What do we think the 5 Supreme Court judges are thinking of what's happened since?

[loveyouradvice]

Do we think they are sanguine and just accepting that the law takes a long time to be accepted and worked through, given the previous misinformation?

Do we think they are surprised by the resistance from employers and service providers?

What do we think they are thinking`???

If I were one of those judges, I'd be wanting really robust personal security - to protect me from any poor gentle, helpless, vulnerable, victim-like person from deliberately doing me serious violent harm in retaliation.

There are laws that I don't personally like, but I accept that it IS the law. I can complain about them, or even campaign peacefully against them; but what I can't do is just decide that I reckon they were wrong to rule that way, so I don't have to abide by anything I happen not to like.

Sometimes, you just have to accept that not everything in the entire world solely revolves around you and what you want.

If I were one of those judges, I'd be wanting really robust personal security - to protect me from any poor gentle, helpless, vulnerable, victim-like person from deliberately doing me serious violent harm in retaliation.

The principle that judges should suffer for the sins of the politicians was well established with the "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE" headline from the glory days of Brexit. There has been a distinct whiff of "how dare judges apply the law to us" every since.

Thanks Gallant. Very interesting.

Julie says you could see they were confused and flummoxed.

All about being told how lesbians could akcherly meet together, as long as they went about it in a very roundabout way and would still have to include men under certain circumstances.

I have to say, I don't think there's a chance in hell of any transactivist making any headway at all to change an atom of this.

Regarding the discussion here on GRCs, it seems to me that the only use is for the pretence that a heterosexual marriage has taken place.

Yeah, basically legal paperwork between you and the state. You can have your adopted gender instead of sex on your marriage and death certificates.

So transactivists were right after all! It is purely admin.

<sighs happily>

I don't know that we disagree. The SC ruling by definition is what the law always meant. So, the EHRC guidance should always have been to exclude trans individuals from single sex services and spaces corresponding to their acquired gender.

The Supreme Court ruling took out the fact that sex as a protected characteristic could, (as written by the Labour government of the time) be impinged on by the GRC. which is why Labour very kindly added in the clause that "where proportionate" trans women with a GRC could be excluded from a women only service to make it truely single (biological) sex.

The EHRC could not write anything that didn't conform to the law as written. But did recently say the GRA / GRC should not be part of the EA because it impinged on the actuality of sex as a protected characteristic.

The Supreme Court ruling didn't go as far as that but did give sex as a protected characteristic the same right as the other characteristics.

But did nothing to address the vaccuum that those with a GRC are now in.

And important to remember that this ruling only applies to the EA.

ie as was the case in the past events or whatever could have been advertised as being for women and trans women so long as they didn't quote the clause about (proporionate) single biological sex events.

So technically ERCC could have got away with employed a TW but just not advertising the post as only be open to biological women. Which of course they did to promote their politics.

And this in fact is what is happening now. All those who have been Stonewalled and think the Supreme Court ruling undermines them are being totally silly.

Any one who is gender non conforming, or self identifying, and all those other performative lifestyles are untouched by the supreme court ruling as they never were part of it. They have just adopted a life style.

So part of all the fury is all those people who have been conned by Stonewall Law (which they admit is legal) are making a big fuss.

And unfortunately too many institutions are similarly in a quandary because they responded to what is a social movement, not a law, that people can make demands based on their life style.

So the quote about lesbians having to accept isn't about the law, it is about the fact that too many lesbians, have either been bullied or genuinely believe (or want to be seen to believe) that TWAW.

The Supreme Court ruling does absolutely nothing to change that.

There were and still are laws around toilets that say there should be single sex provision. The problem is that too many institutions and employers got caught up in the trans hysteria. Mainly because they had no respect for or it never entered their head(s) that they were impinging on women's sex based rights.

And the Supreme Court ruling hasn't change that mind set.

Sad to say, despite court rulings, and data, and surveys, the voices the majority listen to are the trans voices.

