New EHRC guidance for schools

[emzvalentine]

The EHRC has produced new guidance for transitioning pupils in Scottish schools, with English guidance to follow shortly.

Despite the recent calls for statutory codes for implementing the exceptions in the Equality Act, the EHRC has, once again, repeated a policy that fails to take into account the needs of girls, and defers to the trans organisations.

Details and link to the guidance document are on this thread:
twitter.com/VicM2019/status/1166808190983577608

NoBackboneNoGumption -

“What a bizarre thread!

Really not getting why we should keep quiet about this pile of hot shit in case someone somewhere is working secretly against it and we might fuck that up? That’s TRA mindfuck to a level I hadn’t expected!”

Yep

Gender it’s now in the public domain having been leaked to the Daily Telegraph

So what's the advice when the girl changing in the lone toilet cubicle has half a dozen other girls also wanting to use it. Do they shove three in at a time, have them queueing up outside to use it and missing PE time? And as a parent, if I don't want dd to change with the male bodied child can I insist she has separate changing? But I won't even be told, will I?

Jesus christ this thread is fucking awful.

Firstly this was not a public consultation, this was JUST LIKE NEARLY EVERY OTHER POLICY CONSULTATION PRACTICE a limited consultation with groups that WORK IN THE RELEVANT AREA IN SOME WAY. Scottish women's groups, including grassroots groups, have been involved in these processes, they all know how this works, and they have all kept anything they have been asked to keep confidential to themselves in order to both protect their group and also to protect the integrity of the policy processes they are involved in. This leak came from a source that knew a GC group was involved, and those leaking/sharing knew that this group could be adversely affected by the leak, as could the process, yet they decided to leak it anyway, because who gives a fuck about others and their work right? And for what? The EHRC can get away with not having to say anything to the media because this is not a final draft, so all this has done is make sure that when the guidance is eventually published, just weeks away, it gets far less coverage as it's already been covered. That is how stupid this is. Also the EHRC may step back from involving grassroots and GC groups because of this leak; they did not have to engage with such groups and no, they cannot just make out that a group agreed with them if they didn't, and in fact if they do not listen to what is raised with them, this provides an even stronger basis for challenge when this guidance is finally published. Writing letters of complaint is not going to get the EHRC to budge, just not how this shit works, especially not regarding draft guidance. So a grand old lot of nothing came from this - all this leak achieved is taking the impact out of the publication of the finalised guidance, and potentially harmed a GC group and possibly others.

Since the defense of this leak has been that women want to hear about these kinds of things, the individuals and groups involved will surely now be completely open about their involvement in any policy processes hereon in that may be of interest to women, regardless of the possible repercussions to their groups, otherwise they'd just total fucking hypocrites and it'd be clear that there actions are not the result of principle but of selfish double standards, and that is at the very least.

And also, trying to connect women in this thread to particular groups is the only TRA tactic on display here and is totally fucking disgusting, you should be ashamed of yourself and learn to respect women's anonymity, and be very happy you are getting yours respected. And that will probably be my last post here, the lack of solidarity is astounding.

Hanna And having read through your post I am STILL left with questions:

Why this is being done OUT of public scrutiny, why is the EHRC STILL flouting the EA2010?

Why is no-one there stopping this and pointing out all the places where this guidance has and continues to misinterpret the law?

But mostly why is it always women and girls who have to move over to accomodate men and boys?

I can see what you are saying, but the intransigence of the EHRC is no reason to put up and shut up... they MUST be challenged. The wider public MUST be aware of what is being done, in their name, to change, eradicate the hard won rights to safety and dignity that so many women have fought for.

For TRAs to prevail all that is required is that women do nothing - to paraphrase Burke!.

Curious- For TRAs to prevail all that is required is that women do nothing - yup.

That’s why I don’t understand why anyone supposedly GC would be saying not to write to the EHRC about this.

Is this just for Scotland or is it for England as well?

If this guidance has been in the pipeline since March last year and publication of the final document is now 'just weeks away' then I don't expect to see any major changes from this draft. Therefore, whatever women's organisation(s) have been involved in this consultation have either done a very poor job of representing girls' interests or just haven't been listened to anyway.

HannaSkye's post implies that there will be no public consultation, just this limited exercise with carefully selected groups.

In the absence of a public consultation we have, through this leak, been given an opportunity to kick up a fucking stink while the guidance is still draft and thus easier to get changed. I suggest we don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

Birdsfoottrefoil - Sooo EHRC will now ignore women pointing out that guidelines breach the Equality Act and human rights out of spite?

Yes this does look like what is being suggested. At least we'd know where we stand.

