Quick question as comment on Facebook is making me doubt myself. If the reforms go through

[nottakingthisanymore]

Does it mean that single sex exemptions won’t work anymore?
I am of the understanding that since a person can change their sex on documentation then they will be classed as that sex so that means a shelter would not be able to exclude a male bodied person with a GRC.

I keep seeing comments that say because of EA 2010, women will still be able to have single sex spaces. But we won’t will we?

I would like it if someone could offer clarification on this as I am getting confused. To put it simply-will sex exemptions if the EA become meaningless?

Hope someone can help.

Of the EA not if!
Fat fingers trying to type on small phone!

They're lying.

The government has since said that EA exemptions will not be changed as a result of GRA and statements to that affect are contained also within the consulation. That's what's behind them asking those questions about whether we as respondents think specific exemptions contained there will be affected by the changes.

Having said that, there have certainly been proposals to remove single-sex exceptions from EA. It's a stated aim of Stonewall and it came up in a committee that preceded the consulation (not sure about the precise details). The other issue is that this is an exception to a general rule, so services will have to demonstrate that it is a proportionate and legitimate response if challenged. In practice, it's going to be more of what we're seeing even without the proposed changes, where in practice services are being provided on the basis of self-identification and are not single-sex even when legally permitted to be.

Two issues.

First, the exemptions are not working at the moment. TRAs have created such an atmosphere of group think and fear that there are situations - women's prisons, gym changing rooms, girl guides, youth hostels, sleeper trains - where the exemptions could and should be being applied, but are not.

Second, various parties (including most recently Jeremy Corbyn) are on record as saying that the Equalities Act is their next target.

That's one of the things that infuriated me about that consultation - it's being sold as "minor administrative change" in how one gets a GRC, but (a) vastly widens the pool of people who can get one beyond the genuinely dysphoric individuals the 2003 act was intended to cover, so that it will also now encompass part time fetishistic cross dressers and (b) it's part of a wider campaign to replace sex with gender as the protected characteristic, and modify the Equalities Act accordingly.

(CF the good old planning trick developers in my town used. Buy greenbelt - everyone laughs 'cos you can't build on greenbelt. Attract major government department - Secretary of State waives greenbelt restrictions for that building. Precedent set, fifteen years later last of greenbelt has gone.)

A trans woman who has a gender recognition certificate is treated as the female sex under the Equality Act. Because the proposal is that you can self define to get a certificate rather than needing it confirmed by doctors, it will therefore be easier for men to be classified as female.

People who say it won't affect the equality act are technically correct as in the wording won't change but they are conveniently ignoring that a much wider group of people will now be able to use its provisions.

My interpretation (not a lawyer):
The single sex exemptions are much harder to enforce if the category of legal sex is opened up to anyone who wants it.
Whether or not you have a GRC changes the threshold of when you can invoke exemptions, and I think will make it harder to be excluded from female-only space, because by default you should be treated as though you are female (rather than male).
Currently the functional legal definition of female is biological women + a handful of people who hold a GRC.
Everyone else is legally male (with or without the protected other characteristic of gender reassignment).
If you change the legal definition of female to "anyone who says they are and fills out a declaration," it will make it almost impossible to keep most women-only spaces. It will be much harder to challenge people, because if that person says they're a woman, I guess then legally the meet the requirements for what it takes to be a woman (if all it means now is self-declaration)?
To paraphrase what someone else wrote (sorry I can't remember exactly who), the lock might still be there, but you're handing out copies of the key to all and sundry.

The language of the consultation itself is a bit misleading in my view. They say right up front, and in all the guidance that sex-based rights to single sex spaces will still be protected. But if the proposed changes to GRA go through then a much wider pool of people, on whom there is less onus to demonstrate that they actually want to transition meaningfully to live in the opposite sex, will be able to make a change that says not only are they identified as their new gender but also have it documented that they were born a different sex. So...a m number of people who retain their biological sex and make no changes either through hormone therapy or surgery might very well gain access to the sex-based rights of others - rights that exist for good reason. That’s the issue in my view. It is confusing, because when you’re being assured that ‘no changes to these rights are being discussed’ but that information ignores the fact that the changes imply changing the definition of man and woman, that sets up a basic tension between the different elements of the questions...there’s always a sub text that needs bringing to the surface.