Thanks for the thanks, but someone else explained this on a FWR thread, and it stuck in my head, partly because I couldn't understand until then, why the ruling only applies to the EA.

But I suppose it does mean that in terms of equality practices in firms etc., actual women have to be shown to be being paid, promoted or whatever, to the same level as biological males. Which is of course what the original FWS court case was about. Representation on "boards".

I think the judges were in between a rock and a hard place because their job was to interpret the legislation and the legislation is in a mess, largely because politicians have tried to “be nice” to make themselves look right on and good without fully thinking through the consequences of their actions. I was worried this decision could go the other way and I am very relieved it didn’t.

Of the judges who sat on the case, I am most familiar with Lady Rose. I had her as a judge on a long-running case and heard her give an IWD speech about her life and career. In the case she was fair and pragmatic. She wouldn’t always make the decision my client wanted but you could always see the fairness in what she ruled. In the speech she spoke about the challenges of coming up through the ranks as a female lawyer of her generation. I’m pretty sure she knows what a woman is.

Their job is done now. I’m not sure how closely they will follow what organisations are doing. That is for others to monitor and enforce. Although I think they had an inkling as to what was coming by the ‘nobody should see this as a win’ comment when the summary of the judgment was read out.

Yes, I also was lurking on Bluesky in real time when it was unfolding - it did not go down well with the TRAs!

The FWS case wasn’t just about the issue of representation on boards, it was a challenge to an TRA influenced attempt to write a genderist definition of “woman” based on self ID into law.

In terms of the court case it was about Boards.

And the inclusion of the the GRA in the EA is the problem.

Irrespective of what future plans TRAs may have.

Although curtailed, Labour has by putting the GRA in the EA means there will always be problems.

That's why the EHRC position that the GRA should be disapplied is the solution.

Should have said:

Although curtailed, Labour has by putting the GRA in the EA means there will always be problems. ie they could bring is self id by ammending the GRA.

I know full well what the case was about but the main point is that the Scottish government was trying to get a genderist definition of woman based on self ID into the law. The boards were not the main issue for FWS.

https://fairplayforwomen.com/scottish_stole_woman/

So there we have it. Confirmation that the wording of this legislation was passed in anticipation of future changes to Gender Recognition law in Scotland.The same Gender Recognition law that thousands of women have just submitted their views on in a consultation process. The consultation process hadn’t even closed when they passed this bill on 30th January 2018! How can this be? Can Scottish politicians see into the future and see the text of a new law that has not even been consulted on or drafted yet? No. They know where they are heading and they don’t think anyone is going to try to stop them. They think they can just do whatever they like.
Time and time again Scotland has been used as the testing ground for laws that eventually comes crashing into the whole of the UK. Controversial laws get a foothold in Scotland first and then it’s an easy sledge ride down the slippery slopes into England and Wales.
We mustn’t get distracted and just focus on the UK. We must ALL be aware and care about what happens in Scotland. The Scottish public aren’t fully aware of what’s happening yet. It’s not in the mainstream media. We have to change that. We have to ALL make some noise in Scotland.
Don’t just leave it up to Scottish women. This impacts us all. It’s important.

As the FPFW piece explains, eight years ago the Scottish Trans Alliance, the main TRA organisation in Scotland, pushed for the already inclusive bill (women and those who identify as women) to have a definition of woman based on self ID.

The draft bill was transgender inclusive and included this:

The “gender representation objective” for a public board is that it has—

(a) 50% of non-executive members who are female or who identify as female, and

(b) 50% of non-executive members who are male or who identify as male.

But this still wasn’t enough for the transgender lobby.The Scottish Trans Alliance wanted to remove the phrase ‘who are female’ and ‘who are male’, so as not to create a legal difference between those ‘who are’ and those ‘who identify as’ male or female. They got their way. They always do.
Mary Fee MSP (Scottish Labour) proposed an amendment and it was accepted. The Bill was changed to instead simply refer to ‘women’. No mention of those who are female. No mention of the phrase ‘who identify as’. Just the word women. The same word women that the general public know to mean adult females. The same word defined in the Equality Act 2010 as‘meaning female of any age’.
This was a clever trick. Everyone knows what woman means don’t they. Why would any unsuspecting politician or member of the public be alarmed by a bill that stated on its first page that its objective was to have 50% who are women.

