Tory MSP Sue Webber calls for Rape Crisis Scotland chief to go

Tory MSP Sue Webber has called for the resignation of Rape Crisis Scotland (RCS) chief executive Sandy Brindley.

It follows the publication of an independent report, commissioned by RCS, found that Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre (ERCC) has failed to protect single-sex spaces.

The chief executive of ERCC, Mridul Wadhwa, stepped down from the role last week, having been criticised in the report for having “failed to set professional standards of behaviour”.

Speaking in parliament on Tuesday, Webber said there needed to be a “complete reset” within ERCC, RCS and the Scottish Government “so that women’s safety rather than gender ideology takes precedence when it comes to tackling violence against women and girls”.

She added: “It’s time for the leadership of the ERCC to step down and, indeed, to allow for an entire change of culture, so too should the chief executive of Rape Crisis Scotland who championed the very policies that have been the centre of this entire caustic situation.”

Equalities minister Kaukab Stewart said employment processes and decisions were the responsibility of individual organisations, not the Scottish Government.

She added: “It is totally unacceptable – as the report makes clear – that survivors were let down by a core failure of Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre to deliver services to NSS [National Service Standards] standard.”

The minister welcomed that the ERCC’s board has agreed to implement all the recommendations from the report, and added the centre should be “given the space to continue to rebuild the service and confidence within it”.

Alba’s Ash Regan said the government “cannot distance” itself from the situation and called on it to “show leadership” by investigating how Wadhwa, a trans women who does not hold a gender recognition certificate, was able to get the role of chief executive in the first place.

Stewart said the government “strongly supports” the exemption on the Equalities Act which allows for posts to be designated single sex.

She added: “We would expect that the wishes of survivors about the sex of their support worker to be followed.”