Sunak would amend the Equality Act

[achillestoes]

Rishi Sunak has been trailing Liz Truss in the Tory leadership battle, and he is now trying to re-invent himself a bit. He has strengthened his positions on sex in the Equality Act meaning biological sex, and specifically said the following about the EA:

“The worst offender in this regard is the 2010 Equality Act, conceived in the dog days of the last Labour government.
“It has been a Trojan horse that has allowed every kind of woke nonsense to permeate public life.”

There is a suggestion that he would ‘review’ the Equality Act. Not sure whether that means he would amend it or repeal it, but obviously we would still have the GRA, which without the Equality Act to alter its meaning, even if slightly, would give the TRAs a boost.

They never say what they plan to do though do they.
Review means nothing. You can change nothing and still say you reviewed it.

Ultimately its the gra that needs revoking. We have same sex marriage we dont need it.

Hmm, I wonder exactly what he's got in mind. It's a bit of an odd thing to say. I think the EA is not perfect, but ok and the problem is that organisations aren't actually following it, and acting on bad advice from groups like Stonewall e.g. implying that "gender" is a protected characteristic when it isn't. Is this a bit of playing to the crowd?

This is true. It’s still a big call. The EA is a huge, sprawling piece of legislation. I can’t begin to think what would go if it were to be repealed.

@BlueBrush

Possibly. The EA does a lot beyond issues of sex and gender reassignment.

Review could mean issuing guidance I guess? Saying how the Government expect it to be applied. This would presumably reflect court cases and precedence.

Potentially. Something has to change in this area.

I think Truss’s experience in the Women and Equalities brief is a big plus for her being the successful candidate. Not sure Sunak has been in government long enough or had any real time to consider these issues. We need a safe pair of hands.

I'm just starting to bristle when politicians use the term "woke nonsense". In the 90s, people used "political correctness" as a catch-all term for all socially progressive views, bundling the more reasonable views in with the extreme views, and using that as a way of dismissing them all. I think "woke nonsense" is in danger of being used in the same way. If he's talking about reinforcing sex as a protected characteristic, and clarifying issues around gender identity, I wish he'd just say that. Does anyone have any sense he's gunning for any other protected characteristics?

I have heard snippets about the hustings and what I find really encouraging is that lots of members are clearly very concerned about women's rights and we are hearing very, very positive statements from both candidates about women's right, single sex spaces, single sex sport, correcting gender neutral language.

And their responses seem to be going down well with the grass roots conservatives

I appreciate that there is a big gap between words and actions, but this is the clearest signal yet that the Conservatives has grasped that this actually is a concern for voters. During the initial MPs voting rounds, there were attempts to downgrade it as "voters aren't concerned about trans issues when there is a cost of living crisis".

I'm not quite sure about what is meant about reform of the EA but if it leads to much greater clarity over eg the provision of single sex spaces (for both men and women), that would be a good thing.

The fact that the hustings are happening at the same time as the Tavistock GIDS being closed, Allison Bailey's court success and denouncement of the actions of Stonewall as well as English Rugby's decisions on women's rugby is adding to the momentum.

Liz Trust has also flagged the groupthink within Whitehall that has contributed to the erosion of women's rights in particular - aimed, I imagine, at groups like Stonewall.

I have heard snippets about the hustings and what I find really encouraging is that lots of members are clearly very concerned about women's rights and we are hearing very, very positive statements from both candidates about women's right, single sex spaces, single sex sport, correcting gender neutral language.

This is really good news. Finally it's reaching the mainstream. Truss made a speech in Yorkshire the other night where she said something like "I'm in Yorkshire - full of plain-speaking people who know what a woman is."

The obvious thing wrong with the Equality Act in my view is the existence of "gender reassignment" as a protected characteristic. The definition is woolly and meaningless:

"A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person's sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex."

What on earth does "other attributes" mean? What even does "reassigning the person's sex" mean?

If you're going to have trans identity in there, you need a watertight definition.

I wonder if instead if reviewing guidenve that isn't being followed anyway, if it wouldn't just be easier to remove the reasons why its not being followed instead. Remove the ability for organisations not trained in law to be advising organisations/establishments on said law. Make it so that they do not have the power to go that far in their advice/training?

@BlueBrush

He’d be right, though. ‘Woke nonsense’ extends to any extremist identitarian politics in my view. If you are being subjected to training at work that tells you you are racist, or being educated at school that you have inherited white guilt, or being told you’re ‘cis’ and therefore don’t have a right to an opinion, if you’re being called ‘Karen’, if you’re being told you’re ‘just’ an ‘old white nan’, that is nonsense, and discriminatory.

