As part of LGBTQ History Month, we recognise people that made a change and today it is Christine Burns, MBE (born February 1954), who is a British political activist best known for her work with Press for Change and, more recently, as an internationally recognized health adviser. Burns was awarded an MBE in 2005 in recognition of her work representing transgender people. In 2011, she ranked 35th on the Independent on Sunday's annual Pink List of influential lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in the United Kingdom.
Burns joined Press for Change in 1993, but only made her transsexual background public in 1995. She was able to maintain her initial privacy as early PFC campaigns were paper based and, as such, fairly low key. She would go on to become a leading figure in obtaining legal recognition for trans people. Representing PFC, Burns joined the Parliamentary Forum on Transsexualism shortly after it was set up in early 1995. She was also elected to sit on the policy governing council of the Human Rights NGO, Liberty.
Burn was one of PFC's principal negotiators with Ministers and Civil Servants during the drafting of, and tabling and debating, the Gender Recognition Bill.
In 2005, Burns began to focus on the media and healthcare. She left PFC in November 2007 to pursue strategic issues with public officials and to mentor younger activists.
In 2007, she told the BBC about the rights which she helped win for trans people: "Back in 1992, when Press For Change was started, [trans people] had no employment rights, they couldn't marry, they had no right to privacy and all of those things have been achieved by changes in the law ... I'm a transsexual woman, I'm now regarded as being a woman in the eyes of the law, it means that affects my retirement age, it means that I can marry a man and it also provides me with considerable protection of my privacy. So, for instance, if I disclose my transsexual background to someone in an official capacity and that person then goes off and blabs to somebody else - then that's a criminal offence."