Crossed posted with heresy - yes - what they said!! :)

Please can someone clarify for me - is it correct that you can apply for a new birth certificate if you get a GRC which will in effect change your legal sex?

I read this somewhere but I don’t understand that this can be right because if so how can the single sex exemptions ever still apply?

Yes, that stumped me when I looked at the consultation. Single sex spaces WILL be kept.
BUT men can self identify as women, get a birth certificate that says they ARE FEMALE. Then they access single sex spaces.
I agree this should be made very clear and it isn’t.

Sorry...should have said. Under the new proposals men can self identify as women and get a birth certificate..........

Here are refuge professionals explaining why they fear GRA reform to self-ID would make single sex services impossible to implement on the ground:
fairplayforwomen.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/FPFW_report_19SEPT2018.pdf

This Guardian piece is also good on the legal options and issues with self-ID for single sex services (a variety of opinions, some conflict:

amp.theguardian.com/society/2018/oct/19/gender-recognition-act-reforms-six-legal-views-transgender-debate?__twitter_impression=true

Essentially to be able to sometimes exclude males biological women need a clear social and legal category that applies only to them. If any man can legally become a woman because he says he feels like one (no medical checks) and hardly anyone is allowed to say or ask or confirm (privacy allowances), how on earth will single sex services work on the ground?!?

Thanks for the replies. So let’s say someone with GRC wants to come into a refuge. Legally at the moment we have to let them in because they are legally female. Someone without a GRC could be excluded under the terms of the EA. (I know this isn’t working in practice) Or can we actually exclude someone with a GRC legally when they are themselves legally female?

Yes, that stumped me when I looked at the consultation. Single sex spaces WILL be kept.
BUT men can self identify as women, get a birth certificate that says they ARE FEMALE. Then they access single sex spaces.
I agree this should be made very clear and it isn’t.

Quite!

Cross post with redkey.
That helps. Thanks all.

I was doubting myself but it seems I was right in the first place. We need to make a big deal of how EA won’t work with self ID. That bloke in politics live the other day - think he was called Ben. He mentioned that nothing would change and I was watching thinking eh????

Eleanor you're right. A GRC is genuinely quite a challenge to get, i do see that, but it is a major deal because it changes your legal sex, thereby affecting single sex exemptions.

The pressure now is both to remove all gatekeeping from the GRC process (self id), and before that has happened legally, to prioritise the Equality Act protection of those undergoing gender reassignment over the Equality Act protection of sex. With the result that services provided nominally as single sex become single gender, as GirlGuiding now say they are, with both sexes using them.

There is a profoundly dishonest thread in AIBU in which a "lurker" with an "open mind about the GRA" says that because various women's refuges, rape crisis centres, etc are going along with self-ID, this is proof that it will have no impact on their operations.

Separately I've seen comments about how women's refuges, rape crisis centres, etc have faced the real prospect of losing funding if they come out as "transphobes" (ie maintain the 2010 EA exemptions.)

It's clear what kind of picture that paints for me. It's about coercion.

(And there are now some of us who are calling for the repeal of the GRA).

oatmilk you have pretty much summed up exactly the confusion I had. To me the whole problem with self ID is that single sex provision becomes worthless. But then you read again and again that nothing will change.

Strictly speaking the equality act does allow for a trans person with a certificate to still be excluded in some single sex spaces. I believe a rape centre is the example given, however, there are people ( i beoelev lawyers) who say the law will only be properly clear if it is examined in a court. Which is why I think people are giving in. They don’t have the time and money to fight the tra in court.

It's a bit like saying anyone found breaking and entering will be prosecuted but the key is under the mat for anyone who wants to use it.

I read the guardian piece yesterday about the six legal arguments. Got confused with it and came to the conclusion that the GRA 2004 and EA 2010 must be deeply flawed. But I’m not a lawyer or anything so am probably just not quite understanding things.

That’s interesting mldgebabe you would need a test case in this so easier to say ok you can come in.

It confused me too. The questions seemed so reasonable - the word 'gender' is used throughout the consultation so it's easy to be lulled into thinking the 'sex' exemptions will prevent male-bodied people in women's spaces. I was ready to answer 'no', it wouldn't make a difference to the Equalities Act, but then remembered the whole point about the new birth certificate and privacy restrictions is that the person is legally recognised as the other sex.