Times article - Greening delays plans to reform GRA

The fact Justine Greening has delayed the Westminster consultation will encourage Holyrood to fast track the Scottish one to show how impeccably liberal and inclusive Holyrood and Scotland is

Sadly, I fear you may be right. I'm still going to fight it though, take time to fill out the consultation properly, and go and talk to my MSP face to face.

Saying the non transitioning partner needs to request a divorce ignores the reality of coercion and consent. If you marry someone you dont consent to marry a same sex partner any more than you consent to being raped. The marriage should be dissolved.

That might go some way to stopping AGP's using women and children as a human shield in the first place.

The fact Justine Greening has delayed the Westminster consultation will encourage Holyrood to fast track the Scottish one to show how impeccably liberal and inclusive Holyrood and Scotland is.

We'll exactly, how are they for eg "going to tackle the pay gap between men and women" when they are going to change the definition of women to include men...

I know! I thought the whole point of an impact assessment was to think about possible unintended consequences.

And do they define what they mean by "men" and "women" ? - cos as we all know that's a bit tricky nowadays

Quite apart from the awful "some women's groups" comment, the fact that a policy isn't designed for something doesn't mean there is no impact. How bizarre.

Yes the equality impact assessment is shockingly bad! (page 166 of the PDF download from here)

The current law is that the issuing of an interim gender recognition certificate is an automatic ground for divorce should the other spouse want one.

If a full grc is applied for with the spouse's consent transitioning ceases to be a ground but if the application for a full grc is made without spousal consent it remains a ground.

There is currently therefore no prejudice to the transitioning party who can get their interim or full grc; their spouse may or may not want to remain married.

If transitioning ceases to be a ground the non- transitioning spouse will be tied to the transitioned spouse for up to 2 years (assuming of course they had not separated at an earlier stage)

If you want to be really have a look at the analysis of the impact on women (I think it's buried in the appendices somewhere)

I agree the bit about transitioning not being grounds for divorce is one of the stand out bad bits of the Scottish Consultation. Grounds for immediate divorce would seem better esp as the spouse will have already been transitioning for 2 years by the time he/she gets their GRC. Doesn’t seem fair that the person wanting to divorce then has to wait another 2 years

I think it should be grounds for immediate divorce if the non transitioning partner requests it. No wait.

I saw that RTB. I think the challenge will be that until there is an agreed definition of transphobia - rather than the 'anything said that I don't like', it will be hard to challenge.
The NAHT (Headteachers) guidelines for schools are a classic example of a lack of definition alongside lots of advice about interacting respectfully with trans people, anonymous reporting of issues and a zero tolerance of harassment - which is great until it transpires that they mean objecting to the use of CIS or TERF or wanting to maintain sex segregated spaces is 'transphobic' and will result in staff being disciplined.

Another interesting development today

amp.theguardian.com/education/2017/dec/26/jo-johnson-universities-no-platforming-freedom-of-speech?__twitter_impression=true
Jo Johnson to tell universities to stop 'no-platforming' speakers
Higher education minister says institutions that fail to protect freedom of speech could be fined

With specific reference to Germaine Greer and her views on transgender

What do you mean by "automatic" ? That the marriage becomes void? That can't be right.

It should be a ground for divorce for the non- transitioning partner but not the transitioned partner. Obviously the one year two year rule should still apply to both.

Bloody hell I just went into the Scottish govt website to respond to their consultation. They seem to be full on lemming in their approach. Some of the questions made me consider new horrors I hadn’t even imagined. Such as should a gender reassignment cease to be a valid cause for divorce. Meaning you could find yourself as a woman in a marriage to a “woman” against your will. WTF.

I wrote in the comments that one partner wishing to transition should be grounds for automatic divorce; the couple can remarry at a later date if they both want to. That would be the only way to stop one partner coercing the other into going along with a sex change.

Very good news. People are finally listening. Still boggles my mind though that this was going to be pushed through with no thought at all given to the results of such a ridiculous change. Consulting only with extremist trans rights groups who have no care for women, children or transsexual people. Only the rights of straight white men. Thats how it got as far as it did so fast, and with little resistance.

A husband turning himself into woman and having the right to continue the 'marriage' is just about the most severe case of unreasonable behaviour I can imagine. Clearly the proposed law is a twat.

Divorce in Scotland is one year's separation with consent or 2 years separation without consent.

If you can prove either adultery or unreasonable behaviour you can divorce immediately. You will need an independent third party to corroborate this.

But otherwise I take your point.

Bloody hell I just went into the Scottish govt website to respond to their consultation. They seem to be full on lemming in their approach. Some of the questions made me consider new horrors I hadn’t even imagined. Such as should a gender reassignment cease to be a valid cause for divorce. Meaning you could find yourself as a woman in a marriage to a “woman” against your will. WTF.

Yes I was apalled at this.

It means any woman who wants a divorce because her husband transitions (or vice versa) either has to wait for 2 years (or 5 if he doesn't consent to divorce), or has to cite unreasonable behaviour. Part of the public sector equality duty is to foster or encourage good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who don't. This proposal directly contradicts this duty by removing a simple no-fault way of ending such a marriage.

If you have been legally declared 'husband and wife' and you are suddenly expected to be 'wife and wife' that is surely a breach of contract and there should be a quick and easy way out.

I'm going to spend some time on the Scottish consultation over the next few days. It's open to everybody, not just those in Scotland, and I suspect the UK government are waiting to see how the Scottish consultation goes before they decide what their next move on this will be.

629 UK homicides between June 2016 and June 2017 (excluding acts of terrorism). Trans organisations typically claim 1% of the population identify as trans, so you would expect 6 of the victims to have been trans. In fact, the last known murder of a trans person in the UK was in 2015. So, in a 2 year period (2016 and 2017) when you would have expected 12 trans people to be murdered, if their risk were the same as the general population, there were no murders. Conclusion: being trans reduces your risk of being murdered, compared to the general population.

And a happy christmas from me to all the wise, courageous and brilliant women on here. Our voices are slowly starting to be heard.

for wanders. My first ever. Merry Christmas all

Not all trans teens are of course patients of the GIC, as I'm sure you are aware. As for being trans reducing the risk of you being murdered! Well I did not know that. Please do show me the source of that information. And yes, Guardianfree. I hope I do find some thoughtful posts, certainly they seem to be lacking on the feminist chat board, but I will keep an eye out.

So glad you found this board for your first post on Mumsnet wandersail You'll find some thoughtful and challenging writing and thinking on here if you hang around.