If this guidance has been in the pipeline since March last year and publication of the final document is now 'just weeks away' then I don't expect to see any major changes from this draft. Therefore, whatever women's organisation(s) have been involved in this consultation have either done a very poor job of representing girls' interests or just haven't been listened to anyway.

My thoughts exactly. Forwomen.scot is not involved, possibly because it wasn't in existence in March 2018. The women's group(s) that are involved are presumably ones that were in existence during the Scottish GRA consultation period?

My bigger concern is that it seems the draft guidance has not been made available to parents of kids at school in Scotland. That should be easy to do via PTAs and parent councils.

I see from the quote in today's Sunday Times piece that the EHRC fails to say it has consulted with parents.

How can that be right when the guidance has implications for ALL pupils, trans or not, male or female?

This is anything but a transparent process and they should be called out on it.

I don't see how their closed door policy for consulting, even if there is one GC women's group in the mix, is a good thing. It should be a wholly open and transparent process.

The EHRC can get away with not having to say anything to the media because this is not a final draft

And as it is a final draft they can change it in response to outrage and say this was always intended, it was just a draft. Once published they will just defend it.

Writing letters of complaint is not going to get the EHRC to budge

I wouldn’t expect it to but you need to complain to them first before the parliamentary and health service ombudsman can get involved and that is where we need this to be.

I think it was just EHRC guidance for England and Wales that has been in the pipeline since March 2018 - and is due to be published in a couple of weeks.

It looks like the Scottish Government recently requested the EHRC to produce Scotland specific guidance and this 'consultation' was the EHRC just checking with a few Scottish organisations that their English guidance would work in the Scottish educational system.

The EHRC were not canvassing for views on the main body of the guidance as they seem satisfied with the legalities of it - despite no open consultation in England. From FPFW's blog it looks like it was all news to them too.

Going by HannaSkye's posts above and very similar posts on Twitter it seems clear that she represents the one women's org in Scotland who were asked for feedback. And launching such attacks on other women's groups just tells me that the guidance was shared around somewhat and there's suspicion as to who leaked it from within their own circles.

ForwomenScot have said they only saw the guidance after the leak and today's Times article states groups such as the National Parent Forum and Connect had access - and were not happy with the request to keep it secret. So it's quite possible the leak came from somewhere other than those being accused of not showing enough solidarity.

Whatever. I don't really care. I'm finding the obsession with condemning a leak rather that looking at the truly awful guidance that was leaked quite strange.

As Pencils says the guidance is at a final draft stage before imminent publication so is unlikely to change much. At least now the papers have reported on it and we all get a fighting chance to stop it being published and a better version produced in its place.

The National Parent Forum Scotland is having a conference in Perth on 5th October. John Swinney will be there to answer questions.

“If YOU CAN'T MAKE IT ALONG DROP US AN EMAIL WITH ANY QUESTIONS YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE ASKED ON THE DAY* ([email protected]). While we cannot promise that we will be able to answer every question that gets sent in, we will do our very best to answer as many as possible”

The fact that this draft guidance has been leaked and reported in the MSM shows that there is a legitimate public interest in it; it could potentially impact every girl in the country. All the secrecy suggests that EHRC want to drive it through without proper public scrutiny. Lack of regulatory transparency, inadequate consultation, lack of accountability and the unashamed bias in the document, says a lot about the regulatory culture within EHRC. They clearly believe that the Nolan principles for standards in public life don’t apply to them. The guidance also flies in the face of the government's assurances to women about the exception in the EA; EHRC are rolling them back rather than upholding them. Public confidence in a regulator is difficult to build up, but very easy to lose. EHRC are rapidly losing any credibility it might have had with women. As many people as possible should be complaining about this, and the complaints should also be directed at Amber Rudd. She is ultimately responsible when EHRC is abrogating its regulatory duty to over half of the population.

If Hannaskye actually works for a women’s group I’ll be very surprised. The threats to other women are grim and not something that would come from a women’s group.

Whatever. I don't really care. I'm finding the obsession with condemning a leak rather that looking at the truly awful guidance that was leaked quite strange.

A lot of Third sector jobs depend upon government/EU funding.

This can mean that some groups don't actually want other organisations involved if it means competition for funds.

It doesn't matter if this was 'a proper consultation' the intent is clear.In every EHRC scenario girls are expected to yield to the feelings of a male who wishes to indentify as female.Well that's just tough we will not accept shutting females up because men decide upon it.Let's just say it as it is if you have a penis it's the boys/men's changing room for you matey.You don't get to impose yourself on me or my daughter