To not fully understand the outrage of the gender recognition reform?

[iamop]

Leaving my views at the door on this subject....I am just hoping to gain some clarification on one main point for my own information.

Opponents of the gender reform bill claim that this will effect single sex spaces. I was appalled hearing this but I've done some reading. And it would seem (unless I'm getting this wrong) that due to the equality act 2010, a man claiming to be a female or vice versa can already use single sex spaces due to gender identity being a protected characteristic under this act. And as the equality act is a UK wide legislation implemented under labour, this has nothing to do with the Scottish gov. So am I correct in saying, that actually the gender reform bill won't actually affect single sex spaces any more so than the equality act already does?

I completely disagree with rapists etc being able to change genders and therefore force their victims and the courts to call them by a different pronoun. I think the age of 16 to be able to do this is bonkers, and I think the SNP have lost my vote moving forward.

I was just looking for some clarification to my main point above to be explained by people smarter than myself

Thanks

This isn't terrible helpful if in practice organisations are behaving as though it is not legally possible to exclude a transgender male with a GRC - or indeed without one - from a female only service.

That's why the law now needs to change to mandate the provision of single sex services from which all members of the opposite sex - GRC or not - are in fact excluded, where women have a genuine need for those services to be single sex.

The EHRC guidance on single sex spaces and the equality act, which applies to England, Scotland and Wales, page 5.

The Scottish changes to the GRC process don’t change this.

The judgement just last week has thrown all this into doubt (again) hasn't it?

And TQ+ lobby groups have been vigorously teaching everyone a false version of law that the exceptions can't really ever be used, haven't they?

And the TQ+ lobby groups harass, persecute, threaten and do their best to shut down any group that dares to try and use an exception don't they?

So in reality, the exceptions do not work, female people do not have quality of access, hence women pushing for the EA to be updated with a hell of a lot more clarity. Hence pretty much three quarters of the threads here. Had you noticed Sarah's thread at all? Her issues with an accessible service?

(Here we get the terribly reasonable 'yes but NICE services just don't want to and you can't make them.)

Yes. The EA needs updating to insist that for equality of female people single sex services must be part of the provision to avoid female people taking their choice between surrendering to mixed sex provision if able, or being punished by exclusion if not. Because lets be honest about this, the goal of the TQ+ political lobby is that no such spaces are allowed to exist, isn't it?

If they'd spare a tiny inch of equality of compassion for female people and allow them equality of access we could all go and do something else with our lives. And fuck me would I be grateful because this is so fucking depressing it's getting ridiculous.

aseriesofstillimages

Thankyou for the reference.
Although this legislation will seek to supercede the EA definitions of gender.
"Trans" becomes female- and therefore all the protection for women only places is meaningless.
As is seen already in scotland- trans women working in refuges, being transferred to female prison.

Have we got any links of evidence for the exact number of males in female prisons in the UK? Or are we just relying on a poster’s word that there are ‘only 20’?

If it is 'only 20' ... only....

those twenty males have managed to do a lot of damage between them by the accounts of female prisoners and guards.

Figures

this is the most recent I could find which said 125 in England & wales.

but it does not include prisoners which have a GRC

Nobody knows, because transgender males with a GRC aren't counted in the statistics.

We only know how many transgender males have been housed in women's prisons despite not having a GRC.

Can you not see that they're NOT being excluded? Pretty much all 'women's' spaces are now mixed sex. The conflation of sex and gender is causing this problem. The pretence that TWAW is causing this problem. If gender recognition really was just the smoke screen that we thought TW wanted and they continued to be excluded from all single sex provision (rape crisis centres, prisons, changing rooms, toilets, hospital wards, sports etc.) then women would not be up in arms. The fact is, though, that they are demanding their right to make all such spaces mixed sex and the right to tell women how they (the women) identify in order to support their belief that they have more in common with me than other men do.

Thanks everyone but I would like seriesofstillkmages to provide the evidence of what they are declaring.

It is absolutely up to them to evidence their assertions. And if they cannot with confidence that that it is currently 20, and that it includes any transitioned male with a GRC, they need to stop posting misinformation.

It's also interesting to note that there are currently 230 transgender prisoners in the UK prison system, of whom 97 have been convicted of a sexual offence - questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2022-11-25/96653

The EHRC guidance posted below is new, and published after the appointment of Akua Reindorf's appointment as an EHRC commissioner. Reindorf is not a gender adherent, and her appointment led to a notable change in EHRC policy (on a side note she has today been appointed a KC, so huge congratulations due to her).

The EHRC's previous advice contained a little table which set out how service providers should treat people who have undergone gender reassignment without a GRC, and those that have. The advice was that excluding a male with a GRC from a women's single sex service was a very high bar to reach, and was higher than the bar for excluding those without a GRC. So technically legally possible (as per Sch 3 of the EA), but unlikely to happen in practice. Possession of a GRC therefore, under that guidance, led to a change in ability to be admitted to women's spaces.

