. I don’t want history repeating itself it as I don’t think it’s a good message for the Scottish Parliament to be sending, particularly to women.”

Though maternity leave and proxy voting are available, Gallacher notes that the former is imperfect as MSPs have to remain contactable to deal with issues their offices cannot sign off on, while the latter is still to be put to the test. In any case, she feels that something far more wide reaching is required. As some MSPs have far longer commutes to parliament than she does, and many have to spend several nights a week in Edinburgh, she says that as a start on-site nursery provision would make juggling family and working life a more palatable proposition.

“We need to look at what Westminster does in terms of nursery provision,” she says. “There is a creche, but as it stands you can only use it for a couple of hours and that’s no use, particularly for people like me coming from the Central Belt – leaving before seven in the morning and not retuning, if decision time gets moved, until seven or eight at night. Originally the creche was meant for people who were taking part in committee evidence sessions or members of the public going on public tours, but it was offered to MSPs for a couple of hours. I wonder how many people in this building could benefit, and that goes beyond MSPs.       

“I’m not necessarily saying that would be the ultimate solution, but when you compare it to Westminster they have more than what happens here at Holyrood. What bugs me is that Holyrood claims to be a family-friendly parliament and it frustrates me – from what I’m experiencing they can’t claim to be family friendly. I’m not the only person to sort this problem – any other MSP with young children could join me on that. I want to send that message to other young women. We need someone to break the mould.”

Gallacher has already broken the mould elsewhere in that she was appointed deputy leader of the Scottish Tories just as she was about to go on maternity leave. Though party leader Douglas Ross had scrapped the position when he took on the top job in 2020, he reinstated it following what he termed the party’s “very disappointing” showing in last year’s local authority elections, when it lost 63 seats. Gallacher was just weeks away from taking leave at the time, but Ross said she had been given the nod due to her “outstanding” constituency work, adding that she “has a bright future in our party”.    

“When I was appointed deputy leader it was a surprise but a pleasant one and one that I take very seriously,” Gallacher says. “We’ve got a very important job to do. It’s really exciting because we have our conference in April and will be able to set out new political ideas that we’ve been working hard on and I think will be attractive. I’m really excited about what’s going on behind the scenes.”

The last time I interviewed Gallacher, Boris Johnson was still leading the Conservatives at Westminster and the controversy over the Covid rule-breaking that went on in Downing Street under his watch was still playing out. The Sue Gray report, which found Johnson was among those to have breached the rules, had not yet been published and, though Gallacher had raised concerns about what the then Prime Minister was reported to have done, she sought to distance herself from the impact it would have on the constituency she represents. The people of Central Scotland were, she said, more concerned about fly-tipping in the local area than they were about what the country’s leader may or may not have been getting up to.

When I mention Johnson to her this time she gives a knowing smile, then readily finds more complimentary words for current prime minister Rishi Sunak than she did for the one before last.     

“I’ve always said Boris Johnson is like Marmite,” she says. “For me, I’ll respect any and all party leaders because they have been elected by the party membership. Rishi will steady the ship and that’s what we need. He’s still very early into his time as prime minister [but] is settling in well. He’s definitely a change in terms of behaviours, mannerisms and how he conducts business. It was really exciting to have him in Scotland [Sunak visited the Highlands in early January]. It shows he has a real passion to level up in Scotland. I’m delighted that we have a prime minister that wants to make Scotland a focal point of the UK and I’m looking forward to him coming back for more visits.”

On Liz Truss, whose ill-fated 49-day premiership was sandwiched in between those of Johnson and Sunak, she has less to say, using the same diversionary tactic she did when we spoke about Johnson last year.

“I’m just so engrossed with the work I do here in the Scottish Parliament,” she says when asked whether last summer’s prime ministerial merry-go-round had damaged the Conservate cause in Scotland. “It’s things like kids schools where I live, potholes, why people are not able to see a GP when they want, why they can’t access A&E. There will be people who take an active interest in the deep spheres of the political realm, but it’s the day-to-day issues that I want to speak about. I’m hopeful now that we can move on.”

Moving on for Gallacher means moving the spotlight away from the Conservative Party at Westminster and onto the SNP’s apparent failures at Holyrood, something she believes deserves to be given far more attention than the ruling party’s ongoing plans to break up the UK via its unremitting commitment to independence.

“When you look at things like our NHS, education system, environmental targets, we are not where we need to be,” she says. “The SNP has been in power now for 15 years. I fail to see where they are making inroads. Their answer is that they want to hold a second independence referendum. I’ve no idea how they can use that as an argument when they can’t get the basics right. If they want to make improvements in a wide range of [devolved] areas they can, but they just say ‘if we had independence we’d be fine, we’d have a world-class education system again, an NHS that’s the envy of the world’. I’ve got no understanding of why they are promising an independence referendum over the priorities we all think about on a daily basis. The people we represent expect us to find solutions, but I just don’t see that.”