ECHR as the next battleground for the rights of women and children

[Ingenieur]

I have started this thread to avoid derailing a previous one.

Original thread:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4852476-tougher-transgender-guidance-for-schools-is-unlawful-sunak-told?page=1

It was suggested there that the ECHR would be an impediment to rescinding or fundamentally changing the GRA or the gender reassignment parts of the Equality Act. This is on the basis that membership of the European Convention on Human Rights would not permit the unwinding of existing rights, even if it does not force member nations to comply.

I know most of us do not practise law, and even fewer are international or constitutional lawyers, but I'd like to understand more of the nuance surrounding this aspect of our fight.

As a starter for 10, is this even true? Is leaving the ECHR the only solition to unwinding these laws?

Also, looking at the ECHR summary of the Goodwin case, it states the following:

Since there [we]re no significant factors of public interest to weigh against the interest of this individual applicant in obtaining legal recognition of her gender re-assignment, the Court reache[d] the conclusion that the notion of fair balance inherent in the Convention now tilt[ed] decisively in favour of the applicant.

It is astonishing that a case which overturned a number of previous ECHR Article 8 and Article 12 cases was judged on the basis of public interest, and that no public interest was noted.

Seems like a bit of a mess.

But why should we be forced to participate in other peoples belief systems? The right of those people to falsify their documentation with a legal fiction pertaining to an idea in their head affects those of us who don't believe in gender identities as well.

What's cavalier is assuming that the GFA will hold for the rest of time and nothing can be allowed to challenge it.

It is facing challenges regardless of anything happening with the GRA. Stormont hardly ever sits. Brexit has made it very difficult. The NI Protocol is a bandaid.

This is like Roe v Wade in the US. Precedents and agreements aren't set in stone, they can be overturned. If something is important and it's facing repeated challenges, don't sit on your laurels thinking it will stand forever.

A new agreement in NI is needed. That's an important but hard problem and I agree with PP that if possible, the GRA repeal campaign should try not to get entangled in it (although I can see now that that will be a talking point against it).

What does legal recognition give them the right to expect?

Not access to single sex spaces

Not compelling people to use particular pronouns

Not indoctrination of dc

So it’s just a legal recognition and no one else has to adhere to any changes?

And now I can’t recall if you think people can change sex

How do you define single sex spaces?

Is it limited to biological sex?

(Feel I need to check if we’ve lost the definition there too)

Maybe are there no XY chromosomes

Death certificates - is that it?

Nobody's death certificate is dignified. It lists all the nasty things you died from, more often than not including some disease related to your lifestyle which you might be ashamed of. Depending on the circumstances it might list a complete stranger as the person who reported your death. It's a legal record of your death, nothing more, and it should be accurate.

Nobody is ever in a position to get upset about their own death certificate because they are dead. It's troubling to think about all the undignified things that will definitely happen to all of us after death but there's no law requiring a minister or celebrant to misgender you throughout your funeral or for your gravestone to deadname you, regardless of the sex marker on your death certificate.

Also, to put it bluntly, your human rights end when you die, along with your gender identity. I refuse to take seriously that a sex marker on a death certificate is a human rights issue.

Is there any other reason except for death certificates why repealing the GRA would adversely affect people with trans identities?

That poster thinks that everyone should be allowed to put their made-up gender identity on their birth certificate instead of their sex. According to them this has no effect on the rest of society, including those of us who don't believe in gender identities.

Earlier we had another poster saying that we didn't need to have our sex on our birth certificate at all (so presumably no gender identity either).

I don't know why we can't just go back to birth certificates reflecting reality (sex) and if some people want to have a special certificate just for them showing that they have a gender identity, they can have that, just as long as their made-up gender identity doesn't have any legal standing when we need to know their sex.

Sorry are we being told to leave it or NI will start terrorism again and the troubles? I think that's very unfair blackmail and if the GFA really causes us to have to be beholden to an institution which is fundamentally saying twaw and women should just cope with that then yes, leave the GFA if it means we can repeal the GRA.

So now death certificates should be fictional? How does that help historian's or medical development? Are you even serious?

@PlanetJanette Sorry, I thought that you were arguing in good faith in support of the GFA. I now realise that you are just trying to weaponise it as a barrier to prevent the UK Government from making any changes to either the EqA or the GRA. I apologise to other readers of the thread for wasting so much of their time.

Apparently now the best argument the genderists have is that women should give up their rights so that people with a made-up gender identity can have the wrong sex on their death certificate.

Insane.

Well that was predictable.

No I don't think that, which is why I didn't say that. I am sure we are all well aware of the horrific impact on women and children from men's endless wars and conflicts.

I said that women's human rights are not contingent on the GFA or any other peace treaty between warring tribes of men.

I said it's not our job to sort out lasting peace in NI before we are allowed to advocate and litigate in our own interests.

Women can't have human rights or NI will once again descend into conflict? I don't think so

First rule of misogyny: Women are responsible for what men do.

It's quite breathtaking isn't it?