This advice then filtered down to policy makers, meaning that it is a common position that GRC holders cannot be excluded from single sex spaces. This is the relevant clause of the Ministry of Justice's policy (upheld last year at judicial review) for the treatment of GRC holders:

‘4.64 The Gender Recognition Act 2004 section 9 says that when a full GRC is issued to a person, the person’s gender becomes, for all purposes, their acquired gender. This means that transgender women prisoners with GRCs must be treated in the same way as biological women for all purposes. Transgender women with GRCs must be placed in the women’s estate/AP unless there are exceptional circumstances, as would be the case for biological women.'

So the EHRC's current guidance on what service providers can legally do is not having an effect on what service providers are actually doing. Possibly because it is still very new, but more likely because it gives service providers a nice clean line for policy making ("GRC = in. Bish bash bosh").

They do have to pledge that they will live forever as the opposite gender.

Which of course is impossible to predict. It’s not even possible to know if the person making the pledge is lying.

At least one transman (ie natal female) in England had artificial insemination a few days after receiving a GRC, and went on to give birth.

Define life forever, marriage is meant to be forever but plenty are broken and nobody actually cares.

And there is no penalty if they do lie.

Given the "live like a woman / man" is 100% based on stereotypes, how could you ever prove beyond all reasonable doubt that someone did lie?

Are transwomen only ever allowed to wear skirts?? 🤔

A question, if you are unable to ask if someone has a grc and if they do then they have an altered birth certificate how do you exclude natal males with a grc, so for example you want a same set health care provider- you can see its a male in front of you but they can prove they are a woman. In that situation how does the single sex exemption help?

2nd question for situations where you wouldn't be able to request a birth certificate again you can see its a male born person but they state they are female how the hell do you exclude them?

I suspect organisations which choose to use the single sex exemptions they are entitled to use as stated in the EQA2010 (and are brave enough to risk being targeted by TRA's and are able to not have to rely on funding offered by an utterly captured Government, like in Scotland) will find themselves in unpleasant conversations with intimidating males who insist that they are literally females and so denying them from using a single sex service is literally a hate crime. I've seen various TRA's on Twitter insist that Beira's Place is illegally discriminating against transwomen and many have declared their intention to challenge the service. I wonder how many organisations will have the courage to hold firm.

It was fantastic that Pam Gosal mentioned Beira’s Place when she spoke in Parliament yesterday. The women who will be working there are experienced in many areas and are not beholden to anyone.

Okay so I might be dumb, but I'm still not fully understanding how GRCs are going to affect single sex spaces. From everything I'm reading and researching, men who identify as women WITHOUT a GRC can already use single sex spaces just by identifying with that gender. The Gender Reform states that it doesn't change the legislation already in place for that. So, yes I agree, it's not something that should be passed due to...well the sheer ridiculousness of it all really.

But I'm struggling to get my head around how this new legislation will impact single sex spaces? If there's already trans females in female prisons then do they all have GRC's? Or do they simply identify as female? If they all have GRC's then surely the problem lies with GRC's in the first instance, rather than reforms being made to that initial legislation?

Okay yes, they want to lessen the time requirement and they want to extend it to 16 year olds, it's ridiculous of course. It will make it easier for people to obtain GRCs. HOWEVER, how does this affect single sex spaces?

Or shouldn't the uproar be with the equality act? It seems (to me) that the gender reform won't change anything regarding the rules to single sex spaces already in place.

Nicola Sturgeon is using this legislation to bait the UK government. She knows that Rishi Sunak is likely to challenge it if it is passed and she can then say that the UK parliament is trying to override the will of the Scottish people. She no doubt hopes that this will encourage more people to support independence.

It is a cynical ploy and the fact that she is prepared to throw Scottish women under the bus to do so is despicable.

Also, if Labour get in at the next elecrion it makes it easier for them to introduce the same legislation in England and Wales.

On a quick look, I can’t find that exact number in the published data, but it was stated to me by someone I have reason to believe knows what they are talking about.

looking at the most recent published data for England and Wales, it seems the number here is at most 11, so it would make sense if it was a total of 20 including Scotland.

If I am reading the data correctly, it seems that, as at 2020/21, there were 146 trans women in prison in England or wales without a GRC and also 11 non-binary people who were legally male. Of those, only 1 is housed in the female estate. In addition, and not included in that data, there are a total of 10 prisoners with a GRC (no information is disclosed about whether they are trans women or trans men). If they are all trans women, and all housed in the female estate, that means there’s a total of 11 trans women in the female estate.

That is very interesting, thank you

So no. You have nothing but someone’s say so .

Good for you that your trust this data. But I don’t and no other reader should. If you cannot back it up with published information, please don’t expect anyone to give it any credibility.

And you talk about other’s posts as misleading.

Besides what is the number that is your personal accepted collateral for imprisoned females to be sharing an estate with a male? 21? 50? 100?

“Obviously you think that’s 20 to many, but it’s certainly not hundreds.”

Why are you saying 20 is ok because it is not hundreds? Because that is how I read this.

It is quite clear you have no concerns with males being in the female estate and the impact on female prisoners and staff. Why? Because you don’t believe 1 woman negatively impacted is enough to fight for?

Having had a female family member in prison recently, I am horrified that there are people in this world that would play so casually with her safety and her peace of mind.