Celebrating Pride Month and our Armed Forces colleagues - event 30th June 2pm - 3pm

On 30th June in celebration of Pride month, NHS Business Service Authority will be hosting a truly inspirational speaker who will be talking about her journey and experience of coming out to the army and her family and friends as Transgender in 2004. 

WO2 Deborah Penny deployed to Afghanistan (Op Herrick) in 2012 on her first of two tours and was the first Transgender soldier in an operational theatre.  Following this she used her experiences to provide advice to the Chain of Command on Transgender issues and set up a network for women and LGBTQ+ personnel at Bovington Garrison.

The session will take place on 30th June between 2pm - 3pm via Teams - please click here to join the call.

WO2 Penny

WO2 Penny was born 1966 in Karachi West, Pakistan, she joined the army in September 1982 and joined her first unit (19 Fd Regt RA) in Germany in January 1984. In 1986 she returned to UK and completed the Commando Course and subsequently served with 29 Commando Regiment Royal Artillery until 1999. 

In 1999 she transferred to the Royal Logistics Corps (RLC) as an Ammunition Technician and qualified as an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) Operator.  On promotion to Sgt in she was assigned to 621 EOD Squadron RLC.

She has also served as an instructor at the Amy School of Ammunition, Kineton and as the Ammunition Warrant Officer for Bovington and Lulworth.

Throughout her career, WO2 Penny has deployed on overseas exercises to the United States of America, Belize, Sardinia, Norway, Belize and Brunei and she has undertaken operational deployments to Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Iraq and Afghanistan.

WO2 Penny came out to the army and her family and friends as Transgender in 2004. After two years she was able to start the journey to transition which took until 2010. In 2012 she deployed to Afghanistan (Operation HERRICK) on her first of two tours and was the first Transgender soldier in an operational theatre.  Following this she used her experiences to provide advice to the Chain of Command on Transgender issues and set up a network for women and LGBTQ+ personnel at Bovington Garrison.

WO2 Penny finished her regular career in 2018 and joined the reserves. Since then she has been involved in Operations YELLOW HAMMER, REDFOLD and RESCRIPT.

She currently holds the post as the Warrant Officer Diversity Engagement Team as part of the Army Engagement Group.

WO2 Penny lives with her long-term partner, Annie. She is also a motorbike enthusiast and she and a small group of ladies have just formed a lesbian motorcycle club. She is also part of the English Civil War Society with her partner and is a huge science fiction nut. To the extent that she has dressed up for charity in both a chaos space marine costume and a stormtrooper from Star Wars.