Statistics in the service of ideology
The National Office for Community Safety in the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration is running an online consultation survey on community safety until Friday, 27th February 2026 as part of the development of the first ‘‘National Strategy for Improving Community Safety".
There are 12 questions on aspects of community safety with pre-determined Likert scale answers, for example, the question, ‘I feel safe in my community during the day' with available answers: strongly agree, somewhat agree, neither agree nor disagree, somewhat disagree, strongly disagree, don't know or prefer not to say. Question 13 contains an open test box for you to give your idea for one key action to improve community safety (using fewer than 100 words). The remainder of the questions collect demographic information.
It has been established in research, and common sense would also suggest, that women and men, while having many public safety issues in common, will also have safety concerns specific to their sex. Women, more so than men, carry keys in their hand as a potential defensive weapon when out walking at night, for example. Women are also the primary targets of certain crimes such as the placing of hidden cameras in public changing rooms and public bathrooms which is increasingly becoming an issue which circumscribes women’s access to public space, see here, here and here. The shadow of sexual assault complicates many women’s perceptions of public space in a way in which it doesn't for as many men.
So you'd think it would be useful and important to be able to break down the data produced by this survey by sex, female and male, but the survey does not do this. Instead it asks in question 15, “Which of the following describes how you think of yourself?” Only one option can be chosen from the answers available: female; male; non-binary/gender fluid; transgender; other; and prefer not to say.
Government departments have a duty to be politically impartial
This is such a nonsense question it is hard to know where to start to appraise it. It is informed by Queer Theory's contested idea of gender identity and conflates categories of sex and gender identity. Government departments have a duty to be politically impartial and this is not an impartial take on a contested ideology. The framing of the question in terms of how the respondent thinks of themselves forces the respondent to answer as if they too believe that everyone has a gender identity and that it is more relevant for one’s life experience than one’s sex. The ridiculousness of this framing is sharply highlighted by the fact that it is used in the context of public safety. Does it matter for her safety out walking at night whether a woman thinks she is a woman or not? If a man is walking behind that woman on a street at night, does it alter her sense of safety if he doesn't think himself a man?
Unfortunately this question is also likely to negatively affect the quality of the data produced by the survey when it is disaggregated by sex which may be a missed opportunity and a waste of public resources. In 2024, the UK Government was so concerned by the downgrading in statistical quality of the 2021 census gender identity question results (England and Wales Census), that it commissioned an independent review on the collection of all government data collected on sex and gender identity.
The "Review of data, statistics and research on sex and gender" led by Prof Alice Sullivan of University College London assisted by policy analysts Murray Blackburn Mackenzie, and Dr Kathryn Webb, University of Oxford and published in 2025 points out that "sex" in the ordinary meaning of the term, as in "sex at birth", is critical:
"Sex is a key demographic variable and collecting high quality, robust data on sex is critical to effective policymaking across a wide range of fields, from health and justice to education and the economy. It enables policymakers to measure and address disparities between women and men, and girls and boys. The Government has a strong interest in promoting high-quality data on sex, both in its role as a funder of research and as a producer and user of statistics."
The report recommended that for clarity and accuracy, government and other data collectors must include a question relating to sex, as in sex at birth. It recommends against using unimpartial language, such as sex being ‘observed’ at birth, because it is a perspective grounded in Queer Theory which not everyone subscribes to, and civil servants in particular, have an obligation to remain impartial.
Civil servants also have a duty to be impartial
Under the Standards in Public Office Commission (SIPO) Civil Service Code of Standards and Behaviour which Irish civil servants are required to adhere to, Irish civil servants also have a duty to be impartial. Surely asking what sex you think you are is also an endorsement of the idea that our sex is all in our heads rather than being expressed through our bodies? What evidence does the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration have that Irish people share this belief grounded in Queer Theory and if they don't, why are they forcing survey respondents to respond as if they do?
The UK Report on the collection of data on sex and gender identity also recognised that for some, their gender identity is important to them and that Government should also collect this data, as it does for religion and ethnicity, but to avoid confusion and any reduction in the quality of data on sex, this should be its own question and that it should be possible for people who do not believe in the idea that we all have a gender identity, to not have to answer it. Question 15 of this survey fails in this regard also.
Clear and accurate information should be the standard for government research so that all citizens can benefit from the better policy decisions that ought to be the result. When it comes to the important characteristic of sex, it is hard to see how the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration’s national survey on community safety will achieve that standard. Ireland's first National Strategy for Improving Community Safety will be poorer as a result.
And it is a missed opportunity for improving public safety for women.
