Consultation has reopened 20/05/25

[Justme56]

https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/equality/equality-act-2010/codes-practice/code-practice-services-public-functions-and-associations

Yes I understand. I would hope such facilities would be able to have a floor to door gap too so that it could be a prevention and safeguarding measure. Unfortunately the more research I have done, the more I realised a mixed sex adult-child pair should not be afforded more privacy than a same sex adult-child pair.

It’s a difficult balance. But mixed sex toilets are always enclosed and private in document T. Changing rooms not always.

I don’t understand some of the sports examples. The boxing one - a competition for men that a trans man wants to join. I would have thought the answer was ‘no because you are female’ but apparently it is ‘probably no because of the strength differences’??

There are physical male advantages in snooker/pool. Men are generally taller so can lean further across the table. Even men who are short have a longer arm reach (wing span) than women do which is advantageous for tricky shots. They can also pot the balls with more power. It might be less apparent than other sports but the advantage is there.

Yeah I guess so, you could argue it for most sports - just would have been nice if they said something along the lines of it doesn’t have to be just because of physical differences. Like a girls only rugby team is justified because of lack of participation from girls AND physical differences

Men also have longer fingers so they can stretch them over the other balls to take a shot that a women with smaller hands wouldn’t be able to take without touching the other balls.

My opinion on the age that it's OK to bring boys into the ladies toilet or changing room is 10 is fine but is the top end, but its better to give that as a guideline than getting it too low. If you say 'under 8 only) they too young. I basically held on longer than I should when my son was young at a local swimming pool because I wasn't happy sending him in alone.

This is the new guidance on which the EHRC are inviting comments. I cannot see that there will be any substantive changes after the consultation process.

Definitely worth everyone checking through the small print on this.

Oh noes! They are saying the quiet bit out loud again.

Operation: Let them speak!

Isn’t the last bullet point of this a bit dodgy (my bolding)?

13.1.18 Given the physiological differences between men and women, it will often be necessary for organisations to develop general policies to guide and inform their decision making in this area. Policies should be supported by a clear rationale and evidence base, and will often wish to draw upon guidance from sporting authorities. Relevant factors may include:

• whether an activity is primarily competitive, or competitive but with a significant social and recreational purpose, and whether it is a mass participation event
• whether there are safety risk factors such as those arising from physical contact between men and women
• the extent to which there are competitive advantages arising from sex-based physiological factors such as physical strength, stamina or physique

whether such competitive advantage can be sufficiently 13.1.18 Given the physiological differences between men and women, it will often be necessary for organisations to develop general policies to guide and inform their decision making in this area. Policies should be supported by a clear rationale and evidence base, and will often wish to draw upon guidance from sporting authorities. Relevant factors may include:

• whether an activity is primarily competitive, or competitive but with a significant social and recreational purpose, and whether it is a mass participation event
• whether there are safety risk factors such as those arising from physical contact between men and women
• the extent to which there are competitive advantages arising from sex-based physiological factors such as physical strength, stamina or physique
• whether such competitive advantage can be sufficiently reduced through medical intervention, such as drugs to reduce levels of testosterone, to make the competition fair

@EweSurname Yes perhaps that could be clearer as "sufficiently reduced" is quite arbitrary. Even "eliminated" would be hard to quantify.

I can see why it's in there as it does seem fair enough that if the advantage can be eliminated then why shouldn't trans identified men play with women but the chances of that advantage being sufficiently eliminated seem so remote that it's almost like adding a paragraph to the "separate facilities" section saying "when male violence towards women and girls is sufficiently reduced that women are not significantly at risk from men then we could reconsider".

Good spot.

Can anyone provide an example of a sport or scenario whereby a competitor between a man and a woman would be unfair but could be made fair by a reduction in testosterone alone?

If such scenario doesn’t exist, this shouldn’t be used in the code, as it suggests an unrealistic solution that would serve to disadvantage women just as before.

IIRC, several sports began allowing transwomen to compete as female by making rules based on testosterone levels before it was pointed out that it wasn’t just about the current level of hormones but whether that person went through male puberty or had various physiological differences as a result of still being male,

So if this limb is based on an old myth or is just there to appease transactivists but isn’t anticipated to ever be applicable, it should be removed.

I can't think of any...
Where it is fine to have mixed sport (e.g. show-jumping / dressage / etc.) then it is not relevant - otherwise, it is relevant.

It is important to clear up little bits like this in the consultation period.

However, this is also guidance, not law - if you set up a single-sex sport (e.g. billiards for women / women's rugby football or cricket) then the law since 2010 and clarified now in the SC judgment in 2025 is that a transwoman is a man so can not take part - there is absolute black and white in law. Whatever guidance is given, it will not be legal for a man pretending to be a woman to be allowed to take place if the sport has been set aside as single-sex under the various exemptions. Full testosterone / reduced testosterone / no testosterone - irrelevant, if they are a man (or transwoman) they can not join in.

