Is the ERHC going to cave in to trans demands?

[Arran2024]

Worrying development https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/may/14/uk-equality-watchdog-to-extend-gender-guidance-consultation-say-insiders?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Yes I agree. I mean in my job I’ve had to deal with specific laws and yes there was guidance to help explain what some of it meant in more detail but it didn’t mean that you waited until the guidance came out before implementing the law. The guidance was just that, guidance - it didn’t change the law or imply you could not bother with the bits you didn’t like

I suspect that for organisations who are still wholly or partially captured are afraid of back lash if the move before the absolute last second they can get away with.

Once the guidance comes out, they can then point to the exact section that stops men going into the woman's toilet and shrug and wring their hands and say 'sorry mam, WE are fine with you in there but....what can we do? Look at my rainbow badge though!!!!'

I was heartened by the clarity of this: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgd73lkxmmo. The union understands that guidance is helpful to organisations but they're already bound by the law:

'The union says schools "don't have the luxury of waiting for updated guidance" because the ruling means they are required to comply with the Equality Act now.'

All organisations need to get their heads round that!

Yes this Union guy was on the bbc Scotland news a couple of days ago. He said the Union is concerned teachers are being exposed to risk as the advice they are currently giving to pupils doesn’t comply with the law.
Thats first time I’ve seen a union stand up and say this

Worth looking at the House of Commons briefing shared on the other thread: the sexism and capture is quite staggering. The briefing frames the judgment more or less as a bad law that needs fixing because it's all and only about creating issues for straight men with trans identities.

As it does not mention women, women's needs for those protections, or lesbian and gay people's needs for those protections, or women with trans identities' needs for those protections, you would be forgiven for thinking those groups had nothing to do with it.

The prejudice and active discrimination against women is unreal. But this is the level of spin being fed to ministers to inform their views and actions.

Starting to think that women and gay people need to start reporting this very frequently and clearly as discrimination because this is the message being given to those who download their thinking and relentlessly pushed to the general public. This is the trouble with being actually oppressed rather than performatively oppressed: your voices and even your presence in law is just disappeared under the powerful groups. Or in this case, group.

No, not always and forever, but what will happen is that the balance of rationality and common sense will be restored, and the high water mark of trans totalitarianism will have receded significantly. Before there was covert manipulation and repression, now there is far more consciousness and awareness.

@Leafstamp @Theeyeballsinthesky

i’m not happy with the foot dragging either. I’m just saying guidance is normal.

Back in the nineties new legislation came out in Scotland that I wanted to use. Nothing to do with sex and gender. The Children’s Reporter refused to allow it until the associated guidance was issued.

Context may be relevant

We want as many transactivists to participate as possible.

Get you misinterpretations and lies in here folks so that the EHRC can explicitly counter them in the guidance and nobody will have any excuse that they really didn't understand the law.

I do think they will need to clarify the part that is giving the most concern, and leading some to interpret it that transmen will not be allowed to use either male or female facilities.

What is this?

I love that the Guardian have said “according to insiders” like they’ve made some big scoop, when the EHRC sent their email explaining the consultation will be extended to literally everyone subscribed to their mailing list.

They are hoping that some clever lawyer somewhere will come up with a way to legally circumvent the law. They simply can't believe the law is as it says, as they have spent years prioritising trans people and their wishes, and they cannot cope with the reality of the law.

My concern is if a clever lawyer DOES come up with some apparent solution and this is embraced wholeheartedly by the ERHC. What we're talking about here is interpretation of the law - that's where things can be manipulated.

I was on a call the other night about the SC fallout and the speaker likened the hysterics to the backlash against the original race discrimination legislation. Employers couldn't quite take it in and thought it was a matter for their discretion. There were lots that thought that 'I'm not racist but my customers wouldn't like it' was somehow going to cut it. Eventually employers and service providers are going to have to get accurate advice from credible lawyers and stfu.

I am honestly astounded that more sensible people are not going 'hang on a minute, why the heck are these men fighting so hard to be in women's spaces'. It seems like yesterday that all the sensible people knew the sort of men who wanted to invade women's spaces, and we all fought like hell to keep them out. I am sure they have no idea of the sort of men they are defending, they surely cannot. But then again when MSM are not reporting any crimes committed by men declaring themselves women, how would sensible people know.

I agree, and various legal “experts” have pushed themselves to the fore, because it’s an obvious way of raising funds or profile.

