When I survey the battered wreckage of my country after the scourge of political correctness (PC) has wrought its havoc, it is hard not to despair.  PC is now so out of control that we find ourselves in a situation where nothing is sacred, from cultural icons to even what is written in our passports. There is no doubt in my mind that PC is a virulent sickness that is spreading into every aspect of our lives.

The emasculation of Doctor Who was greeted by the great and the good as a huge step forward in gender balancing and many rushed to point out that it is perfectly possible for the Doctor to regenerate as a woman.  No one seemed interested in whether it was actually a good idea from an audience and entertainment point of view.

You can’t help but feel sorry for the tens of thousands of little and, indeed, older boys, who will now have to accept that their hero has been irrevocably changed.  I doubt whether increased interest in the Time Lord (Time Lady?) from young girls will be enough to balance this out.  It is difficult to see how the programme makers can ever revert to a male actor in the role.  Having gone down the PC route, wouldn’t they find themselves accused of sexism?  In any event, I won’t be watching. The Doctor should be above politics and there is no way that this enforced change of gender is about anything other than politics.  The same applies to the endless clamour for the ludicrous idea of James Bond becoming Jamie Bond!

More recently, an equality campaigner has won the right to a judicial review of the Home Office’s refusal to issue gender neutral ‘X’ passports. This is apparently for the benefit of people who have ambiguity in regard to their sexual organs.  When asked in a radio interview how many people this involved, the equality campaigner responded that there was no way to be certain until the option to have an X passport was provided.  In other words, it doesn’t matter how few people are actually going to utilise this option and how impractical it is, so long as PC wins the day.

However, I learn that transgender people and many others on an increasingly long list of gender variants may also jump on the bandwagon.  If this review leads to a change in the law, one wonders how, in these security conscious times, other countries will respond to not knowing if a new arrival at their airports or ports is a man or a woman?  Moreover, it would be yet another triumph for PC dogma over common sense.

Much to my surprise, when I began researching this article, I discovered that there are 10 countries already issuing X passports, but notably the list does not include the United States, perhaps the most security conscious of potential destinations.   However, even with 10 countries involved, it is still a tiny proportion of the world.  I am irresistibly reminded of the wise saying: “The needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few or the one.”  Sadly, the logic of this very practical philosophy has long since been thrown overboard in modern Britain.

The examples are legion.  In July, London Transport confirmed, in a move supported by Mayor Sadiq Khan, that it was scrapping the term ‘Ladies and Gentlemen’ in public address announcements, in favour of more gender-neutral terms.  Apparently, the traditional form of address, is now ‘outdated’ and ‘polite but really belonging to yesterday’.  Apparently, this is for the benefit of the lesbian, gay, bi and trans communities.  A school in East Sussex has banned girls from wearing skirts, by introducing gender-neutral uniforms.  A Church of England primary school in the Diocese of Portsmouth allowed a boy to come to school in a skirt, which he sometimes but not always does.  He obviously can’t make up his mind which he prefers! This caused such confusion to one of the other pupils that his parents took it upon themselves, very bravely in my view, to remove him and his sibling from this establishment and to consider taking legal action against it.  I hope they succeed.

Even as I write, new stories emerge.  Perhaps most scandalously, it is being reported that record numbers of children are being referred to ‘gender reassignment doctors’.  This is apparently happening at a rate of 50 children per week.  Such referrals in the last 18 months included two four-year-olds, four five-year-olds and 17 children aged six.  These are primary school children, for heaven’s sake!  At these clinics, they are given counselling.  I do wonder if this counselling makes any effort to encourage them to stay with their existing gender or is all that swept away by the PC tidal wave?  These youngsters can subsequently be prescribed hormone blockers from the age of eleven, to delay puberty, which is horrifying.

Many children are slightly confused about their gender for a short time in their development.  This is, in my view, perfectly normal and it passes.  It certainly does not require heavy handed intervention from the blundering state.  Concern is now being expressed by organisations like the Christian Institute, Parents Out-loud and Conservative Woman website about children being steered down the wrong path in response to pressure coming from the media, which is obsessed by this issue.

However, the politicians must also take their share of the responsibility for this dangerous nonsense that so lets down our children at the most vulnerable time in their lives. I understand that there are now examples of youngsters who have been through this process and regret their gender decisions.

[Ed: Part 2 of Political Correctness will be published tomorrow here on UKIP Daily.]

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