Trick to sidestep equality law?

I agree with PP that it would be hard to come up with a charitable objective for a group which is women and trans-identified males, such as a re-branded WI. However, associations don't have to be charities.

I'm very surprised that she seems now to be saying that the law is badly drafted and either does or should allow some wiggle room.

I'm not impressed by Article 11 freedom of association rights being thrown at this. Nobody would defend the "freedom of association" of white people to make sure they associate only with other white people by excluding black people from their club.

I agree that the law is clear in this, but once we have people saying that you can have "wriggle room" and that it doesn't matter how something is adverttised, you open up a huge can of worms, with reguard to safeguarding etc.

Sorry, I didn't RTFT before I posted and missed your post.

"I think she is saying that two (or more) separate PCs should be able to associate."

No, she said last year that everybody must have each of the PCs. So, for example, you could have a club for lesbian, disabled, retired women.

That would be fine as long as everybody in the club was lesbian AND disabled AND retired.

But you couldn't have a club where there was no overlap between the PCs. It is not possible to be both a woman and a trans-identifying man.

What she seems to be suggesting now is that there may be some conflict between the Human Rights Act and the Equality Act.

Although, as she says, this has never been tested in court so it is just a theory at the moment.

AR said: “On the face of the Act it looks like you can't have a group of mixed PCs - eg women + TW. That's obvs unfair & contrary to the right to freedom of association”

Article 11 - the right to freedom of association is a qualified right not an absolute one. I don’t think it’s unfair - obviously or otherwise - to stop an organization excluding one group of boys but admitting another, while admitting all girls.

I see that “legitimate aim” gets another outing but I don’t think it’s relevant here, or even in half the cases where it is cited. Single PC associations are lawful for any aim and even for no aim at all, just for “because.”

I agree with you. However, I remember reading a couple of tweets from Akua Reindorf KC a few days ago suggesting that it may be theoretically possible.

She said (in one of a series of tweets):

6 Associations are different. No-one wants to stop anyone associating with anyone. If women want to associate with transwomen they can (with a bit of legal wriggling – the Act is badly drafted here). Just don’t advertise an association as a women’s group when it includes men /END

She was then asked:

Seems like it just needs the groups to be honest so that women joining what is badged as a womens’ group, actually has no men in it. Not difficult. So instead of Womens’ Institute (for example), they’d call it the Peoples’ Institute.

To which she replied:

Yes. On the face of the Act it looks like you can't have a group of mixed PCs - eg women + TW. That's obvs unfair & contrary to the right to freedom of association, so you have to fiddle about with the Act to get it to fit. Once you do it's fine, as long as you're clear about it.

Which is very different from her position on the matter a year ago.

Then someone asked her:

By “fiddle about with the Act” are you suggesting there should be legislation to modify the Act or are you suggesting carefully working within its current confines?

Her reply was:

IMO the Act can probably be construed to give effect to the Art 11 right to Freedom of Association, but it's not yet been tested in court & it might not work. Ideally the Act would be amended, but I'd be wary of opening up the Act in case it opens the door to less welcome changes

But then somebody replied with the point that I would have made:

But restricting access to any group requires a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. To mix woman and trans women but exclude men (and trans men?) would need a legitimate aim. Not sure what that group has in common that would meet that target.

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So, things do seem a bit up in the air at the moment.

https://x.com/akuareindorf/status/2044875369849786516?s=20

What the law says is that associations are either entirely single (biological) sex or fully mixed sex, with no half measures.

I think the concerns in this thread shared by Akua Reindorf and some in this thread about what a group is called of how it’s advertised are misplaced. I don’t think the title of a group was something relevant to the implications of the SC’s findings in FWS.

But there is no law that says that women and trans women cannot mix, the law and the equalities act says that men and women are allowed single sex provision.

But If the trans lobby were to win over the girl guides its charity charter would be incorrect and would have to be re aquired as it would be wrong as its for single sex provision, and they wouldn't be able to get such a good deal out of the charities commision.

Lets not forget that all the trans lobby and their supporters need to do is start their own group, but it isn't and has (IMO) never been about the group.

edit - it would also be interesting to see how they would deal with the safeguarding issues of a group where boys are girls, girls are boys and boys are boys and girls are girls.

So to be clear you think a “girls + trans-identifying boys” club would be ok if it was advertised as such?

Many people here (including me) think that wouldn’t and shouldn’t be ok regardless of what it’s called or who consents.

i think the SC went further than you do. I think the SC said that regardless of what it’s called, a “space” for any girls and only some boys is unlawful.

They wouldn't. It would be open to everyone on the assumption that anyone who wants to join must be a PinkFluff (or whatever they use as their mixed sex "girl" equivalent) not a BlueTuff, because BlueTuffs won't want to join.

And to be fair, if PinkFluffClub no longer means private female spaces, they are probably right in assuming BlueTuffs won't be that interested.

Kind of like a goth night. They assume mostly only goths will bother but don't ban other people unless they cause trouble.

If gender is really so important, then properly aligning the purpose and with the Gender Identity it is there to serve instead of trying to smoosh GI and sex together makes the whole project much much easier. It's a wonder they didn't do this from the start (well, it is a wonder if you take TRAs at face value when they talk about gender and supporting trans people)

Not necessarily. Take, for example, an association that purports to admit anyone who "lives as a woman".

