Tuesday 9th March - could be a big day

[Xanthangum]

1. Helen Staniland and Glinner giving evidence to the Commons

1. Fair Play For Women VS UK Statistics Authority at Royal Courts of Justice at 10am

1. The Court of Appeal and Harry/ We Are Fair Cop - The Court of Appeal will examine the validity of the College of Police Hate Crimes Guidance

I wanted to start a thread where any major decisions or outcomes and links to anyone live tweeting or online footage. See you back here tomorrow!

Judge is sounding pretty clued up. Although may respond similarly to the other side I guess.

the claim is that they can reverse engineer sex from the two questions

The gender identity question is voluntary. They're relying on answer to a voluntary question to patch up the misguided compulsory sex question?

I still find the TRA argument really odd - do they genuinely.not want to know how many transmen and transwomen there are?

(True Garden - those complaints are completely groundless - it's a criminal offence to look up individuals and certainly to share it - It's not possible legally. and UK Gov is v. anti big brother database like other EU countries)

Ooh I do like it when judges are "surprised". Fingers crossed.

Judge is sounding pretty clued up. Although may respond similarly to the other side I guess.

I get the impression that in a judicial review, it's not so directly combative, and the judge is less passive. More of a participant than just a referee. The judge is trying to draw out the arguments, so is trying to get the best case from each.

Both probing weak points and pulling out points the judge thinks important.

Looking good!

@ItsAllGoingToBeFine

Mimmymum: FPFW have just started live-tweeting their *@ONS* legal case.

I’d encourage all trans people to complete their #census2021 TODAY while your passport is currently considered a ‘legal document’ re the sex marker.

Just in case the Judge sides with FPFW 🙄

I don't get this at all. Accurate numbers for both sex and gender identity are needed in order to allocate resources and make decisions on all sorts of things. It does trans people absolutely no favours at all if the government has no idea how many of them there when working out what resources to allocate for things like gender clinics. They're shooting themselves in the foot.

Because everything is secondary to validation.

(JustTurtles - It's true that it hurts trans people not to collect accurate data for providing services for them and making good policy for them. Accurate data is good for trans people but bad for the likes of Mermaids / MimmyMum - with accurate data, over the coming decades, life expectancy, deaths, health outcomes for the trans population could show the impact of things like puberty blockers long term ...)

JC refers to definition of sex in normal language and law. Common law position (Bellinger) is that sex is a matter of biological sex. Judges questioning if/how GRA2004 has changed that interpretation. /16

JC says meaning of male and female has not changed - it can only be sex at birth or what it becomes under GRA2004. It CANNOT be a matter of self-identity /17

Defendant did not ask itself "what does the legalisation means in relation to male and female". It is a strong case that sex is not self-identified. /18

JC now turns to request for interim relief (order to force ONS to remove guidance now pending full JR). It must be in the public interest. Claimant is not asking judge to stop the census. Just to remove unlawful guidance so it can proceed lawfully /19

@ItsAllGoingToBeFine I don't think completing it today would make any difference. It has to be information that is correct as per whatever the rules are on the 21st. If they change the rules people will have to go back and resubmit if they're answers would no longer be correct.

This is my understanding, I'm sure more knowledgeable people will correct me if I'm wrong!

JC says granting interim relief is better than keeping unlawful guidance in place because i) ONS will not be collecting the data its required to and people will be answering incorrectly ii) important data on birth sex gets lost. /20

Legal sex = birth sex (for all but 6000 people). /21

If they change the rules people will have to go back and resubmit if they're answers would no longer be correct.

The stakes really are high aren't they - so if the ONS lose they will have mailshot every household in the UK to tell them the guidance has changed?

This is the issue....mimmymum saying things without looking at accuracy. It's been the issue all along. on 21st March or as near as possible. The 9th March is not either of those things

Defendant has claimed birth sex is not lost because can be imputed from answers on the gender identity question. We dispute this because GI question is voluntary and non-specific answers won't help deduce sex at birth. /22

The stakes really are high aren't they - so if the ONS lose they will have mailshot every household in the UK to tell them the guidance has changed?
Surely, just those who have already completed the census? I didn't get the guidance with my letter, it just pointed me to online.

@AdHominemNonSequitur do you want to take over?

This is not the full Judicial Review so we won’t hear all the arguments today. FPFW are seeking an interim order that the guidance is taken down pending the JR. The crux of their argument today is that the guidance may not correctly reflect the law so anyone following may be filling out the census in an unlawful way. I think this is a lower bar to reach than the full JR to have the guidance struck out completely. My thought would be that if the judge agrees that there is a reasonable chance that it can be argued the guidance is unlawful they will order it taken down. I think it can be argued that the risk to the integrity of the census of potentially unlawful guidance is worse than no guidance at all.

Surely, just those who have already completed the census? I didn't get the guidance with my letter, it just pointed me to online.

But they don't know how many people have already read the guidance and will apply it - people aren't going to keep checking the guidance to see if it has changed before they submit, and we know this guidance has been widely talked about in the communities it will most impact.