That is very interesting, a very apt comparison.

People's absolute unawareness of how the law in their own country works is also an issue. I saw a comment by an absolute twit yesterday on FB announcing authoritatively that the judgment from the SC was just advisory, and now it would have to be discussed in parliament to be turned into law, and there was lots of opinioning and stuff to happen before any real action might be taken.

People were trying to explain that no, the Supreme Court isn't an opinion poll or a think tank.

Yes and the backlash to the equality act itself with respect to sexual orientation- remember the b and b that wanted to refuse accommodation to a gay couple? There were actually lots and lots of people who couldn't quite believe that they weren't allowed to discriminate against gay people any more.

I do wish they taught the basics of how our legal system works in schools. They definitely could. I remember sitting for whole school lectures for...gosh I can't even remember what it was called now...it was an a level and you had to write essays on something fairly random. The only lecture I remember was about some picture of the earth taken from really far away. General Studies! I failed at general studies. But something like that could have been really useful for learning about law, tax, government etc.

In that article, Reindorf is very clear that Single-sex facilities are mandatory in workplaces and schools. The judgment has put it beyond doubt that the Equality Act, with other legislation, requires these to be provided according to biological sex.

I wondered if the TRAs would try to argue that the Workplace Regs doesn’t define sex and that as such employees can self ID into whatever space they fancy.

The fox botherer’s GLP is certainly implying this now:

However, the specific law governing toilets, changing rooms and strip searches is not contained in the Equality Act itself, but in different sets of regulations, like the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 and the School Premises (England) Regulations. The definition of “biological sex” does not automatically read into this law.

https://goodlawproject.org/resource/trans-inclusion-after-the-supreme-court-decision-faqs/

They can apply whatever definition of sex they like to the School Premises Regulations but, given that the Equality Act also needs to be complied with, then they'd be very poorly advised if they treated "boys and girls" as written in the School Premises Regulations as referring to anything other than biological sex.

IANAL though.

IANAL either but I agree. If a male is let into a female only space then that is surely discrimination under the EA?

Also, Helen Joyce has suggested that if a man repeatedly enters a women’s space, having been told not to then that is sexual harassment.

It's not as if the School Premises Regulations is a very long piece of law. The section covering sex separation in toilets is below. Absolutely no reason for it to conflict with the Equality Act.

"(2) Separate toilet facilities for boys and girls aged 8 years or over must be provided except where the toilet facility is provided in a room that can be secured from the inside and that is intended for use by one pupil at a time."

I suspect TRA's like Maugham and other failing legal bods will continue to argue that biological sex can't possibly apply to children in schools, men and women in the workplace and almost everywhere. Fingers crossed they'll ask the Supreme Court to rule on that as well. So feeble are their arguments that one of their ilk has even claimed that as women take their male children (even babies) into women's changing rooms, middle aged men MUST be allowed in as well. Cos there's no difference between a middle aged man and a baby in a nappy. 🙄

The more this lot howl at the moon trying to upend reality, the better for exposing the futility of their arguments I suppose. But the constant whining is tedious.

This is spot on.

I have some questions that may be relevant to the consultation. Is there any law saying that councils or shopping centres have to provide single-sex toilets to the public? Is there any law that shops, swimming baths, gyms have to supply single sex changing rooms? Crucially, is there any law saying that an icon or word denoting 'men' or 'women' has to apply to the biological sex? Thus can the above organisations run mixed-sex facilities and label them as men's or women's? I don't think the EA answers that without further legislation or case law, but good practice put into the EHRC guidance might save some litigation from happening.

The Workplace Regs is subject to an Approved Code of Practice, which is quite clear about separate washing and changing facilities for men and women unless they are fully enclosed cubicles, lockable from the inside and intended to be used by one person at a time.

ACOPs give practical advice on how to comply with the law, so following the advice is enough to comply with the law; you can still use alternative methods to those set out in the Code in order to comply with legal duties.

However, ACOPs have special legal status, so if you are prosecuted for breach of health and safety law, and it is proved that you did not follow the relevant provisions of the Code, you will need to show that you have complied with the law in some other way or a Court will find you at fault.

I’m not altogether sure how GLP could show that the words ‘man’ and ‘woman’ in the Workplace Regs mean something completely different to the words ‘man’ and ‘woman’ in the Equality Act.