Which just goes to show, we should have been forging ahead with Equal Marriage in 2004, instead of fannying around with the GRA…

I think they’ll be disappointed that most of the warnings they urged alongside the ruling were ignored.

The majority of women services providers knew and know that there is a clause that specifically allows the exclusion of trans women from single sex spaces. And with the ruling if they are providing single sex services this now automaticallly means biological sex.

The 'lesbian' argument was about clubs and societies, not services were a 'proportionate means/legitimate aim' argument is required to exclude men.

Thanks for all the posts about the Scottish specific aspect of the original case.

But in terms of the EA which applies across the UK and why the UK Government opposed the Scottish self id attempt, that fact that the GRA remains as a part of the EA ie a protected characteristic means it can be changed at any time.

Unlike any other protected characteristic which isn't based on having a certificate.

Nothing to say that as final gesture the current Labour Government which has the majority couldn't as its passing shot, make getting a GRC available via self identification.

Which means they would not have a legal basis on which to oppose Scotland bringing in such a law, as making self id legal it would apply to England, Scotland and Wales - although not NI.

Unlike any other protected characteristic which isn't based on having a certificate.

The FWS ruling we just had made clear that GRCs have no effect on the Equality Act. The "sex" characteristic is not affected by a GRC (the point in dispute); and the "gender reassignment" characteristic has never required a GRC.

Which actually means a large part of the basis of the original Section 35 block on the Scottish Gender Recognition Reform Bill - impact on application of the EA with regard to "sex" (not gender reassignment) - already no longer applies.

Michael Foran explained that in the Spectator here, and elsewhere.

https://archive.is/DsMPC

If Scotland wanted to try to do their self-ID again now, the UK government would have to find new arguments for a new Section 35 attempt. It's harder to justify blocking a piece of paper that's now understood to be far less significant - not impacting "sex".

The FWS ruling we just had made clear that GRCs have no effect on the Equality Act. The "sex" characteristic is not affected by a GRC (the point in dispute); and the "gender reassignment" characteristic has never required a GRC.

The ruling was entirely about the conflict between a GRC creating a "legal woman" and the protected characteristic of sex.

Because this impinged on the characteristic of sex, ie made it open to being down graded, the ruling clarified that within the EA sex would only mean biological.

Whereas until then, unless the clause to set up of women only service was invoked, men with a GRC could be included as having the sex of their certificate.

That's why the right (where proportionate) to exclude trans women was included in the EA.

The need to justify that it was proporationate would never have been written if TW with a GRC were never to have been included.

"gender reassignment" characteristic has never required a GRC

I think again this is an example of how Stonewall's law has seemed to have taken over as being the law.

The intent of GRC is either to have gained a certificate or to be seen to be progressing towards gaining one.

That is the reason why as token gesture the cost of aquiring one was reduced.

But agree that in practice most people think that they are covered by the protected characteristic of gender reassignment just by saying they are trans.

The EA does spell this out.

The point is that the Supreme Court has superseded all that by making it clear that the protected characteristic of sex was only meant to include biological sex. I don’t disagree that it was a grey area before this, but that’s been swept aside as a judgment has been made that it was always intended to mean biological sex as anything else was unworkable and absurd. As pp have said, the light bulb moment was when the judges fully considered that what was literally being demanded is that a man should be seen as a woman in terms of whether he could enter women’s spaces or a lesbian group based on whether he had obtained a piece of paper or not. It’s never not been absurd, but it’s never been confronted at this level.

The judges were required to take a view on whether the legislation defined women by biological or certificated sex. And concluded that it was biological sex. What Labour were probably implying about GRCs allowing legal “woman” status is immaterial, as it isn’t defined in the legislation, there were only politicised guidance notes.