Transgender campaigners have too much say over expanding hate crime laws, says top judge

[PronounssheRa]

Articles in the telegraph and the mail today.

A former top judge has claimed transgender groups are having too much say over hate crime laws that could cause freedom of speech to 'suffer'.

Charles Wide, a retired Old Bailey judge, has said only an 'limited range' of views was being sought out to advise on a possible expansion of legislation.


He singled out LGBT campaigners Stonewall, saying the Commission was treating them more like 'a consultant than consultee'.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9539545/Transgender-groups-say-hate-crime-laws-former-Old-Bailey-judge-says.html

[ChattyLion]

I hope there’s a proper debate about this issue in government circles, it is really important.

[SmokedDuck]

[quote EmbarrassingAdmissions]I read the following as an extension of a wider discussion about charities and an agenda for change. I have no difficulty however in believing that due diligence demands scrutiny of advice and evidence from those same charities.

Charities could also do worse than remember the 2014 words of the late Stephen Lloyd, an outstanding charity lawyer: ‘If politics are not concerned with poverty, injustice, climate change, the distribution of wealth, human rights and education, what are they for? And since these, and many other issues, are the essence of charitable purposes, it is inevitable that charities will engage with contentious political issues. It goes with the patch.’

www.transformingsociety.co.uk/2021/04/22/charities-in-the-culture-wars/[/quote]
I don't think he's wrong, and I have no issue with groups engaging in some way in politics.

But if we take that as true, it raises a lot of questions in terms of special access to government, and government funding of charities, and things like asking charities to give state funded organisations (like the police) things like badges for right conduct or training.

[Igneococcus]

In the Times now:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/607c8f5e-acaa-11eb-bda6-057976012425?shareToken=5f5bb7422ea99878560aef8df85625fe

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

I read the following as an extension of a wider discussion about charities and an agenda for change. I have no difficulty however in believing that due diligence demands scrutiny of advice and evidence from those same charities.

Charities could also do worse than remember the 2014 words of the late Stephen Lloyd, an outstanding charity lawyer: ‘If politics are not concerned with poverty, injustice, climate change, the distribution of wealth, human rights and education, what are they for? And since these, and many other issues, are the essence of charitable purposes, it is inevitable that charities will engage with contentious political issues. It goes with the patch.’

www.transformingsociety.co.uk/2021/04/22/charities-in-the-culture-wars/

[SmokedDuck]

Also, I think there is a culture element. We've kind of trained people to think - who do you look to for policy advice on x, y, or z? Well, you look to a group involved in that area - even when they clearly have a specific approach to that question. So it really ends up referencing the views that are already the most socially on the up and up. If you wanted to ask some lobby group, say, opposing same sex unions to contribute to a policy approach question, people would go through the roof.

Great if you happen to agree with whatever the view of the day is, but the first time you fid yourself on the other side of that...

[SmokedDuck]

@Ereshkigalangcleg

The likes of Stonewall, Mermaids, Gendered Intelligence etc have altogether too much sway. I'd really like to know how they got it in the first place.

I fear it would be a somewhat murky tale.

I think this is something that really needs to be looked at however - I think it is a bigger system problem, not just about Stonewall.

Ir's interesting, the business about not supporting political parties or candidates - it seems to me several charities, including Stonewall, basically endorse candidates - some of the environmental ones for example.

[Abitofalark]

I don't disagree with anything quoted here from that judge. One of the ways in which this disproportionate influence by a particular narrow lobby group was enabled was because of government departments such as education, not doing their job of overseeing and guaranteeing the safeguarding of children and standards in schools.

Also the very body that is supposed to monitor, advise and enforce compliance with the law on equality (the Equality and Human Rights Commission) appeared to have been taken over by the same lobby and had in charge lawyers who didn't even know the law of equality. What if anything has been done about that scandal?

