"Transgender man, 34, loses legal battle to be named as the father on his child's birth certificate as Supreme Court refuses to hear his case"

[Malahaha]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8953783/Transgender-man-34-loses-legal-battle-named-father-childs-birth-certificate.html

Don't know if this was already posted but it's a glimmer of hope that soe judges have their heads screwed on tightly.

This should always be about the truth on the child's birth certificate, not for validation of the parent's identity.

100% this. The child is a human being, not an accessory.

The whole premise of the Gender Recognition Act is nonsense. It should be repealed.

@DrDinosaur

The whole premise of the Gender Recognition Act is nonsense. It should be repealed.

Yes! The sooner the better. Birth certificates should represent the facts at birth and should not be changed. If women couldn’t change the F to M on their own birth certificates then we would not now be seeing pressure to change Mother to Father on a child’s birth certificate.

The mess of the GRA is directly threatening the protections for babies born in this country- having a mother legally responsible for the welfare of the baby from the moment of birth and the rights of everyone by an attempt at changing the meanings of words such as mother, father, man and woman.

The GRA started off the process of queer theory and gender identity theory taking over institutions and culture in the U.K. and becoming akin to a new state religion, participation in which is being enforced to varying degrees in a different parts of the U.K.

@ChattyLion

Nothing will ever count as fraud I suspect. How could ‘fraud’ be proved when it’s completely in people’s own heads how they feel? It’s just a pointless, undefined addition to the Act dressed up to look like some kind of a safeguard. The whole premise is so poorly conceived- no acknowledgement of women who get pregnant, no provision for people with GRCs to change their minds and remove their consent to have ‘changed’ sex. Feels like it was just scribbled out on the back of an envelope at a drinks reception and then turned into binding law. Its bizarrely full of holes. It wasn’t even made law that long ago.

FlyingOink - "What do you think would actually class as fraud then?"

Looking at the minutes of the GRC Panel User Group 2005-2018, questions about "fraud" have been mainly about marriage and the Spousal Consent Clause, which obviously do not apply in this case, although the minutes from the 2018 meeting are interesting:

mforstater.medium.com/long-slow-demeaning-intrusive-and-distressing-or-swift-professional-and-efficient-e100f2fb41f8

Gender Recognition Panel User Group Meeting Edinburgh Sept 2011

Judicial report - Jeremy Bennett

Please see the minutes from the GRP User group meeting in Scotland Additionally to the points raised at the Scottish GRP User group meeting Mr Bennett highlighted that the panel need to see evidence of divorce documents and change of name documents. The reason for this is to confirm that a marriage has come to end otherwise only an interim certificate can be issued. An applicant must declare whether they are married or divorced. On rare occasions applicants have failed to declare their marital status. If a full certificate was issued and applicant was still married this may be considered as fraudulent.

Previous minutes - suggestion that gender recognition obtained by married person would invalidate the marriage.

Ms Gray told the meeting that, in her opinion, it would be the certificate that was invalidated, not the marriage. Ms Celizalso commented that there may be fraud implications that might have to be considered.

Minutes of Gender Recognition Panel User Group Meeting 21 November 2016

Page 5

1. This is to be taken as a general and not specific(related to any person) question. If the trans spouse knows that spousal consent has been given under duress and does not declare this, Is the trans party guilty of any criminal offence?

Answer: It is not for the panel to comment on whether the applicant has committed a criminal offence in circumstances not known by the panel.

If the panel became aware that spousal consent had been given under duress, the panel would have to decide whether the spousal consent has been freely given. The panel might contact the spouse for clarification of their wishes.

Section8 GRA2004 allows the applicant's spouse to apply to the High Court for Court of Sessions to quash the grant of the GRC if it was secured by fraud. Similarly, the Secretary of State could apply to set aside the decisionIf they consider it was secured by fraud.

PG said there are precedents in other areas of law, allowing for Instance for the annulment of a marriage.

JB said if the panel were aware spousal consent had not been clearly given they would question the application

Page 7

(Redacted) asked about numbers of fraudulent applications. JB said he couldn't disclose this but it was mlnlscule (sic). The Secretary of State does have power to act.

Minutes of 2018 Gender RecognitionPanel User Group Meeting

Page 6 - 7

Statutory declarations made on application for a GRC: If an Interim GRC is issued that la not "cashed in", if the applicant then begins to live In their legal gender, would this be a crlminal offence?

Judge Bennett said that the full GRC comes from the court or in some circumstances from the panel. The Interim certificate does not legally change the gender only the full GRC does this.

(Redacted) said that the statutory declaration is a legal document and that If an applicant has sworn they will live in their gender for the rest of their life could they still not be committing fraud even if they have not been Issued with a GRC?

Judge Bennett said no.


(Redacted) said that the statutory declaration is only fraud if created with fraudulent intent. It needs to be created 'In good faith' at the time of being sworn. Wedding vows may say that someone intends to be married until death but there is still divorce. Judge Bennett agreed.

(Redacted) asked who would bring a fraud case?


Judge Bennett said that theSecretary of State would take advice of the panel in cases of fraud.

(Redacted) asked If the panel had input into the consultation regarding the statutory declaration?

