Supreme Court - are single gender spaces still allowed?

[DisappearingGirl]

I have a question.

The Supreme Court judgement makes clear that organisations are allowed to provide single sex spaces, services and sports which exclude all those of the opposite biological sex.

However, are they obliged to do this?

Can they still choose to define a space or service as "single gender" (e.g. anyone who identifies as a woman)? Or would this discriminate against males who aren't trans? In which case would they have to choose between "single biological sex" or "everyone"?

In the case of toilets, I think mixed sex (including "single gender") would need to be self contained, but not sure about the rules for other spaces / services / sports.

Basically I'm wondering if organisations can just choose to say, well we've decided trans women can still use our women's spaces/services etc.

They are just legally illiterate and didn't understand how all this bullshit is contradictory and completely falls apart the second you replace sex with gender.

The equality act literally only makes sense if sex means biological sex.

Otherwise you get stupid situations where impossible scenarios emerge where all actions by others are unlawful and trans people can only win.

In an organisation I work at, there are two floors where there are mixed toilets, and one floor with single-sex toilets. I think this is how it ought to be.

re toilets, I've seen in a few news articles the suggestion (again) that trans people should use the one for the disabled. They seem to see it as some kind of third space, which it is not.

As plenty of people on MN have already explained, some disabilities require very quick access with little waiting time. Other disabilities make it difficult to stand for a longer time when you wait in front of the door.

Thus that space should not be unneccessarily occupied by non-disabled people.

It is a again made out that others who also fought for their rights should shuffle aside to make space for TW (and TM).

(The only exception I can otherwise imagine is for people who have very small children with them, so they can still take care of them or supervise them and who would run off outside; but that is usually not a topic for the workplace.)

It seems any corporations, companies and other bodies should in the future redesign their set up, so that there is a better distribution of male, female, chaning room for babies, toilets for people with a disability and gender-neutral self-contained versions.
Yes, that will take up more space, but I don't see any better options. Often the changing rooms are very neglected or small, too.
At IKEA they have a smart solution, which is the changing room being separate to the toilets, so you don't need several set ups in each of the others.
They also have one larger toilet stall within the ladies (and probably the gents but I haven't checked) which is for parent + small child.

What do you mean by ‘how it ought to be’? Unless the mixed sex toilets are individual rooms containing a sink and toilet, it is not lawful.

Yes, the mixed loos are all rooms with a toilet and sink.

So only one user at a time?
It’s not how mixed sex usually works, is it?

No, it’s a room with cubicles… with a toilet and a sink in each one 🙄 surely it’s not that difficult to comprehend.

Lots of ‘mixed sexy’ toilets are like normal toilet cubicles with communal sinks. That is unlawful. So PP wanted to check it complied with regs eg full height doors too.

Not now you’ve explained it properly, no 😂

No communal sinks, and full height doors too.

Legally women in the UK cannot work as miners (since c. 1840). Also any job that requires heavy lifting will be difficult for women, because they have less upper body strength than men. Heavy agricultural work was carried out in China during the revolution taking no account of women's physiology, menstruation, pregnancy and childbirth, breastfeeding, i.e. they were just a body on the rota. The result was an increase in miscarriages, stillbirths and neonatal deaths, and women being totally exhausted because they were treated as if they had the same constant strength and stamina as men.

Come up recently in my family history research -
The Mines and Collieries Act 1842. This was a response to an incident a few years earlier in which 26 children had drowned under ground. An inquiry was launched and the result was the prohibition of women and boys under 10 from working below ground.

The effect was to simply put many women out of work and into greater destitution than they already faced. Some were offered jobs above ground but these were limited and not every colliery did this. This was because jobs above ground were sought after and generally reserved for older men or men who had previously been injured - precisely because they were less dangerous.

Other collieries ignored the ruling and turned a blind eye to women working underground - especially if they dressed in men's clothing for some years - dressing as the opposite sex was almost a way for the mine owners to be able to deny responsibility. I mean how could they possibly know they were being mislead?

This didn't mean women weren't miners. Technically you were still classified as a miner if you worked above ground at a colliery. As I say some collieries did employ women in this capacity if they could prove their ability. They were cheaper to employ after all. And there was a convention of offering work to widows of miners who had been killed in colliery accidents as a way to try and support the family.

But at times when employment was scare, jobs were prioritised for men and women were first to be laid off when jobs were cut.

Women who worked above ground often dressed in trousers with an apron. This created something of a curiosity to middle classes because of this and there was a thing for photographing these women and creating postcards from these photos. To some they regarded these women as degenerates and a threat to society and they campaigned to have them banned, despite these women having few other options and being desperately poor and those campaigning being somewhat tone deaf to this financial hardship.

I think it's fascinating. Anyone who says their family history is boring because they were all miners should dig a bit deeper.

So if Marks & Spencer's have a woman's changing room, they can't let men in.

How will this actually be controlled? So if a TW goes into a women's changing room who is going to stop them and say you can't come in here, this is a women's changing room for biological women only. iow, which poor M&S staff member is going to have that in their task list?

💐How awful. Incredible that you survived that.

I personally think the proportion should be the other way around (people overwhelmingly prefer single sex communal toilets and that arrangement should continue to be the norm) but it's good to have a few unisex cubicles for choice/overflow (ha!).

I agree!

Naomi Cunningham helpfully explaining the SC judgment to Harriet Harman using a peanut analogy.

“Nope. Single-sex spaces for women must always exclude "trans women" (a subset of men), or they will not be single-sex. It's like peanut-free meals: you have to leave the peanuts out. It's really not that hard.”

https://x.com/LoudBonnet/status/1912991077948432750

Does the bar have separate staff toilets? Because if they don't they become workplace toilets 🚻

Bars and clubs are workplaces as well as entertainment venues, banning smoking 🚬 in workplaces is what lead to the smoking ban in pubs etc.

That's a good point. I'm going to monitor what happens there as a result of the ruling.

This new ruling, over-rules all previous rulings...for the reason it makes clear what the law means/stands for in the first place.

The problems and confusion have arisen because of misapplication, and a lack of clarity around the meaning of the word 'sex' and the word 'woman'.

All previous rulings did not have to hand the Supreme Court Ruling, which has, for the first time, conducted a through examination into the law as it stands.

You really only need one or two unisex toilets, alongside the single sex ones. A new venue where I live has implemented this and it seems to work. It is proportionate to the population that requires/needs them.

Do you think, given that they can now blame the supreme court for everything, there will be a slow and subtle drift back to common sense?

It's not a perfect system. No-one is saying that it is, any more than locking your house keeps out a really determined burglar.

Men who are pretending to be women know now that they are, by law, not allowed in the female changing room. This by itself will be enough to stop some of them.

Female customers can complain that he's in there.
Staff can direct him elsewhere at the entrance.
FWIW if you think this will be a problem for m&s staff, men have been masturbating in the knicker section and trying to get in the female changing room forever, and M&S staff have been dealing with it for the same length of time. I had an x mas job there years ago and only the older and v experienced female staff worked the underwear section. The men who tried to get in the female changing room were regulars and the permanent staff knew them on sight and would chase them off.

And a male customer who persists in trying to access the female changing room can now be arrested, can't he?

This has always been an issue with M+S’ policy (and the reason I boycott them).

I hope that's a typo