Gender recognition reform blocked

[hadntbeen]

Scottish Secretary Alister Jack has made an order under section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998, preventing the Scottish Parliament’s Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill from proceeding to Royal Assent.
Thank god 🙏🏻 I am an SNP supporter but this is one bill I was wholeheartedly against. I'm glad and relieved this decision was made.

Sturgeon has lost her marbles on this one and failed to listen to women.

Whoever would have thought I’d be supporting a Brexit supporting Tory PM over Sturgeon over an issue. Strange times.

And the worst of it is - if Starmer was in power he wouldn’t be challenging NS on this. The Labour Party is creating the mother of all women problems.

I can't understand why some people still think this is about hating trans people.

I don't hate men but I don't want to share a space where I'm vulnerable with them, like a changing room. If anyone can say they're a woman and enter a female safe space then some men will do that to get access . It has already been proven. Why is that so difficult to grasp?

This bill went way too far and I think that was intentional. Sturgeon always knew it would get blocked because it was so far reaching. It’s funny Sturgeon calling out the UK government for using trans people as political pawns when she is doing exactly that. It’s just another argument for independence. If she really cared about trans people the bill would have been much more limited.

I don’t agree with that, I mean she knew it might get blocked but I think her support is sincere.

I think Sturgeon is sincerely supportive of anything that will boost her chances at the next referendum. I am not anti Scotland leaving the union, I just think Sturgeon is someone who will do absolutely anything to be the person who took Scotland out of the Union like BJ and Brexit.

Thank goodness that sense prevails.

As for “How many people who express an opinion (judgement) on this actually know any trans people?”, I met the first two trans people I knew around 1971, and even then, the differences between the one with gender dysphoria and the
one with auto gynephilia were obvious, even though we didn't have the terms then.

I think everything the SNP do has one eye on how it can rule Westminster. But if this was its sole intention - as you suggest - then women and children are pawns / collateral damage . And that's despicable and unforgivable.

Further, the SNP have a track record for ill conceived laws that are harmful to women and children - the named person, hate crime stand out .

Are you suggesting that if we vote for Independence, that all this will melt away and we'll have a wonderful country with good laws? That this isn't the real SNP?

Or is it possible that if we vote for Independence our lives will be in the hands of people who impose bad controlling laws on its populace?

Sometimes the simplest answer is the most obvious one. I think the SNP did this because they did a deal with the greens. I think it's populate among many of the SNP MSPs as well. I think they thought it would look progressive and modern and edgy and appeal to the youth. And above all, I think they thought they could impose it on dissenters because they believe they can get away with absolutely anything because they have a core group who only care about 'independence'.

You seem nice, but supporters like you are part of the problem here. It's Trump's 5th Avenue analogy. And that is utterly terrifying for the rest of us.

I’m certain that violent, aggressive men don’t need to pretend to be women to do so

@RosaCaramella: Explain to me why we have sex-segregated spaces at all then? Why not dispense with them all together?

@RosaCaramella what are your thoughts on the serial rapist demanding a move to a women’s prison because he meets the new GRR criteria?

are the women in prison protected by having a single sex space or not?

100% agree. The only reason they raised this was to appear edgy and it would please the Green Party who they are coalition with.

The Scottish Greens are batshit bonkers, which is criminal considering the climate emergency we are currently facing.

@Sorefootouch

The Scottish Greens are batshit bonkers, which is criminal considering the climate emergency we are currently facing.

My husband announced he was going to vote Green and it provoked a row of massive proportions. I couldn't believe he'd throw my daughter and I under the bus like that. I told him it would be like supporting an apartheid party if the two of us were black. He hadn't even thought about it at all.

I really hope the Westminster involvement shines a light on who these parties are and how far they'll go to achieve things.

In the end, DH decided that the environment was such a pressing issue it rendered the need for a ' Green Party ' obsolete - ironically. Environment was now mainstream politics too. I wonder if this might be why the Green Party are scrabbling around in different issue areas.

And this is likely to fuck that up. I think she genuinely thought it was the right progressive move to appeal to the younger population, but she misread women on this - failed to heed women’s opposition.

There is a degree of real confusion about what that Scottish Government can do. They certainly don't have the power to do this - all the power it has ever had can be taken away by Westminster. All of them.

This has always been the case. Devolved government only has the power given to it. If it treads on a reserved matter like the Equality Act, then that law will be invalid.

