The High Court has ruled against Sex Matters in their case against the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and British Transport Police (BTP) over their “consensual” searching policies

Great, thanks for laying out the reason for optimism.

5. Consent cannot create powers Parliament has not conferred
Public authorities may act only within the powers granted by law. A detainee's consent cannot authorise a police officer to act outside statutory limits imposed by Parliament.

This one alone should be enough to overturn this turnips judgement. 😁

The fight goes on but it's worth it, fortunately it's payday so I can contribute to the fighting fund.

Seems like a lawful judgement to me.

Any member of the public can consent to being searched by anyone else. Police officers are members of the public with extra powers.

If someone consents to being searched by someone else and the person doing the searching consents, then I don't see the issue.

Now, if the person refuses to be searched, then PACE is engaged and the person will be searches by a member of their biological sex.

The judgement literally says that a police officer cannot be made to search someone they don't want to, so this will provide an exemption for all GC people without detriment

This one alone should be enough to overturn this turnips judgement.

Well, quite! They can't just make up law to suite the wishes of TRAs. It's worrying how unclued-up some of these judges are.

@OneGreyScroller Female police officers are coerced all the time by male colleagues. "Now you wouldn't want to be the little trouble-maker that causes everyone so much hassle, would you?"

There’s the Sex Matters podcast on this. I don’t think it’s necessarily male officers being patronising to female officers that creates the pressure - rather it just creates more work for everyone and therefore many female officers will feel under pressure to do what’s potentially the best for the team even if it makes them very uncomfortable.

And yes very disappointing result

Exactly! I said that in the other thread, it can’t be considered consensual as it’s under duress. What happens when they withdraw it after the fact and claim they’ve been sexually assaulted?

It says in the guidance that the individual being searched, the officer searching, and the custody sergeant will sign to say consent has been given. Custody suites are also on camera, so the consent will have been recorded. Hard to say you didn't give consent after all that.

They can refuse to be strip searched. They can be searched whether they like it or not.

What about the other side of it, female officers coming under pressure to search genderaddled males.

“If you are seen as a troublemaker or somebody who won’t toe the line, then you won’t get any further.”

Not to mention there's a law concerning this PACE, and the guidance is contrary to the law, if the coppers won't follow the law, why should anyone else.

'Without detriment'

The female Police officer we had on here a few months ago would beg to differ. The detriment will be subtle and definite.

That’s why the whole “consent” framing of these searches is stupid. No one would consent unless they were under duress.

Because it isn’t actually consensual.

This is my area. So our guidance is we can refuse to no detriment. I have been vocally GC in work for a while now, and a bit long in the tooth so no one would be pressuring me. My male colleagues are decent so it wouldn’t happen anyway. However I worry about young, new starts that may feel like they have to or they would be seen as bigoted.

We had a problematic TIM and I saw he had requested to be searched (a standard search) by two females (and this was granted). I would have liked to have been there to see the reasoning, how comfortable they were etc. It’s just a cursory search but still. I can’t see any females agreeing to strip search a TIM. None of my colleagues would.

The other side, yes it’s all on camera but the majority who come into custody are under the influence or have mental health issues. The trans people I’ve dealt with, both male and female, have all had mental health issues. What if they turn round and say ‘I didn’t have the capacity’ which would have detrimental effects on officers who were probably just trying to be kind.

The good thing though is our systems have been changed to ‘biological sex’ and not gender. I’ve been moaning about that for a while!

So if you were a new, young female officer. Only female on shift. And a trans id man asked for a female to search him, you wouldn't feel at all pressured to consent?

This is why we have laws that take these decisions away from the individual. So that they can't be pressured or coerced. They have the law to protect them.

Well, we used to...

Worked with police for nearly 20 years. Never known of a strip search being done by the opposite sex. We only have one trans lady PCSO and PCSOs don’t have search powers. Stop searches are usually done by same sex wherever possible, but sometimes the detainee will ask to just get searched and get on with their day. Everyone arrested has to be searched for their and others’ safety, and if a same sex officer cannot attend at the time then the search will be carried out as necessary. PACE covers all searches. It is incredibly complicated legislation with loads of little sections.

Generally no one gets aroused when either being searched or doing a search. Everyone tends to have other things on their mind. Actually, police hate it as much as those being searched, trust me. Plenty of ‘3 pairs of gloves’ customers.

Really interesting @AccidentallyWesAnderson - glad your colleagues would feel able to refuse. And agree it’s a minefield legally re capacity, duress and ability to “consent” to something you aren’t actually consenting to.

It’s far more likely that a male appearing male will give the little new female officer shit and abuse. Unfortunately the majority of the people who have interactions with the police like hurting themselves or others.

Do you think there’s herds of trans women running around shoplifting on the chance they might get searched by a female officer?! Jesus.

Weird flex.

Well no, and yes the majority are horrible men, but that’s the thing about safeguarding. You cover for all eventualities. And TIM offenders exist.

It’s definitely improved after the Supreme Court ruling but a few years ago a trans man came in (again significant MH issues) and wanted to be searched by a man. The custody Sgt was falling over himself telling everyone to mind the pronouns, but still put her in the female corridor (but TIM’s got to go in the females too?) and generally faffed about the whole scenario.

The male cop did the search but I did wonder how comfortable he felt with it; and would be do it now we’ve moved on and sanity appears to be prevailing. Edited to add - maybe not given the subject of the thread!

Do you think there’s herds of trans women running around shoplifting on the chance they might get searched by a female officer?! Jesus.

Live in a posh area do you, the idea of the coppers turning up for shop lifting is hilarious 😂

I guess it's too much to ask for the coppers to follow the law they're empowered to arrest people for breaking. If they can pick and choose, what's stopping the population from doing so?

Pick and choose what? The thread is about search powers. And yes, crimes are committed in posh areas too. By posh people. Some really fucking horrible crimes. Just like the poor criminals.

Just re-read….the shoplifting was just an example. Don’t be obtuse.

Pick and choose whether to follow a law that is on the books or something the high ups have decided to invent to signal the political credentials.

I thought it was an over the top exaggeration, maybe if you're going to illustrate your point with an example you should put less performance into it.

As I said, this situation isn’t that common. Certainly not with strip searches. Less intrusive searches are wherever possible by same sex, but honestly, if you knew how few cops are now out there looking after us, the rare dodgy trans lady would not be on your radar. Despite the ‘uplift’ more officers have left and not been replaced than you could imagine. Ask for a ride along. Somewhere nice and busy. Anyone who isn’t a station cat has way too much to worry about out than someone trying to get a thrill from a search. And IF you are asked to search the opposite sex you can say no. This is such a non-issue. I would rather focus be given more to the millions of varying grades of domestic abuse and coercive control which are rampant and notoriously difficult to get through CPS. Or ditto for rape.

Nothing to see, move long. Oh look a squirrel.