Judge Bennett said that the panel interprets the law given to them they do not make the law. Judge Bennett said that he may personally feel that the law should be changed but that is only a personal view. Until the law changes the panel must operate under the current Act.

(Continued in next post)

Going back to Freddy:

The GRC minutes from 2018 would suggest that the Secretary of State consulted the GRC Panel before deciding not to take steps to revoke Freddy's GRC.

In Paragraph 45, Justice McFarlane clearly thought that Freddy's application for a GRC might be considered fraudulent, although he does not state why.

"The Secretary of State has the right to refer a GR certificate to the High Court or Family Court if he considers that its grant has been secured by ‘fraud’ [GRA 2004, s 8(5)]. At a preliminary hearing, I enquired whether there was to be any challenge to the validity of the GR certificate in the light of the close chronological alignment of the GR certificate application with the Claimant’s IUI treatment. Having taken instructions, Ms Sarah Hannett, on that occasion acting both for the Secretaries of State and for the RG, confirmed that there was to be no such challenge and that the judicial review proceedings would proceed on the basis that the certificate was valid. This position was confirmed by Mr Ben Jaffey QC at the final hearing, although he reserved the right to refer to TT’s behaviour as part of any submissions on proportionality; in the event this, potentially striking, aspect of the factual background was not in fact referred to in submissions. I have therefore ignored it in my analysis of the issues."

One possibility springs to mind:

McFarlane would be aware that an applicant for a GRC must sign a declaration that he/she "intends to continue to live in the acquired gender until death"
2 (1) (c) on this page:
www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2004/7/section/2

Perhaps McFarlane assumed that this meant that, since only females can get pregnant, that someone who has declared that they intend to live as a male until death would appear to have made a fraudulent declaration if, on receipt of a GRC and obtaining a new Birth Certificate, they promptly made arrangements to be impregnated by IVF.

Perhaps McFarlane also considered what the motivation for fraud might be, given the nature of Freddy's case, if the declaration was indeed fraudulent?

That line of thought took me down a bit of a rabbit hole into legal stuff beyond my ken - IANAL!

Was McFarlane seeking to establish whether the "Mischief Rule" might apply?
I honestly do not know whether this is relevant and hope a lawyer happens by this way. Tagging @spero :-)

The mischief rule

Sometimes, statutes can be defined more broadly by the courts to deal with unforeseen loopholes or ambiguity within the legislation, which may prevent parliament’s original intention being honoured. This application is known as the mischief rule, and will be used where there is ambiguity.

The mischief rule was laid down in the landmarkHeydon’s Casein 1584 where the court said four issues need to be considered when interpreting statutes. These were to: examine the common law prior to the Act, locate the mischief or defeat in the common law, identify the remedy Parliament meant to propose to eliminate the mischief, and finally, to give effect to that remedy.

The mischief rule is narrower than the golden rule and only applied to determine the mischief and defect that the statute was intended to remedy.

www.inbrief.co.uk/legal-system/statutory-interpretation/

The Mischief Rule of Statutory Interpretation

"Themischief rule of statutory interpretationis the oldest of the rules.Themischief rulewas established inHeydon's Case[1584] EWHC Exch J36Case summary. InRe Sussex Peerage, it was held that themischief ruleshould only be applied where there is ambiguity in the statute. Under themischief rulethe court's role is to suppress the mischief the Act is aimed at and advance the remedy."

Continues at:
www.e-lawresources.co.uk/Mischief-rule.php

On birth certificates, it's legal in several European countries to give birth without your identity being recorded. About 600-700 women do this in France every year, for instance. There is no way for the child to discover their mother's identity unless she decides to reveal it herself.

@KeflavikAirport

On birth certificates, it's legal in several European countries to give birth without your identity being recorded. About 600-700 women do this in France every year, for instance. There is no way for the child to discover their mother's identity unless she decides to reveal it herself.

Have you got a source for that, please?

A quick search turned up this:

"the legal maternal relationship with the child is automatically established with the mother's name appearing on the birth certificate"

www.angloinfo.com/how-to/france/healthcare/pregnancy-birth/registration-nationality

fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accouchement_sous_le_secret or in English www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/les-enfants-x-denied-their-true-identity-2333283.html

Bosky thanks for all that info. It really is a bit of shitty, ill-thought-out legislation isn't it?

In a previous thread I suggested a large group of women get GRCs and then try to reverse them a year later, then try to get another GRC. It should be technically possible for some. Provided reversal was allowed, one could change legal sex every couple of years.

It's a fiver and some gas bills; I'm sure it could be done.

I wonder if the decision not to attempt to revoke FM's GRC was in any way linked to the realisation that it would be a shit-show. Imagine!

Prick News and the Grauniad going wild at the evil reactionary courts suggesting pregnancy is a female thing.

Endless stories about how being a man isn't limited to physical sex, appearance, actions, stereotypes, behaviour or personality. It's a special twinkly invisible fairy dust glittering away invisibly in one's mind.

Only special people can see it, only special people have it, but yeah it's definitely worth encapsulating in law and it definitely applies to ten year olds too.

In fact, challenging FM could well have brought the whole house of cards down, if Prick News etc decided to get irate about the unfair expectations placed on trans people to act in acceptably masculine or feminine ways etc etc

Sooner or later the public will begin to ask what trans even means.