Another source is MPs not doing a job of communicating and informing their constituents about important issues and seeking their views on proposals and policies. They seem just to do their own thing regardless of their constituents and what they might think. For a Law Commission on the scope of laws that affect every single person and may put them in jeopardy for expressing opinions not approved of, to cite a figure of 2500 responses like a trump card, when it is a drop in the ocean is shocking. How many individuals in the population even know about it and how many voters even got a letter and a consultation from their MP or a town meeting to air it?

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

I haven't read it yet but the online version is now on the website.

Thank you! It's quite short.

Hostility crime and the Law Commission:

policyexchange.org.uk/publication/hostility-crime-and-the-law-commission/

[Thingybob]

[quote EmbarrassingAdmissions]Wonder if it will make it online or whether they will keep it old-school?

They normally have online versions as well as other distribution. Worth keeping out an eye for it turning up:

policyexchange.org.uk/publications/

twitter.com/Policy_Exchange[/quote]
I haven't read it yet but the online version is now on the website.

[toffeebutterpopcorn]

Friends in low places I’d guess.

[MarieIVanArkleStinks]

@Ereshkigalangcleg

The likes of Stonewall, Mermaids, Gendered Intelligence etc have altogether too much sway. I'd really like to know how they got it in the first place.

I fear it would be a somewhat murky tale.

Me too. As murky as the miasma swelling around Mermaids at the later end of last year, which all went suddenly and unaccountably quiet even allowing for the outcome of the Bell case.

I'd love to know why that happened, too.

[Ereshkigalangcleg]

The likes of Stonewall, Mermaids, Gendered Intelligence etc have altogether too much sway. I'd really like to know how they got it in the first place.

I fear it would be a somewhat murky tale.

[MarieIVanArkleStinks]

Isn't it ironic?

The antediluvian legal system, conservatives, and the Daily Mail - not to mention the likes of Piers Morgan - are now the most consistent allies with women's sex-based rights. What a turnaround.

The likes of Stonewall, Mermaids, Gendered Intelligence etc have altogether too much sway. I'd really like to know how they got it in the first place.

[persistentwoman]

@Clymene

I still believe stonewall are operating outwith the remit of a charity in terms of political campaigning. This is what the Charity Commission have to say about political lobbying (my bold):

'There may be situations where carrying out political activity is the best way for trustees to support the charity’s purposes. A charity may choose to focus most, or all, of its resources on political activity for a period. The key issue for charity trustees is the need to ensure that this activity is not, and does not become, the reason for the charity’s existence.
• Charities can campaign for a change in the law, policy or decisions (as detailed in this guidance in section 2.4) where such change would support the charity’s purposes. Charities can also campaign to ensure that existing laws are observed.
• Legal requirement: however, a charity cannot exist for a political purpose, which is any purpose directed at furthering the interests of any political party, or securing or opposing a change in the law, policy or decisions either in this country or abroad.
• Legal requirement: in the political arena, a charity must stress its independence and ensure that any involvement it has with political parties is balanced. A charity must not give support or funding to a political party, nor to a candidate or politician.
• A charity may give its support to specific policies advocated by political parties if it would help achieve its charitable purposes. However, trustees must not allow the charity to be used as a vehicle for the expression of the political views of any individual trustee or staff member (in this context the Charity Commission means personal or party political views).
• Legal requirement: as with any decision they make, when considering campaigning and political activity charity trustees must carefully weigh up the possible benefits against the costs and risks in deciding whether the campaign is likely to be an effective way of furthering or supporting the charity’s purposes.
• Legal requirement: when campaigning, charity trustees must comply not only with charity law, but other civil and criminal laws that may apply. Where applicable they should also comply with the Code of the Advertising Standards Authority.
• A charity can campaign using emotive or controversial material, where this is lawful and justifiable in the context of the campaign. Such material must be factually accurate and have a legitimate evidence base.'

Excellent post Clymene. In addition to complaints to the Charity Commission, hopefully their excessive overreach and the clear breach of the Nolan principles of public life by supposedly neutral government agencies will be the subject of one of the next judicial reviews?

