My employer has invited Susie Green for a transgender inclusion event

I’d ask about the policy on sex equality.
And also ask about the policy on involving children in this.
Don’t give your opinion but make it clear that if they mention children they will look extremely dodgy.
You can have a trans inclusionary policy without involving mermaids!!

Mermaids comment from recommendations link above:

"GenderGp - Helen Webberly
Provider of private health care for transgender patients based in Abergavenny, but also working through video conferencing. Prospective patients may want to know that, in Oct 2018, Health Inspectorate Wales successfully proceeded with criminal action. Both Online GP Services Ltd and Dr Webberley were found guilty at Merthyr Magistrates court. Sentencing will take place on 2 November 2018.
hiw.org.uk/news/onlinegpprosecution?lang=en
To review Helen's response: gendergp.co.uk/update-health-inspectorate-wales-decision/ "

If your company employs women of different religions the gendering of toilets (instead of by sex) will be an exclusive policy not inclusive.

Mermaids are still promoting Dr Webberley on their website:
www.mermaidsuk.org.uk/resources-for-professionals.html

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-45767360

Dr Helen Webberley is awaiting sentencing tomorrow:
"Healthcare Inspectorate Wales prosecutes online GP
Published 5 Oct 2018
HIW has today successfully prosecuted Online GP Services Ltd and Dr Helen Webberley for illegally providing online healthcare services which require registration under the Care Standards Act 2000

The prosecution follows a period in which Dr Webberley had refused to stop providing services to patients. As a result, HIW proceeded with criminal action against Online GP Services Ltd and Dr Webberley for operating a service without being registered under Section 11 of the Care Standards Act 2000.

Both Online GP Services Ltd and Dr Webberley were found guilty at Merthyr Magistrates court today. Sentencing will take place on 2 November 2018." (continues)
hiw.org.uk/news/onlinegpprosecution?lang=en
thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3385789-Helen-Webberley-found-guilty

I'd draw attention to the connection between Mermaids and Helen Webberley.
Plus that Mermaids staff have been caught asking for people to be hacked on twitter and have engaged in targeted harassment.

I wouldnt worry about the event, it is for show. I would focus on the policies.
Highlight the need for single sex toilets to enable access to toilets for natal women of different religious beliefs.
If people have to give up single sex space suggest that it is men who do this for above reason. Highlight the difference between sex and gender and the law in relation to this.
Are there any other problematic issues he is highlighting?
Personally I would try and take the stance of the recent guardian article of competing rights and responsibilities. Coming across as just anti is likely to just get you labelled.

ignore, sisters, ignore!

Stop your fucking keyboard warrior shit

Aren't you rather being a "keyboard warrior" here?

Or adk why the company is moving ahead of the law with self ID when it is still the subject of a government consultation

Would the fuck most of you ask anything like these questions

Don't be so sure

I’d be tempted to question what someone from a parenting support charity, has to do with advising adults who want to transition their gender presentation at work?

It looks like it's the human shield approach. Go along with what we say or else you're being transphobic towards the most vulnerable people in society today. The "don't be a colossal meanie" argument.

And can I suggest that you always use sex when you mean sex (so unisex, not gender neutral) as it keeps things absolutely clear.

Mixed sex is the clearest and most accurate description.

I said I didn't know, but I'd like to be able to come up with a suggestion....
... so let's put it out to consultation so we can check intersectionality across the whole workplace.
I'd like to see him diversify himself out of that little hole he's dug for himself.

I'd be most concerned about partnering with Stonewall.

Questions I'd ask:

• have you asked female employees if they are happy to partner with an organisation campaigning to end the single sex exemption of the Equalities Act (ie, do away with any female only spaces)?

• have you seen the petition from a group of concerned LGBT people to Stonewall pointing out the misogyny and homophobia of their position?

Stonewall used to be a nice option for diversity. As we say in my industry "no one loses their job for buying IBM". Stonewall was the equivalent. It's not any more. It's now toxic in a way that some people haven't understood yet.

that also suggests that he hasn't consulted with any women at all.

If you handle this well, you can push back on pretty much everything as he's almost certainly not acting lawfully.

gender is not a protected characteristic, so he's on a slippery slope designating toilets by gender not sex. He also needs to think about women of faith who will simply not be able to use their preferred (and legally correct and protected) toilet at all.

That, from the start, suggests he hasn't a clue about the Equality Act.

It's not your job to provide solutions, but it is his job to adhere to the law.

And can I suggest that you always use sex when you mean sex (so unisex, not gender neutral) as it keeps things absolutely clear.

With male-bodied

That's a brilliant idea. We'll done. Basically the solution is turning men's into mixed sex toilets.

Can you email affirming you verbal suggestion, and saying this would also maintain female spaces for those women who for religious reasons cannot share spaces will make bodied people.

Note how it's up to the women to come up with a solution for a male problem.

I would naively ask if its true that men who are sexually aroused by dressing as women are included in the definition of transgender. Act as if this couldn't possibly be true, no matter what it says in stonewall literature.

I think it's vitally important to get this fact in the public eye. People still think that trans women are all harmless, genuinely dysphoric men, and understandably feel sympathetic and unthreatened by them.

The more women (and men) understand that Stonewall et Al don't distinguish between transsexuals and men who get sexual kicks from claiming to be women, the faster this nightmare will be over.

I’d be tempted to question what someone from a parenting support charity, has to do with advising adults who want to transition their gender presentation at work?

It seems highly patronising to assume that someone who is a professional parent of a trans child running a parenting support charity has any expertise at all to speak for, or even to speak about, adults who plan to transition at work? Which is what this event is about.

Susie Green clearly isn’t trans herself? You need an adult transitioned working person on the panel. Plus a gender critical legal expert who can advise on the boundaries of accommodation in the workplace.

You could suggest that Pips Bunce or some other ‘out at work’ adult trans person comes to speak.

Your colleagues can then concentrate on the issues raised by such a speaker.

You could then further suggest that if your Head of Diversity wants a series of parenting experts to come in and present I staff.. that working parents in the organisation can be invited to suggest topics and speakers that they would like to discuss/hear from. Mermaids then may or may not be on such a list.

Also if they say the Equality Act includes people with a GRC in the sex category, be ready with the response that this is not the case, because self ID was not being considered by government in the preparations for the GRA 2004 and is a relatively new legal concept. There is no degi ition in law of sex as biological because it was inconceivable that sex could mean anything other than biological. (which it was, and for most people still is)

If you've got the confidence, you could ask what provision is made for women who believe it's discriminatory and sexist to believe that women and men have different kinds of brains. You could ask them to confirm that they believe men and women have different kinds of brains, because you are waiting for evidence that this is the case. And say that women who don't wish to submit to the belief that they have different kinds of brains should have provision made for them to opt out of promulgating this belief.