A membership criterion that appears on its face to be fair and neutral may not be so. As was noted by Baroness Hale DPSC in R(Coll) v Secretary of State for Justice [2017] UKSC 40 at [32], [2017] 1 WLR 2093:

“...The question of comparing like with like must always be treated with great care - men and women are different from one another in many ways, but that does not mean that the relevant circumstances cannot be the same for the purpose of deciding whether one has been treated less favourably than the other.”

Also, in Chief Inspector of Education v Al-Hijrah School [2017] EWCA Civ 1426, [2018] 1 WLR 1471, the Court of Appeal considered whether rules in a mixed school by which the pupils were neutrally segregated by sex was direct sex discrimination. Holding that it was, the Court explained that direct discrimination falls to be considered by reference to the position of individual Equality Act 2010 rights holders (in that case, the girls viewed individually, and the boys viewed individually). At [50], Sir Terence Etherton MR and Beatson LJ explained that:

“...The starting point is that EA 2010 s.13 specifies what is direct discrimination by reference to a "person". There is no reference to "group" discrimination or comparison. Each girl pupil and each boy pupil is entitled to freedom from direct discrimination looking at the matter from her or his individual perspective.”

These two cases illustrate that neutral rules do not preclude their treating one sex less favourably than the other and that will be direct discrimination.

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A membership criterion of something like “live as women” allows women to live conventionally for their sex. Generally speaking, this is not going to be a burden for women since all that they are required to do is to carry on living as they always have done within the very broad parameters of whatever “live as women” means. Women are not required to alter how they live their lives in any way.

In contrast, a requirement that men must “live as women” involves a much greater burden. It involves utterly rejecting a conventional lifestyle, it may also involve the use of drugs and/or surgery.

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However, it might well be theoretically possible to come up with a definition that doesn't cause an extra burden on one sex compared to the other.

In that situation it may be that Article 11, Human Rights Act 1998 comes into play. This is the one about freedom of association. Although that has never been tested in court.

This.
Especially the "fuck off" bit.

This is the first time these men have been told no and the narcisstic rage can be seen from outer space.

No need to anxiously pretzel ourselves to address their flailing arguments. Stand firm. The Supreme Court has spoken. Women are taking our stuff back.
While we have to tediously watch so many groups / resources for women and girls being trashed - if we stay strong and in some cases have to replace what women originally built - enraging as it is, we'll get there.

An association for willies and nillies, obviously!

I mthink she’s saying they should be able to - fair enough, an expression of opinion - and that they lawfully can. With a bit of wriggling because the act isn’t well drafted. I think they can’t lawfully, and the Act is tight.

I can't see them doing that. They'd get a 95% "Sod that!" response and they know it.

I would be really interested in seeing their definition of gender that they used to decide who was eligible for membership and who wasn't.

I'd estimate 3 minutes and 40 seconds before someone was howling that they'd been excluded unfairly, or that people who were saying that they were woman gender weren't and were spoiling things.

Maybe they could get Layla Moran in to adjudicate using vibes.

No, I think she is just making a general point. She may not be correct; I guess it would have to be tested in court. I would be interested to hear Michael Foran's thoughts.

Does she say anything about the charity status that is convade to girl guides in being a single sex organisation?
Which is something that is overlooked by the trans lobby with their drive to get boys in.

I want to know what a willy-nilly exclusion association looks like 😉

@MyAmpleSheep I think she is saying that two (or more) separate PCs should be able to associate.

She goes on to say:

On the face of the Act it looks like you can't have a group of mixed PCs - eg women + TW. That's obvs unfair & contrary to the right to freedom of association, so you have to fiddle about with the Act to get it to fit. Once you do it's fine, as long as you're clear about it

In the replies: https://x.com/akuareindorf/status/2044875369849786516

IANAL, just interested in the arguments

Worthless as my opinion is, I think she's wrong. She frames her argument that people should be free to choose with whom they associate. That sounds great until you realize that same freedom means the freedom to exclude people with whom you don't want to associate, and the EA2010 is all about preventing exclusion for improper purposes.

When she says "with a bit of legal wriggling – the Act is badly drafted here" - it's not bad drafting. It's intentional and correct. If you exclude (eg) women - a narrow exception - you have to exclude all women and not just the "wrong sort" of women that you don't like. If you exclude men, mutatis mutandis.

Section 15 of the Equality Act as I understand it says ...

We might be looking at a different Act. The part of the EA2010 that's applicable to Associations (itself a defined term) is Part 7, beginning with section 100. Section 15 of the EA2010 is about discrimination arising from disability.

But it does have to be a proportionate means to achieve a legitimate aim. You can't say "no gays in this pub, straights only" or ban pregnant women from your gym, that's discrimination.

You cannot compare pubs and gyms with associations: a pub is a public service and not an association. Likewise a gym. The exception allowing for single-PC associations doesn't apply to pubs or gyms. It has nothing to do with proportionality or legitimate aim in either case. You can have an association for straight people only.

Pregnancy: As an aside, there are lots of situations you are allowed to discriminate against a woman because of her pregnancy where safety is concerned. A gym might actually be one of them. I'd have to look.

Everyone has protected characteristics. That's not free licence to exclude willy nilly as I read Section 15.

Associations do have free licence to have membership that includes only certain PC's willy-nilly, except on the grounds of race. See schedule 16 section 1. Services and employers have different rules.

The "proportionate means to a legitimate aim" comes in to allow indirect discrimination in situations where direct discrimination isn't legal and in some other places. It's not relevant to the GG context.