Liz Truss to propose law banning biological males from single-sex spaces

[IwantToRetire]

Liz Truss is to introduce a draft law that will seek to ban biological males from entering single-sex spaces and prevent children from attempting to change their gender.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/liz-truss-mps-conservative-government-mail-on-sunday-b1124423.html

Oh dear! I suspect association with Liz Truss will in fact mean loss of support for these proposals.

Exactly this

This issue affects all women and girls. It's vital that sunlight is shone on how ~ 90% of "trans women" are still fully intact males. These males can and are changing with women and girls. Male pattern violence doesn't disappear with the donning a skirt and sex offenders / otherwise violent men don't come with a warning label. We have (had) single sex facilities to protect the dignity and safety of all women - they must be redefined.

And the point of this is?

That I'm supposed to suck up the abandonment of women's rights, equalities, disabilities, access, child safeguarding, homosexuality yada yada (which is not inferred information from one source but openly discussed constantly and I find all that a LOT more disturbing)

and still vote Labour because gasptories <insert fainting couch here>

This is getting really silly now.

Interesting she focuses on a man, the Tories Deputy Chair. He might well be acting in a politically cynical way, but having seen Rosie Duffield, Miriam Cates and Joanna Cherry together outside Westminster Hall, I am confident they are all genuine in wanting to protect women’s rights, regardless of party or politics.

These are useful noises, however do allow me some eye rolling. Didn’t Labour use the whip to help get the Scottish legislation through, including the defeat of a couple of important amendments? And where is her support of Rosie?

And the point of this is?

The more Labour struggle to let women like Duffield speak whilst Truss does stand up with others, the more obvious deflections from TRAs / gender captured will get.

Hopefully it’ll keep building in right direction for women.

If it does I expect those concerned about women’s rights overtaking men’s will get more active

So jgw1, you think

“Spending so much time and money on education also makes it much more difficult, particularly for women, to decide when is a good time to pause and have children.”

equates to a government policy that girls should receive less education because they are just going to stay at home and have babies?

unconvincing!

And frankly, even if MC completely agreed with the words you are putting in her mouth, I and many others here can disagree with that while still holding the same GC position

If that is all you have, you have nothing. I read that completely differently to advocating for less education for women. And to draw that conclusion you have requires some deep prejudice.

I couldn't access the op's link to the end so, in case anyone's in the same boat, this is from The Independent but looks like the same article?

So it's being presented this week, along with a list of backers and seeking cross party support. I can't decide which party leader might be squirming more: all-talk-but-no action Sunak? Or Starmer who might now need to clarify whether he actually meant a word he said?

I was right. The ability to propose a Private Members Bill is a ballot. 20 MPs get the chance to propose something outside the Government’s legislative agenda. I seem to remember that the up skirting bill had similar origins, with the Government of the day, and maybe the opposition, saying they would not oppose it, so it passed. I think there is a problem with one MP, Sir Christopher Chope?, opposing the principle of such MP led initiatives so regularly throwing in procedural roadblocks.

Liz is using her opportunity effectively. I would be surprised if Rishi does not give tacit support. I think, from Conservatives for Women figures, that the majority of Tory MPs are GC, but there are enough divisions within the party on other issues, and enough Stonewall diehards, that he will want to concentrate on his own legislative agenda as outlined in the Kings Speech. So Liz should have the majority of the Tories. How many Labour/LibDems? It would be so good to see this succeed.

If not we have more clarity on Labour’s thinking.

I guess the best known successful Private Member's Bill was The Abortion Act of 1967.

But yeah, whether it succeeds or not, it could shine some very helpful light on all sides of the House of Commons.

Given that Liz Truss is 18th on the ballot for Private Members bills this session and in a typical session 7 Fridays are devoted to the 2nd reading of Private Members bills in the House of Commons in is quite likely that any bill she proposes will not even be listed to have its 2nd reading. This becomes more likely to be the case in a session that is cut short by a general election and equally even those bills that have had their 2nd reading, might not finish the remaining Parliamentary processes before a general election is called.

If it is listed it is unlikely that it will be the first bill listed for that day. In that case perhaps the first bill (s) will be uncontroversial and debate will be short and it will be called. Or uncalled people's can be approved at 2.30pm as long as no one objects to their 2nd reading.

