Another ministerial response to GRA

[BiologyIsReal]

I am now on my 4th ministerial response. My MP has assiduously passed on the various points I have made over several months to the latest of many equalities ministers and have had Minsterial responses. All to date have been standard waffle. This one is also waffly and as full of holes as a Gouda cheese, but there are signs that the penny is beginning to drop....

My latest letter concentrated on safe spaces and prisons.

Paraphrasing the Minister's response. (Direct quotes in quotation marks). She says the Government understands there are "individuals" who have concerns about the potential knock on effects of any changes to the GRA on the rights of women and they take these seriously - in particular the right to operate women-only spaces, such as domestic violence refuges. The Government agrees "that in certain circumstances maintaining access to single-sex spaces is important and helps keep vulnerable women and children safe".

I'm told that I should not underestimate the importance of the existing single-sex exemptions in the Equality Act 2010. These mean "that in some situations, and as long as it is considered to be a proportionate means to a legitimate aim, an organiser of a women's single-sex service could be permitted to omit access to a transgender woman with a GRA". (So no blanket ban then, more an individual bun fight that could end in the courts, as per Canada).

Here comes the backpeddle.... The Minister says has the Government only announced its intention to consult on amending the GRA "to make the gender recognition process less bureaucratic and intrusive for applicants "and we have expressed no preference as to how the process might be changed". Yeah right....

Don't want to pre-empt the findings of the consultation blah blah..."It is not the case that Government has said it is intent on moving to a fully self-declarative model, where a transgender individual's legal gender would be based on their own self-determination without any qualifying criteria". Really? Tell that to the Girl Guides, Swim England, the Labour Party, sports bodies etc., who are pre-empting legislation left, right and centre.

On prisons the Minister says the Government is working closely with the MoJ to understand issues specific to prisoners. She claims there are already strong safeguards and a robust risk assessment protocol in place. But the default is to place a prisoner in the prison of the gender in which they identify but the GRA is not determinative, no prisoner has the right to choose. This is done by the Transgender Case Board on a case by case basis. Again, really?

She does finish by saying the Government would object to any attempt to stifle debate....Hmmm. Perhaps putting in a call to the #NoDebate lot would be in order then?

The Minister urges us to express our views via the GOV.UK website when it is available.

Sorry for length of post, but it has been interesting seeing the very gradual backpeddling from my first response to this 4th one.

The law of unintended consequences is beginning to dawn on them I hope.

I am now on my 4th ministerial response.

I salute your persistence, OP. You're fab!

I agree there are some slight signs of pennies dropping. I've had three responses so far (MP not ministerial) and there are definite signs of thaw.

Thanks LangCleg. I name changed as don't want to risk outing my MP who, I believe, may be GC by the alacrity with which he bounces my letters straight on to the Equalities minister, but is keeping his powder dry at the moment. He answers promptly every email and has admitted the GRA question has been raised by a number of people in his constituency.

Will go back to him with a "and another thing...." question when I can summon up the energy.

Well done OP.
It is the persistence of steadily and respectfully pointing out the threats to women and children that self ID poses. Once people understand it, they can't "un know" it. And we have plenty of historical evidence about what happens when politically correct views are allowed to drown evidenced safeguarding realities.

Well done, keep going!

She says the Government understands there are "individuals" who have concerns about the potential knock on effects of any changes to the GRA on the rights of women and they take these seriously - in particular the right to operate women-only spaces, such as domestic violence refuges. The Government agrees "that in certain circumstances maintaining access to single-sex spaces is important and helps keep vulnerable women and children safe".

There's a very strong statement on the WPUK website from the head of a VAW charity who only feels able to speak out anonymously.

She claims there are already strong safeguards and a robust risk assessment protocol in place. But the default is to place a prisoner in the prison of the gender in which they identify but the GRA is not determinative, no prisoner has the right to choose. This is done by the Transgender Case Board on a case by case basis.

Only those without a GRC are dealt with on a case by case basis by the Transgender Case Board.

Prison instructions for trans prisoners can be downloaded here - scroll down to '17/2016 The Care and Management of Transgender Offenders'.

The prison service go by legal sex, first and foremost. They're not allowed to ask to see a GRC but they can ask for a birth certificate (the sole remaining thing a GRC is good for). If a prisoner has a female birth cert (original or obtained via a GRC) they will be housed in the female estate unless they present an exceptional risk, in which case they may be moved to a men's prison, purely because this is where the facilities are. They will still be housed separately from men and will be accommodated in line with PSI for female prisoners. TW prisoners with a GRC are treated as female in all circumstances.

There is case law directly referenced in the prison rules linked above that says that even if a tw is in prison for attempted rape, if they have a grc and hence a bc that says 'female', they must be sent to a women's prison. The bar is very low as we have seen in various cases that have made mainstream media.

