Good Law Project suing the EHRC and Bridget Phillipson - letter before action

[OhBuggerandArse]

Sorry if this has already been shared - here are the links to their letter and statement. Looking forward to the Mumsnet analysis :-)

https://goodlawproject.org/were-bringing-a-legal-challenge-to-the-ehrcs-interim-update

https://goodlawproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Letter-to-the-Equality-and-Human-Rights-Commission-16-May-2025_Redacted.pdf

That makes sense. It's the only explanation.

What are they actually suing for? What has been the damage? As far I know (IANAL) you cannot sue for something that has not happened to you, can you?

I think this just shows how blind they are. We read that and think ‘well yes, obviously only women should search women’. And put ourselves in the position of either a woman forced to be searched by a man, or a woman forced to search a man.

They see it purely from the viewpoint, I presume, of being a transwoman and so convinced that you are a woman that you feel violated by being searched by a man.

Which, for certain transwomen, I have a degree of sympathy with.

But, being female, my solution is not that strip searches should be by gender, because of the problems for women identified above.

My solutions are either:
a) tough. The greater good requires only same sex searches.
b) transwomen can choose, if they wish, to be searched by a transwoman. They might need to wait longer.
c) We propose to the general public that the police stop searching transwomen altogether, on the basis that there are only a few of them, no one would ever pretend to be one when they are not, and they are uniquely vulnerable and deserve special treatment. Police officers hold consultations on this with the public, see if people can see any flaws in it, and then decide on the policy after that.

I am being charitable and presuming no one could possibly be insisting on the right of men to strip search women.

I suppose anything is possible, as the past decade or so has horrifyingly demonstrated..

But stepping back and trying to be objective - this is all about toilets??
It's not about not being allowed vote, or only being allowed to shop for groceries between the hours of 8am and 9.30am, or having to step off the pavement to allow Gender Critical woman to pass, or being forced to tidy litter from the side of the A13 for 10 hours a day using only a hall-marked silver Georgian sugar tongs...

It's not even about toilets, as in 'we physically can't use them' - which was the origin of the campaign for accessible toilets for disabled people which started in the 1960s - it's about which toilets they prefer to use, for very their own very abstract reasons.

I'd like to think that they'll be told to feck off and stop bothering us reframe their trauma that they don't have a case, but like I said, anything is possible🙄

Precisely this. What a lot of sound and fury. Why aren't they fundraising and campaigning for, say, awareness-raising about how gender-non-conforming men in men's spaces shouldn't be subjected to violence or ridicule? I mean, I might even support that.

"Why aren't they fundraising and campaigning for, say, awareness-raising about how gender-non-conforming men in men's spaces shouldn't be subjected to violence or ridicule?"

@LittleBitofBread Because where is the fun in that for them? Will they get a euphoria boner from being accepted by other men? Will being accepted as a gender non conforming male allow them to shit on women and use them or their spaces for validation, no to all of that. Their fury at the SC ruling and their fight to be able to access women's spaces regardless is all about male sexual rights and gratification which to the male brain should held as sacred above all else.

Or d) transwomen have a really really good try at not committing crimes, and thereby never need to be searched by anyone?

Maugham is not just a former tax lawyer. Although he doesn't practise as a barrister any more he still identifies as a KC, i.e. supposedly one of the most senior and skilled barristers in the UK. In other circumstances, I suppose he might have tried to become a judge, so we should probably be very grateful that he's gone off in this other direction.

Haven't watched the video or read the letter. There seems little point. Is it all about transwomen, or do transmen get a look in?

If I had a young girl or woman close to me who identified as male or non-binary, I would be worried sick about her going into male changing rooms, toilets etc, over and above all the worry about possible medical and surgical treatments she might want to inflict on herself. I can't imagine advocating for reverting to the pre-SC days when Stonewall law said transmen were fine in all-male settings. But there we are, we're all different.

That's silly. Not only guilty people find themselves involved with the police. You can be suspected of something you didn't actually do. Not to mention criminals also have human rights and deserve to be treated with dignity.

We rightly wouldn't accept the argument that if women don't want to be searched by male officers or imprisoned with male prisoners, they should just not commit crimes. We shouldn't make this argument either.

The point is that it's not a violation of your rights to be treated like any other member of your sex.

Is it all about transwomen, or do transmen get a look in?

Doesn’t Foxy have two daughters who both claim to be transmen? So you’d think he’d be concerned about them.

At best, they don't want to be seen as gender-non-confirming men by men. They want to be seen as women by women.

At worst, they are predators of various types.

It was meant to be a joke.

If I thought my human rights were under threat and people were literally trying to make me not exist, being searched by the police would be so far down my list of priorities, but apparently it's of critical moment to transwomen.

Fair enough, but a lot of people did actually say similar things about the women who found themselves imprisoned with Karen White and similar situations.

I'm not impressed by the argument that the ruling only applies to the EA and can therefore be ignored when other rules apply, such as the workplace regulations.

The EA applies to everything. If regulations say 'provide single-sex facilities', then Schedule 3 para 27 is engaged, and must be complied with.

What kind of lawyers are these?

He has three daughters, the eldest of whom is trans-identified. I notice that Wikipedia now no longer mentions his family, but until recently listed him as having a son and two daughters.

Makes me so angry when disabled adults and child are having their protections systematically ripped away that the good law project is busy worrying about this.

This last one is just so pathetic, really makes one feel sorry for these mentally ill people who've been sucked into this sort of delusional behaviour with endless validation.

I was under the impression the middle one did so now as well. But I can’t find the source just at the moment.

But totally not a social contagion. Nope.

How about The Good Lawd Project.

I find this particularly chilling....over 10,000 people are funding it so far....

£390,341.54 raised of £425,000

10003 donations

That's just under £40 each

As a Vulpes vulpes, I am sorely tempted to take the day off work and go along to court to observe the result.

I may have some useful first aid skills in case Jolyon is in danger of harrumphing himself to death.

Quite.

From my very rudimentary understanding of law, I would hope that this doesn't stand a chance. But surely they have taken legal advice and it's concerning that they clearly think they might win.

Do we have any legal people here who can comment on whether they actually have a chance?

I mean, my logical brain says no, but there have been so many ridiculous things happening in recent years, I honestly have zero confidence any more.

The EHRC cannot change UK law. So even it agreed that men should be given access to female only spaces, this would not be law in the UK.