My workplace has been Stonewalled. Completely new policy released. If anyone objects to sharing facilities with a transgender individual of the opposite sex, they will be the ones asked to move.

[iexpectedthis]

I am considering posting the paragraph in question, but its obviously a bit outing as it's a massive corporation.

It talks about being sent to use facilities on another floor if you object, so I am sure they are thinking about their massive offices in London.

I don't feel it will affect me personally on a day to day basis, but I am feeling down on reading the whole policy full of assigned at birth and stereotypes.

I could see this coming as we have had a lot of Stonewall input on diversity days, presentations in London offices featuring Pip Bunce and visits from Scottish trans groups to educate us.

Just a bit of a vent and asking for any thoughts on whether/how to question or challenge this :(

So there are female only facilities on a different floor to you and unisex on your floor? Sounds like a reasonable set up to me 🤷‍♀️

Ask them to show you their equality impact assessment which shows they have considered people with all protected characteristics including religion and sex.

Sorry, what a nightmare!

Sounds like a reasonable set up to me

That depends on whether facilities that can be used by women are sufficient/have been reduced.

You could asked what impact assessment they have done around other protected characteristic, sex and religion in particular

Where are you getting the female only/unisex facilities from sapphos?

It sounds awful. Are you in a union? Have you got female colleagues who feel the same way as you? We managed to get a private facility at our place as there are a few menopausal women in the same team and the (male) union rep was very keen to just sort it out so he didn't have to hear any details!!!

I would check the legality of it and talk to HR (if you feel it won't jeopardise your job)

So basically all the women who don’t want to share facilities with men are being excluded from facilities they could use before. How is that fair SapphosRock?

Did you not read the rest of that sentence Sappho?

It talks about being sent to use facilities on another floor if you object, so I am sure they are thinking about their massive offices in London.

Presumably there are other offices where this isn't the case.

You could asked what impact assessment they have done around other protected characteristic, sex and religion in particular

And disability. It's quite popular in these 'trans inclusive' policies to simply rename the disabled facilities as unisex for everyone.

No, withdrawing a female-only facility isn’t reasonable, Sapphosrock. Providing extra facilities for those who want unisex would be reasonable.

Why should women have to go to a different floor? Many women have urinary problems in pregnancy, after childbirth or as they get older. Menstruation can cause problems such as heavy bleeding, or a sudden rush of blood.

We need women-only toilets, and sometimes we need them in a hurry.

And disability. It's quite popular in these 'trans inclusive' policies to simply rename the disabled facilities as unisex for everyone.

Yes it's always disabled/accessable or women's facilities that get rebadged as unisex, never the men's,

Most of the other workplaces are production facilities, where there won't be a massive selection of facilities. Most will have only one in each area, and people working on production lines normally get timed set breaks to reduce downtime.

In my area there is only one set of female toilets, it's already got a sign on it directing men to their own facilities. The men's was apparently pretty grim for a while, and a few men were nipping into the nice new ladies. 🙄 I do think they should have build nice new mens at the same time so they did get a crappy deal!

In thinking of the big offices too though, where not every man or woman there will be comfortable with this arrangement. Then if they complain they will get re-educated a 'coaching conversation' about their views and asked to go find another toilet if they're not happy validating the trans employee.

*I'm thinking

I would be asking are the men's being made mixed sex or just the women's.

Sorry x post

I've only skimmed all the stuff so far, there is guidance for managers too. It's not going to affect me if someone decides to identify differently and change all their HR stuff, but if there are vulnerable women they're getting tough luck over facilities?

It says explicitly that Stonewall have told them what to do. I expect they want the badge of approval for the website and letter head.

redshoeblueshoe any trans employee can use the facilities they want essentially. So yes the men's would be impacted too.

It's very tricky to question this stuff, without coming across as "anti-trans". I'm nothing of the sort, but it's blindingly clear that organisations are giving zero thought to the impact on other employees - only the trans ones.

There is no balanced approach.

I think that you possibly have to go through HR to declare yourself as trans or non binary or whatever. Which is slightly better I guess.

I actually clicked on it thinking we were just going to get asked to do the pronouns in our email signature.

I mean a lot of it is ok. Not harassing trans employees or discriminating against them when applying for jobs or promotions. Of course.

It just concerns me that it's now in writing in a policy about being assigned at birth and all that nonsense. Also brings the data collection into question if they're only recording gender instead of sex - there's a whole procedure for amending your records.

It says explicitly that Stonewall have told them what to do

In which case I would want to know if they have checked out the legalities
independent of Stonewall advice. Businesses can't ignore the law and they could be opening themselves up to being sued.

@PronounssheRa

And disability. It's quite popular in these 'trans inclusive' policies to simply rename the disabled facilities as unisex for everyone.

Yes it's always disabled/accessable or women's facilities that get rebadged as unisex, never the men's,

This. Because men would never stand for it.

There is no balanced approach

absolutely this - I can't think of any other situation where decisions will be made without considering the requirements of all the affected groups. This is happening in schools, hospitals and businesses but how do the decision makers manage to only focus on one tiny group of service users? How does it happen that apparently no one even questions it? Maybe there is a secret technique?

I'm taking a crumb of comfort that they've suggested people can use alternative facilities and aren't labelling anyone uncomfortable with sharing facilities as transphobic.

Plus everyone is going to know, from which toilets they see you using, where you stand on the gender debate.

It's just the feeling that my beliefs and in fact the beliefs of most people no longer matter. Or in fact worse are wrong and unacceptable now.

I must be happy with my "gender assigned at birth".

It's infuriating. I used to work at a place with a lot of different staff coming and going, but the vast majority were female-probably 95 %
They made the 1 toilet on our floor unisex, which meant that various men in the building would make their way up there every morning for a nice quiet poo in a clean toilet (which then wasn't very clean..)
I objected and was told that all toilets had to be "inclusive" even when half the women now felt excluded. I had to go 4 flights down to use the one set of toilets that remained female (because of the way they were designed, not because they gave a shit about women)
It makes me so fucking angry having to share every last thing with men when there's just no need!

Toilets have always been unisex really - like you said, men often pop into the women's if they want to, no one stops them. Trans women have been using women's toilets for eons, too.

It's just a more formal recognition. I do think it's unnecessary pandering, but won't make a huge difference to you really.