[BadGherkin]

☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

@ItsAllGoingToBeFine

He singled out LGBT campaigners Stonewall, saying the Commission was treating them more like 'a consultant than consultee'.

This phrase really stood out to me. It beautifully sums up the issue with Stonewall and their influence with governments and big organisations.

It's spot-on. Too many organisations have done this and might be about to discover that they have no protection against wrong advice because they're still obliged to perform due diligence to check it. Which almost nobody did.

We badly need Sinnott to succeed in order to stop the rot of bad advice or misinterpretation being dispensed with no consequences.

[Clymene]

I still believe stonewall are operating outwith the remit of a charity in terms of political campaigning. This is what the Charity Commission have to say about political lobbying (my bold):

'There may be situations where carrying out political activity is the best way for trustees to support the charity’s purposes. A charity may choose to focus most, or all, of its resources on political activity for a period. The key issue for charity trustees is the need to ensure that this activity is not, and does not become, the reason for the charity’s existence.
• Charities can campaign for a change in the law, policy or decisions (as detailed in this guidance in section 2.4) where such change would support the charity’s purposes. Charities can also campaign to ensure that existing laws are observed.
• Legal requirement: however, a charity cannot exist for a political purpose, which is any purpose directed at furthering the interests of any political party, or securing or opposing a change in the law, policy or decisions either in this country or abroad.
• Legal requirement: in the political arena, a charity must stress its independence and ensure that any involvement it has with political parties is balanced. A charity must not give support or funding to a political party, nor to a candidate or politician.
• A charity may give its support to specific policies advocated by political parties if it would help achieve its charitable purposes. However, trustees must not allow the charity to be used as a vehicle for the expression of the political views of any individual trustee or staff member (in this context the Charity Commission means personal or party political views).
• Legal requirement: as with any decision they make, when considering campaigning and political activity charity trustees must carefully weigh up the possible benefits against the costs and risks in deciding whether the campaign is likely to be an effective way of furthering or supporting the charity’s purposes.
• Legal requirement: when campaigning, charity trustees must comply not only with charity law, but other civil and criminal laws that may apply. Where applicable they should also comply with the Code of the Advertising Standards Authority.
• A charity can campaign using emotive or controversial material, where this is lawful and justifiable in the context of the campaign. Such material must be factually accurate and have a legitimate evidence base.'

[ItsAllGoingToBeFine]

He singled out LGBT campaigners Stonewall, saying the Commission was treating them more like 'a consultant than consultee'.

This phrase really stood out to me. It beautifully sums up the issue with Stonewall and their influence with governments and big organisations.

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

Wonder if it will make it online or whether they will keep it old-school?

They normally have online versions as well as other distribution. Worth keeping out an eye for it turning up:

policyexchange.org.uk/publications/

twitter.com/Policy_Exchange

[PronounssheRa]

@EmbarrassingAdmissions

Policy Exchange isn't making it easy to find on the website and as of yet it's not on their Twitter.

According to the telegraph its written in a pamphlet.

In a pamphlet for the think tank Policy Exchange, Judge Wide said that by contrast the views of other groups and members of the public who challenged such theories - often in the face of a vitriolic backlash - had been ignored.

Wonder if it will make it online or whether they will keep it old-school?

[EmbarrassingAdmissions]

Policy Exchange isn't making it easy to find on the website and as of yet it's not on their Twitter.

[Zeev]

According to the Daily Telegraph, the Commission has already backed down on one proposal for offensive family dinner table comments to be classified as a hate crime.

"That's enough Granny, we're calling the police!"

[OhHolyJesus]

It's that it's unbalanced - "relied too much on a "narrow" range of campaign groups".

Same with the surrogacy reform consultation.

However public it may be it was written and designed with a small number of 'stakeholders', Stonewall are listed on that too.

[highame]

Absolutely agree Necessary the full debate by all parties. I think the nobbling of the Judiciary is appalling in a democracy. There was always a point when too far was reached and I think this is it. Worthy of some serious parliamentary scrutiny

[Terranean]

Good to see more voices shining light on this mad capture!