Just over 10% of Private Members bills became law between 1983 and 2010.

And?

It may come to nothing, but it is a useful way for her to use her opportunity.

The 10% sounds like a surprisingly high number. I assume many proposals won’t have broad support. Whilst the procedural complexities such as a shortage of parliamentary time, and our old friend Chope, will put paid to others.

I still am not seeing a downside here.

This.

If she doesn't get a debate, then a LOT of MPs will conveniently have other appointments at the same time so they can not attend...

Me either. Lots of people hoping no one brings this stuff up

They can bog off quite frankly. All those who keep pushing keep going.

If she does get a debate and it is still ongoing at 2.30pm then she may need 100 MPs to vote to close the debate. Typically Friday's are poorly attended in the commons anyway as MPs like to return to their constituencies for surgeries.
We will have a better idea of what the 17 bills ahead of hers are on Wednesday when they have their first reading.

If nothing comes of it, whats the problem?

If she gets to speak, we may get a glimpse of what is likely to be the outcome under starmers labour or a coalition with geeens and libs dems.

So what can we as constituents do? Will we have some warning, so we can write and urge our MP to attend.

Something that the various women’s groups from across the Country could engage in?

There is an election coming up. This is an issue on which some political parties are out of step with the electorate, and they know it.

Putting it forward as a Private Members Bill is quite clever. I accept that because it is being introduced in this way, the chances of it succeeding are low. But it makes it less party political. Is this why Anneliese Dodds has just chimed in saying Labour will protect all vulnerable people. Both women and those that consider themselves the most oppressed. Getting in early because they won’t support the simple clarification of “biological sex”.

I must admit, it's been a while since I've seen that Anneliese Dodds article (upthread) and, on re-reading, I'm quite struck by how specific she is.

I'd forgotten that she uses phrases like 'biological women only' and 'single sex services' rather than the vague, 'safe spaces', and that she says, 'We will make sure that nothing in our modernised gender recognition process would override the single-sex exemptions in the Equality Act.'

Further clarity still needed as to exactly what 'single sex' and 'biological women' would mean under a Labour government, especially once a GRC is issued. Nevertheless she goes further than I'd remembered, and it makes me quite sad to think how much my trust in them has corroded.

If Labour seriously want to persuade voters like me that they're not being slippery with language then supporting a Private Member's Bill - however inconvenient the hour - would be a great start.

This proposed law (as it is summarised in the article) seems to be solving a misconceived version of the problem, rather than the actual problem. (Actually, it seems to be aimed at getting publicity for Liz Truss, but leaving that to one side.)

The actual problem is that service providers etc who were formerly able to provide single-sex spaces if they chose to are now finding that they face challenges that prevent them from doing that (ie challenges that require them to admit a subset of males).
What we therefore need is clarification in the Equality Act to establish clear grounds for the legality of providing single-sex spaces. It isn't a question (in most circumstances) of a legal ban on male presence; it is a question of reasserting a legal right for service providers to exclude males.
The danger with this misrepresentation of the problem is that people who are in favour of allowing a subset of males into singe-sex spaces will say 'how will you enforce such a ban? Genital checks on entry??' That alleged gotcha loses power when the issue is presented accurately in terms of the rights and duties of service providers under the Equality Act (rather than in terms of statutory prohibitions on service users)

Can't be asked to read but is she proposing to allow or ban females from male-only spaces in the same law? Considering that most male only clubs/societies are under fire all the time for this

Sunak has reportedly reaffirmed his GC views today. Perhaps that means something in the context of this Bill. Let's see:

x.com/nickfletchermp/status/1731736347713372275?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

It was Boris who flip flopped a couple of times before finally getting it right. Rishi is sound on this and very unlikely to become TWAW. The issue is more whether he will see sorting something out as a priority. I am not sure he will.

What we therefore need is clarification in the Equality Act
Yes but that would be something for the government to legislate on, which so far they have singularly failed to do, whatever their reasons. Happy to be corrected but I don't think a Private Members Bill can be a clarification to an existing law. I believe it has to be a new piece of legislation and proposed by a back bench MP, not a minister.

I thought the Eq A was in progress

If anyone signed the petition for biological sex definition they would have received an email

If anyone signed the petition for biological sex definition they would have received an email

Can you quote the letter? After the debate in response to the two opposing petitions were that "they would look into it".