Pride in London’s 2023 campaign is called Never March Alone: Championing Trans Allyship (Pictures: Getty)

‘Our trans siblings are human beings. All they want is to live their lives, to wake up in the morning and go to work, they want to be able to take their kids to school.

‘They don’t need to be vilified by the media or society or used as political pawns by politicians. It really is just them wanting to live their lives and that’s why there has to be an element of trans joy this year.’

This is what the CEO of Pride in London said as this year’s celebration kicks off today.

Christopher Joell-Deshields is hesitant to even mention other issues facing the LGBTQI+ community, insisting the ‘continued attack on trans people is what is pushing this country to the bottom of the barrel’.

And he didn’t mince his words when he told Metro.co.uk: ‘There is no Pride without the T – there will never be a Pride in London without the T.’

Pride in London announced their ‘Never March Alone: Championing Trans Allyship’ campaign earlier this year, saying they wanted to show the ‘joyful’ trans community they had their ‘full support’.

Several trans advocates helped develop the concept in the face of what one called an ‘influx of transphobic headlines and commentators’.

Someone wearing the colours of the trans flag at Pride in London in 2022 (Picture: Getty)

Protesters draped in rainbow Pride and trans flags in Soho (Picture: Getty)

Pride organisers believe showcasing ‘trans joy’ is an important part of protest (Picture: Getty)

Christopher says: ‘We realised that we as a community, we as a platform and as an event, needed to lend our allyship to the trans community.

‘So hence we are taking this on and stepping up with our trans community this year, as we do every year, but putting specific focus on them – to highlight the issues that they continue to experience and show that they’ll never be alone in terms of having those allies.

‘I think it’s important that we put most of our focus at this time on the trans community. They’re a community that is at their weakest point. They’re a marginalised community within a community.’

This year’s Pride parade route (Picture: Metro.co.uk)

Stonewall’s most recent report on the challenges trans people have to deal with looked at the year leading up to January 2018, and found two in five trans people had experienced a hate crime or incident.

The largest LGBTQI+ rights organisation in Europe also discovered half of the 800 trans and non-binary people they questioned felt they had to hide who they were in the workplace, often by dressing differently to their identities.

This was the state of things for trans people living in the UK five years ago, and the community ‘continues to come under attack’ today, Christopher said.

Pride in London wants ‘politicians to recognise the importance of trans rights’ (Picture: Getty)

Organisers believe ‘Pride is a protest and a celebration’ (Picture: Getty)

More than 600 LGBTQI+ community groups are joining the march last year

In May, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) issued the first guidance of its kind on the merits of changing the legal definition of ‘sex’ to mean only biological sex.

Currently, anyone with a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC) has their acquired gender recognised as their legal sex ‘for all purposes’ in the same way a cisgender person’s sex has.

Trans people can still be excluded from single-sex spaces, such as domestic violence shelters and sporting events, but organisers have to prove this exclusion is ‘necessary for the purposes of fair competition or safety’.

Under a new biological sex definition, there would be a ‘shift in favour of excluding trans women’ with organisations such as sporting bodies no longer required to justify barring their involvement.

This is just one of the many issues trans people are grappling with in the UK, a nation accused of maintaining a ‘hostile environment’ for the community.

TransActual, an organisation dedicated to tackling misinformation about trans people, used this phrase in its 2021 study.

Researchers surveyed 700 people and found ‘a disturbing but unsurprising picture of a community struggling to thrive in hard conditions’.

Christopher Joell-Deshields is the CEO of Pride in London (Picture: Pride in London)

Some 40% said they experienced transphobia when looking for housing, with the majority of those forced into homelessness at some point in their lives, and 63% feeling discriminated against when seeking employment.

Christopher says: ‘If we can get politicians to recognise the importance of trans rights and begin creating policies that will make life better for trans people then I can see our trajectory progressing. At the moment it just seems we are going backwards.

‘If we look at the rhetoric we’ve had previously, in particular for gay men, we’re starting to see that resurface. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s shifted entirely off gay men, but it is now focused on the trans community.’

Christopher wholeheartedly believes Pride in London is a place to tackle these issues, frequently mentioning the event is first and foremost a protest.

A record 1.5 million people attended last year’s Pride event in London (Picture: PA)

This may initially seem contrary to Pride’s focus on ‘trans joy’ this year, but Christopher believes the two elements are one and the same.

He added: ‘Protest takes many forms and, as I’ve said, Pride is a protest and a celebration.

‘Our campaign is heavy this year and will focus on the trans community and allyship. This is the first time we’re back after a two-year absence so we’re just getting back into the rhythm of being very visible on the streets.’

Pride in London’s parade is set to showcase nearly 600 groups with more than 32,000 participants. Last year saw a record 1.5 million people hit celebrate the 50th anniversary and organisers are hoping for a new record this year.

The parade will start at Hyde Park Corner at 12pm, and you can see more details about the route here.

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‘There is no Pride without the T – there will never be a Pride in London without the T.’