It will obviously be enormously helpful if the guidance has equal clarity - so absolutely worth highlighting as a response to the consultation, but even if the guidance is wrong or implies something else, it can't actually change the law.

These amendments will be passed as statutory guidance, though, so while it can’t override the EA, it can still be used by organisations as a defence in court or tribunals and the judge would have to take the statutory guidance position into account, right?

• whether such competitive advantage can be sufficiently reduced through medical intervention, such as drugs to reduce levels of testosterone, to make the competition fair

I agree this is unhelpful not least because there is relatively little reliable scientific evidence on the effects of reducing testosterone. It is likely to vary from one individual to another depending on a range of factors including age and the length of time the suppression has been in place. In addition the significance will probably vary in different sports.

Re receptionists having to take a suspected male purporting to be female into a private room to challenge them, isn’t this a huge safety risk for the receptionists, given that this role generally tends to be performed by women?

Surely it’s not a sensible idea for a woman to go into a private side room with a man to say a thing that’s obviously going to make him extremely angry?

Also, I get that this needs to happen discreetly, but since this situation is likely to provoke a confrontational reaction from the transwoman, wouldn’t it be safer for the company and a worker of either sex to have witnesses to the exchange so they can’t be falsely accused of saying something inappropriate?

The answer is absolutely no, I went quite deep. There is no sport where testosterone reduction alone would make it for for a woman to play a man, nothing at all.

technically it is I think a code of practice - not sure what difference that makes though it sounds more definitive than guidance. I think you are right - it will be used in court cases - however, it can't change law, so if in a court there is a debate over what is said here, and what is in the actual law - the law will win and the code of practice / guidance will have to be updated, so nothing here can set back or alter the SC judgement or the basic underlying principle that you can not change your birth sex.

consultation response submitted - lots of very good things - a few tweaks suggested.

My summary though reflected the inaccurate use of pronouns - this is what I wrote:

There is a concern over inaccurate use of pronouns. The development of pronouns as a way of identifying as the opposite sex can be seen as a coercive form of behaviour to validate the belief that a man can become a woman or vice versa. That belief has been confirmed by the supreme court judgement to be inaccurate - you can not change sex. Therefore it is important to use accurate pronouns that reflect the person's birth sex. Through-out the guidance she is used for trans women and he for trans men - despite the clarity brought by the recent judgement that a trans woman is a man and a trans man is a woman. To use these inaccurate pronouns in a statutory code of practice validates the suggestion of a sex change and encourages confusion. Considering that in most situations where there might be debate resolved by reference to this code of practice it is likely to be an emotionally charged situation founded on discussion or accusations around whether someone is a man or woman, it is imperative that the code of practice follows the law which states that you are your birth sex and that is immutable. Pronouns should be updated throughout the code of practice to reflect birth sex.

I feel that this is an area not yet critiqued, and perhaps if others agree, worth raising repeatedly in response to the consultation.

I fully agree that a junior employee who may be female shouldn’t have to be in a “side room” alone with an angry man. It should be a manager used to dealing with difficult situations with whatever additional backup may be necessary.

I wonder what is going to constitute proof? A birth certificate? But it will have to be the long one.

But it's certainly doable

It’s problematic isn’t it. Look at some of the anger we’ve seen from men online and offline.

Just started reading. This is amazing.

‘Legal sex is the sex that was recorded at your birth or the sex you have acquired by obtaining a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC).’

Following the UK Supreme Court ruling in For Women Scotland, this definition is no longer accurate, because a GRC does not change your legal sex for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010. We have therefore updated this definition throughout the code to be:

‘Legal sex is the sex that was recorded at your birth.’

FWS did this. Absolutely brilliant women.

If legal sex was the sex recorded at birth - aren't birth certificates now falsifiable with a GRC? There would need to be a checkable database of issued GRCs by name to be certain the birth certificate offered was in fact the original.

However the onus should be on the person wishing to use a single sex space that they are of that sex, and not of the space/resource or service provider when there is doubt and there is a mixed sex service available.

Birth certificates are indeed falsifiable now, it's a consequence of having a GRC.

Someone is going to have to look at the GRA anyway because there is no mechanism for detransitioners to undo a GRC. Keira Bell has mentioned this:
https://safeschoolsallianceuk.net/2020/05/12/a-de-transitioners-viewpoint-keira-bell/

The GRA is harmful as it is creating falsified and indelible records based on the current feelings of people. It has the ability to trap us detransitioners as when we begin to recover from gender dysphoria we are stuck on the “gender recognition register” and there is no policy to be able to revert to our original birth certificates with our birth sex.

I'm cautious about putting the onus of proof onto the person who wants access. Could it be turned against women wanting access to women's spaces? This is already very much on the minds of TRAs.

I don't know how this data mess can be cleared up because no existing document is reliable. I think the actual register of births deaths and marriages still contains the birth sex information as well as the new one. So maybe the proposed new government identity app could show birth sex correctly based on the original registry entry, along with certificated sex and gender idendity 😱