Baroness Faulkner on Times Radio

[RightsHoardingRaptor]

She will be on the Times Radio with Tom Newton Dunn, talking about Kathleen Stock's situation shortly.

The show is 10-1 so no idea how far in.

Just checked Twitter and it will be on at 12:35

www.thetimes.co.uk/radio

And with brilliant timing on my part I see your post!

Let's hope she says the things we desperately need to hear.

Wow great questions!!!

• Balancing sometimes conflicting and sometimes competing rights.

So this means you acknowledge there are competing rights?

• She accepts there are competing rights.

The questioning is brilliant.

In talking about gender reassignment in the Equality Act 2010:

"Do you acknowledge this is a space where there are conflicting rights?"

"Absolutely."

@nauticant yes! Direct questions about single sex spaces now...

I hope she doesn't fudge it

Ugh she used the word gender instead of sex

She was like this on her last outing. I'm going to hide behind the sofa until it's over.

At least she is clear that you cannot just fudge the law. As long as the law is there she says charities etc can't just make it up and implement what they wish it was like.

Ha ha she tries to use terminology which is clear. Good luck in picking apart the TRA definitions then!

Well that was rather short and vague.

Her answer about a woman in hospital seemed to emphasise a trans person's rights as an employee of the NHS ( to be treated as the opposite sex / gender) but she did not answer about the balance of rights for the woman ( to be treated by someone of the same SEX if that is what they want.)

Very unclear. Not particularly reassuring.

She was asked about Stonewall law being what Stonewall would like it to be rather than what it is. Reading between the lines she takes a very dim view of this and thinks the EHRC should intervene.

Yes, for someone who likes to use clear language, it was not at all clear.

Nope agreed not very reassuring at all but at least she said the law is the law and cannot be pushed aside.

The way the needs of women are pushed aside shocks me every time I hear it.

On the Nolan podcast when speaking to pink news the CEO just could not compute that Nolan was talking about what women need rather than what trans people want.

He couldn't get his head round the fact that it wasn't about them.

@nauticant yes in agree.

@nauticant I agree. Silly keyboard

The stonewall issue was a bit clearer, at least at the beginning of what was said.

Her answer to the hospital question disappointed me - I wish Sonia had followed it up more and pushed on to what a 'single-sex ward' actually is, and whether women can refuse to submit to intimate procedures from male-bodied HCPs who say they're women, without fear of being accused of some sort of hate crime.

If this isn't one of the exceptions envisaged in the legislation then I really fucking give up.

The Baroness's use of 'gender' in that answer made me worried tbh.

To me she sounded like a cautious lawyer speaking. Her use of the term "gender" seemed to be reflecting the Equality Act wording. I did get a sense of her wanting the EHRC to go along with what the law is. My feeling is that people are aware there's something in the air and need to resist doing what Stonewall and trans activism tell them to do. As someone pointed out recently, after Stonewall misled the University of Essex over the Equality Act, when it went wrong it was the UoE left trying the deal with the mess while Stonewall were nowhere to be seen.

I'm going to be more optimistic than the overall vibe of this thread.

My take on what she said was as gender reassignment is a protected characteristic those people who have undergone this are allowed in law to be in the single sex space of their new identity. I think self ID is a different issue.

I suppose I just so very much wanted her to say that of course a woman can legally withhold consent to an intimate procedure if they feel uncomfortable with someone of the opposite chromosomal sex, irrespective of certificates held, without that patient attracting opprobrium and running the risk of medical treatment being subsequently refused. Just 'no thank you' should be enough.

Coerced consent and forced consent is not consent.

@Violetparis

My take on what she said was as gender reassignment is a protected characteristic those people who have undergone this are allowed in law to be in the single sex space of their new identity. I think self ID is a different issue.

But exceptions are allowed. Exceptions were always envisaged.

She only talked about reassignment in the context of being an employer, so the NHS role as an employer. Anyone can change their ID as an employee.

When she was asked about same sex care she said that has to be considered on a case by case basis.

So services provided by the NHS can treat employees differently to their identity as an employee. Which is a reasonable balance of rights.

@nauticant I completely agree that although a bit vague and a bit fluffed and not pushed enough, hearing these things spoken about regularly now shows that people do realise there is something in the air and this can only be a good thing.

I will join you in your positivity.

This shows a muddle here. The GRA2004 and EA2010 put responsibilities on the government and organisations to treat people a certain way.

There is a power imbalance between an individual and an organisation, so there are lots of discrimination rules.

But none of those rules apply to individuals. An individual is free to discriminate. An individual can do whatever they like, and can reject a person for any reason. The GRA2004 and EA2010 do not apply to individuals.

The problem comes in where an individual finds themselves interacting with an organisation - such as a woman dealing with the NHS.

The NHS may feel it may end up in breach of its GRA2004 or EA2010 responsibilities to "trans" staff if it does not compel women to treat a man as a woman. Right up to vaginal examination. She is roped into their role-play.

What's not clear is how much freedom they have to compel women to do this.

I'm pretty certain this sort of scenario was never envisioned during GRA2004 debates, and if anyone had raised it they would have been laughed at for being so ridiculously paranoid. Of course this would never happen.

As Helen Joyce has said - once you let "1 = 0" in one part of mathematics, it spreads. You can't let a falsehood stand in one place and expect it to remain there.