Not interested!

J.K. Rowling does not want to join the British House of Lords

(Bild: APA/AFP/Tolga Akmen)

The successful British author J.K. Rowling does not want to be a member of the British House of Lords. She has already turned down an offer twice and would do so a third time. 

"It's considered bad form to talk about it, but given the special circumstances, I want to make an exception," wrote the Harry Potter author on the X platform (formerly Twitter).

"It's up to me"
"I've already turned down a Lordship twice, once under Labour, once under the Tories. If I was offered it a third time, I wouldn't accept it again. It's not up to her, it's up to me," Rowling wrote. The author was responding to statements made by Conservative politician Kemi Badenoch in a debate about the treatment of gender reassignment, particularly among teenagers.

Transgender debate
Badenoch, who is a candidate for the Tory party leadership, had stated in an interview that she had already successfully secured a seat in the House of Lords for pediatrician Hilary Cass and could do the same for Rowling if she was elected party leader. The background to this is the fierce transgender debate in the UK, in which Rowling has recently taken a rather conservative stance.

Rowling has repeatedly expressed criticism of a completely liberalized approach to trans people and warned of the dangers that she believes trans women could pose in girls' toilets, for example. On other issues, Rowling was heard more as a progressive voice in the kingdom's political discourse.

An investigation report presented by pediatrician Cass in April concluded months ago that there was insufficient research evidence to support the practice of prescribing medication for teenagers, including so-called puberty blockers, which prevent the onset of puberty characteristics such as menstruation, breast growth and voice change. Rowling had expressed her approval of the report.