Only for trans prisoners without a GRC - i.e. those who are legally male - are decisions made on a case by case basis. And the Transgender Case Board are no fools, which is why all those self ID trans sex offenders are still treated as male prisoners in the male estate.

Changing the GRA to a self-ID process would allow all of them to be treated as female. The vast majority would have to be moved to the female estate, with only the few exceptionally dangerous ones remaining in the male estate, but housed there as female prisoners.

it has been interesting seeing the very gradual backpeddling from my first response to this 4th one

That's only apparent because you kept writing

I find it strange that MNers think that the prison service rules on transgender prisoners are immutable and can never change. Therefore, we can predict the impact on prisoners of changes to the GRA.

The reality is that the prison services rules can and do change. They have changed at least twice in the last 8 years. They don't need an act of parliament to change.

If there is a change in primary legislation (like a reformed GRA) then the rules will be reviewed - it would be negligent if they are not. Any issues caused in managing trans prisoners by a reformed GRA will be dealt with by revised rules.

At the end of the day the prison service (technically NOMS) decides where it wants to hold prisoners (subject to a human rights backstop).

Great work Biology and thanks for updating like this. It shows the effect that persistent rational truth telling can have.

Human rights of women?

I had a meeting the other day with with some geneticists who were involved to some university research project. We went off on a bit of a feminist tangent (we were all women) talking about titles (Miss/Mrs/etc). They said the university have five different genders identities students can choose from. I smiled and asked how that works with you lot being geneticists considering that they can see that sex clearly is binary. They smiled back and shrugged shoulders in a what's the world coming to sort of way.

Are you suggesting that trans people who already have a GRC will lose rights if self ID comes in?

Yet another reason to oppose it.

There are quite a few MPs who are GC but not yet been 'outed' on social media about it. It's not come before parliament yet, so they're not raising their heads above the parapet.
I have chatted to several who didn't know self ID was a possibility, and we're not in favour at all.
There are far more in agreement with David TC Davies than you might think.

Are you suggesting that trans people who already have a GRC will lose rights if self ID comes in?

I think there will inevitable be two classes of trans people - those with the current GRC and those with self-id GRCs. The former will have met far stricter evidential requirements than the later. There is no legal situation I am aware of where legal gender is determinative - it always subject to exceptions. I think courts will give less weight to a GRC if the evidential requirements are weakened.

Also under the Irish system, GRCs can be revoked by the minister if there is evidence (and I am simplifying) that the GRC was obtained under false pretences. So the second class of GRCs could be revoked by a minister without the involvement of a court. Although presumable the decision to revoke a GRC would be subject to judicial review. There is no system to revoke current GRCs.

BTW applying to have a GRC revoked is one technique prison authorities can use to stop a non-genuine trans prisoner being transferred to the women's estate.

But, SarahAr, there is of course will be no such thing as a non-genuine trans person when you have self ID.

Interesting post SarahAr.

I haven't seen such a two tier system being discussed anywhere. There was no mention of it in the Scottish consultation. We have just been told repeatedly that nothing will change, it's just simplifying and streamlining the process of getting a GRC.

I don't see how a two tier system could work. Surely you get your GRC and then use it to get a new birth certificate. Obviously the birth certificate doesn't come with an issue date on it, just your DOB. Otherwise it would totally out you.

Even if it was possible to differentiate, I have seen no discussion of the old, evidence-based system being continued alongside the new self-ID system, so the option would be gone for trans people to get a stronger, evidence-based GRC that carried more weight. All that would be available for future applicants would be the weaker self-ID GRC. So if you are correct, these proposals weaken rights for trans people, as pointed out by the transsexuals who signed the guardian letter. I'd be really pissed off about that if I was trans.

There is no system to revoke current GRCs

Yes there is. See Section 8 (5,6) here.

I wonder how many GRCs under the current system have been revoked. I wonder if any have. It would at least be possible to show fraud under the current system, by showing that some of the evidence submitted was not genuine. Take away all requirements for evidence and there is no way to show fraud or false pretences. It's not clear what false pretences would even mean in this case.

What is 'non-genuine trans'? What is 'genuine trans'?

But, SarahAr, there is of course will be no such thing as a non-genuine trans person when you have self ID.

David Lewis. But only because he told the Spectator and following that Labour arbitrarily decided he was doing it in bad faith, unlike people like Madigan who it could be argued are similarly unfit to be women's officer.

I haven't seen such a two tier system being discussed anywhere. There was no mention of it in the Scottish consultation. We have just been told repeatedly that nothing will change, it's just simplifying and streamlining the process of getting a GRC.

No.

As in no, nor have I!