It's the same kind of shit they pulled for years with Roe v Wade.

If the GFA were to end up being broken for whatever unrelated reason I wonder what would be held over us next in an attempt to make us shut up.

Yes, it's all looking a bit flimsy now isn't it?

Returning to the topic for those who do want to discuss it.

To what extent is it possible, through legislation that presumably the Tories would have to pass in the next year before they lose the next election to repeal the GRA but also clarify other points relating to women's rights and the conflict with this issue? For example no-one asks to see GRCs when entering female spas or whatever so presumably that comes under something else (EqA?)

Are there genuinely any areas where the ECHR would stop us? Where are the challenges likely to come from? And does anything bad actually happen if we just ignore the ECHR?

I am not an AI. Nor am I a replicant. I am merely intolerant of those that demand free work from others. Interesting that again you felt compelled to respond to me with a post from you that has nothing to do with the thread and with an accusation it is only fair I address. So who's derailing this thread with baseless and pointless accusations?

Testosterone is used by some women as necessary medical treatment. They are not "masculinised". Nor do I believe many would kindly to such a bold claim made on their behalf with no input from them

Just coming back to this, a section 19(b) statement under the Human Rights Act is not an example of civil servants or ministers doing something that is unlawful.

'Unlawful' is a high bar, and has a specific meaning within Government legal circles. A policy can be high risk of successful legal challenge - unlawful goes beyond that. Unlawful means a degree of certainty that a proposed policy would breach domestic or international law.

Government lawyers are reluctant to conclude that a measure is unlawful, and usually will seek the advice of the Attorney General's Office before they do. But once they conclude something is unlawful, it is essentially impossible for the Government to proceed. Civil Servants cannot act unlawfully under the civil service code, and Ministers cannot act unlawfully under the Ministerial code.

A section 19(b) statement is essentially the Government saying that they cannot say with certainty (or near certainty) that their proposed policy is in line with ECHR rights. But it does not mean that they therefore know the policy to be unlawful. The policy essentially sits somewhere in the grey area where lawyers have probably indicated that there is a reasonable or high probability of a legal challenge succeeding, but stopping short of concluding that the policy is unlawful.

The thread is titled "ECHR as the next battleground for the rights of women and children". Many of the posts from many of the users reference how the ECHR put in place a ruling that requires a country to provide recognition that somebody has changed sex/gender/gender identity. It is a statement of fact that the ECHR made that ruling, and subsequent rulings, and in subsequent rulings have pointed to relevant fields of science and medicine to support this judgement

That is the point I answered when somebody asked why 'time' did not fall under that remit (the answer being that there is no evidence to show that one person experiences time passing faster or slower that 1 second per second compared to another person and an abundance of evidence to show that every person experiences time at the same rate under the same conditions)

You're right that the GFA has lots of faults. And it would be wonderful if a cross-community mood in favour of addressing those faults developed.

But if and when that happens, it needs to happen organically and not be imposed from outside, and certainly cannot be imposed from outside for reasons other than to do with peace and good government in Northern Ireland.

And any agreement updating the GFA will need political buy in in Northern Ireland. And we know that four out of the five largest parties would never agree to something that did not include ECHR membership, and the DUP don't much care either way so would never make scrapping the ECHR a red line.

So whatever the future holds for the GFA, it is a red herring because that future will never include something that excludes the ECHR. So ECHR membership is an obligation for the UK for as long as it wants to preserve a peace settlement in Northern Ireland.

Why would a court require a court order to access somebody's medical records to determine their sex? They do not do that now. Should sex be relevant (it rarely is for most cases before a court or tribunal) then a court or tribunal may make its own determination of somebody's sex without needing to access medical records. As they do now for anybody before them that does not have a birth certificate for reasons I mentioned before

It’s ok I don’t want your ‘free work’. It’s fine I’ll just exchange information with others.

Probably for the best all round.

@PlanetJanette when you said yes to single sex spaces did you mean biological sex?

How many women in Northern Ireland being killed as a result of a new era of the troubles would be an acceptable price to pay for repealing a piece of legislation that has extremely limited impact?

How many women losing limbs, or senses, or being widowed or losing their children is a price worth paying?

er, no, you were asked about an assertion you had made about the state of scientific and medical evidence. I’m sure you’ve noticed before how threads, like discussions in real life, can take different directions? That’s the direction you’d gone in, so I asked you about it. You responded with what the ECHR had decided, which was irrelevant to the point being discussed ( although quite a telling response, I thought).

It is my choice as to whether I will provide my work for free. It's an autonomous choice which suggests that there's some level of a lesson there that can be applied to an understanding of almost all Convention rights as most of the Articles are based on the position of respecting and protecting individual autonomy

If I choose not to provide any more work to somebody who's already had an answer from me because they choose not to do the desired reading and feel entitled enough to demand I provide it for them then I cannot see why a poster here would be aggrieved at somebody setting out their own boundaries in a clear and easily understood manner. For example:

Them: "Do this for me"
Me: "No"

It’s fine 😂 don’t do it.