There is no precedent. Just the constitution of the UK and it's law.

No one asked me my opinion on the bill and it wasn’t discussed widely in the press or on social media as far as I am aware so I would also question the assertions that the Scottish public didn’t want the bill.

It's very interesting to hear you say this, RosaCaramella, because Scottish Government insisted that this was the most scrutinised piece of legislation they'd put forward, and had been the subject of multiple public consultations, although it's true those consultations didn't actually include listening to many of the concerns raised by women, as noted by Reem Alsalem, the UN's Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls: www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bc237744-7ff0-11ed-ab78-11b70ed96428?shareToken=c0957e4d2cd99ee6635e9e027b6ca3bb

Perhaps ScotGov didn't publicise it as well as they claim to have done.

There were several polls conducted as the legislation went through the Scottish parliament which showed low public support for it, for example this YouGov one: https://docs.cdn.yougov.com/plh4depnh8/TimesScottGender221209.pdf

Does anyone know why Alister Jack's statement only mentions Great Britain? What is the equivalent of the Equality Act in Northern Ireland that means they wouldn't be affected by the GRR?

Pretty sure this was what wee Jimmy was after but it's a risky issue to be the one to cause the split I reckon.

@StuntNun - I think it’s covered in the Northern Ireland Act 1998 but don’t quote me on it. Odd it’s devolved in NI but not everywhere else, I guess due to the specific religious divisions present in NI and not as present in the rest of the UK.

In answer to a previous poster’s question, I know several trans people. Thankfully the ones born male understand that sex is not the same as gender and happily use facilities set aside for men.

Another one is now disabled from taking cross sex hormones, left his family and is extremely depressed.

There are also a couple of young female transitioners and I’m not sure how they are right now - they’ve gone very quiet.

It seems like Nicola has decided to throw trans people as well as women under the bus in pursuit of Independence. The lobbyists have tried very hard to keep this all under the radar for years and get the law changed before we all realised what was going on like they did in Ireland.

They nearly succeeded under Theresa May who was pushing for the UK to adopt self id but thankfully some people in government are still advocating for women and children’s needs and at least attempting to balance them with the requirements of trans people.

We have found that when people understand the implications of self id legislation, they are far less supportive. This huge row means that greater public awareness and therefore ultimately more resistance to self id.

We have been sleepwalking into this for years with many organisations quietly introducing self id policies for toilets, changing rooms, schools, hospitals etc. The GRR will cement those policies and prevent the companies that do understand the need to maintain single sex spaces and services.

We know that women and girls are already being harmed directly as a result of self id policies - sexually assaulted and peeped at in Primark, mixed sex changing villages, raped in hospitals and prisons etc.

Why would anyone bring in a law that makes all that more likely and makes it easier for men to prey on women?

I think this will backfire on NS. The publicity this bill is generating just results in it being scrutinised more closely, and people are wondering why on earth a government would pass such a terribly drafted piece of legislation which is so unpopular with the public. It makes the Scottish government look incompetent. Which it is.

Good. Hope Sunak manages to stop this. Even Starmer agreed that age 16 was too young for all this.

Sturgron is just using this to push her independence agenda.🙄

I think it would make a more dangerous precedent to allow the devolved administration to create new laws that have far reaching consequences outside of their competency. Regardless of the topic within this legislation, to say that there is no impact of the Equality Act, and no consequences for non-devolved matters is totally disingenuous. This whole legislative process by the SG has been flawed from the outset.

Wonder whether she's capable of making the connection:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-64223032

I’m certain that violent, aggressive men don’t need to pretend to be women to do so

nobody has ever said that violent, aggressive men need these new laws to be able to harm women.
Rapists gotta rape.

However, it makes it so much easier for a bloke to just walk into, say, a gym changing room and not be challenged because they literally cannot be challenged. And anyone who does challenge them, even with a polite "this is the ladies" might realistically be prosecuted.

I personally don't think women are at risk from a genuine, honest-to-god trans woman. I do think women are at risk from men who have now been handed the ability to access women's areas on a plate. There is no need to even put on a dress, shave, or adapt in any way to indicate that you "are a woman"

I don't know any trans people but I know plenty of men and that's enough for me to oppose this bill tyvm.

I think NS has done us all a favour by blowing this issue out of the bylines and into the mainstream narrative. Thank you Nic!