Brighton's continued status as pink capital of the free world will be called into question so long as Heather James remains a councillor.

Not only has she supported a transphobic campaign mounted against transwoman Sue Sheppard's lawful business in Portland Road, Hove (The Argus, February 4), but also, in attempting to back-pedal from her insult to the trans community, has shoved her hoof deeper into her own mouth.

"It is very important not to judge people by their sexuality", she writes of Sue

Sheppard (Letters, February 10). We agree with her. But what has Ms Sheppard's sexuality got to do with her gender identity?

Gender identity is not sexual orientation. Transsexuality is not a sub-set of lesbian and gay behaviour, of social, sexual and affective preference. It is a phenomenon in its own right. Like any other women, transwomen may be straight or lesbian. Many with gender identity disorder have little or no interest in, or experience of, sex. For a Brighton and Hove councillor to be unaware of such a basic fact about pink people she is supposed to be representing defies belief.

The Gender Reassignment Regulations 1999 already make it illegal to discriminate against us in the workplace.

Legislation now before Parliament will make xenophobia a crime for which a European arrest warrant can be issued. European law will thus put an end to petitions and hate campaigns of the kind with which Councillor James was pleased to associate herself until pink citizens brought her to task.

-Zoe Reitsch, Valerie Tinbergen and Stella Purvis, Trans-Suffragettes (Brighton Local), St Catherine's Terrace, Hove