We should be able to protect people from discrimination. That doesn’t mean we have to have workplace struggle sessions. It doesn’t mean we need to be made to feel a sense of guilt for being a particular race, sex, sexuality, age etc.

The problem is - if you start making changing you start 'removing rights'. Even if the act is no longer fit for purpose because it has been misused by people born male.

We shouldn't need to change the equality act or anything else.

People born male should respect that women have a right to safety and dignity and single sex spaces where someone who has a Penis does not there.

This is the doing of Stonewall and their cronies.

I have debated whether to include People who have had GRS above. I did not have a real issue with them previously, but I've got to admit the ones of Twitter who have such a real hatred for women whilst calling themselves suffragettes/ feminists is making my position harden.

‘I have debated whether to include People who have had GRS above. I did not have a real issue with them previously...’

I have no issue with them at all. I wouldn’t deny them a job or a service. It still doesn’t mean they have changed sex in a literal sense.

Changing the Equality Act worries me as it is the one bit of legislation that protects me at work as I have 2 disabling chronic illnesses that require reasonable adjustments and leeway with absences... a Tory like Sunak would think that's a bad thing!!

He can shred the EA and use the strips for kindling, I still won't support him.

Anagram for Rishi Sunak is 'Hi risk anus'. Found that quite amusing.

Who thought a Billionaire would shout the line. " The Emperor's got no clothes on!" Out loud.

I should have worded that better.

The numbers of transsexuals are so few that I did not really object strenuously to them using Female spaces in certain instances. (Not all).

Now however, when the loudest voices amongst them have so much hatred for woman too, I am more against them using Female spaces as I feel the danger is there whether they have a penis or not.

I do not believe that TWAW but I am happy to respect the decisions they make.

If I were to interview someone that would not be a factor in my decision regarding employment. I would treat them the same way I treat everyone else.

I wouldnt believe any of it. They will both say what they think will get them votes

@Live4weekend

Same. But where we can’t legally discriminate between people who have had reassignment surgery and people who haven’t (and we can’t, because of privacy law and its interaction with discrimination law), we have to fall back on women’s spaces are for female people, not women’s spaces have to be for people who say they’re women.

Same here. I'm sure it meant surgery of some description. Because the thinking was that the person was an old school 'transsexual'. That's what it meant and that's what they would do.

Not cross dressers, AGPs or indeed any man whatsoever who can hide behind 'proposing to undergo'.

It's not something you can easily amend either. You'd have difficulty making the definition of gender reassignment conditional on surgery.

They could be more explicit what it entitled a man to, though. Not being fired, or denied housing, etc. But women's spaces isn't included.

I thought the Equality Act was useful in bringing together all the anti discrimination that had been passed over the years. The problem is with organisations that have been providing training that is disingenuous at best and deceitful at worst. That's where Rishi Sunak should be giving his attention.

I don’t want people to be unreasonably discriminated against either, but I think the EDI juggernaut has gone too far. If you think about the NHS, various government departments, councils, schools etc., and think how much public money is spent on administration and marketing of equality activity alone - no productive function at all - it’s crazy. Those people in those jobs could be nurses, teachers, care workers, police officers etc., and instead they’re sitting in a social media or EDI team, working on telling the rest of us how they don’t discriminate against anyone, whilst actually and plainly discriminating against women.

Then look at private companies and ask how much better we would be doing if the people who work for Halifax telling everyone it’s vital to have pronoun badges and how ‘it’s not hard to be inclusive’, we’re setting up small businesses, or running youth clubs, or farming, or learning a trade, or being dentists.

It’s an inglorious waste.

The Times has an article on it. Sounds positive.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/f2818710-0f7d-11ed-93cf-b011fa7fe86b?shareToken=e9d8de4e8e4b4fe9b4b7ff6668064e40

This is a sign of how little he understands (or gives a shit about) this area.

In court, the Equality Act has been remarkably robust in protecting women's sex based rights (probably because it was brought in just before the trans policy capture of the GEO). We would not have Maya's judgement if it were not for the Equality Act. It consolidates decades worth of anti-discrimination legislation and in my view should not be messed around with lightly.

The problem is the poorly drafted Gender Recognition Act, and the widespread disinformation/confusion about the interaction of the EA/GRA spread by Stonewall and other orgs as part of a concerted cultural movement to erase legal recognition of sex.

@PrinceYakimov

This is true.