As to their claims that this is a lawful positive action under Section 158, I did a long post on that on the previous thread (see my first post on this thread for a link to the first thread). So I won’t repeat that here.
But I will just add, that the WI argue that any woman who becomes a member of the WI must accept TiM as members:
“WI members choose to associate with each other on the basis that they welcome and include anyone who lives as a woman, whatever their recorded sex at birth (“the Membership Criterion”).”
Hmm, I wonder just how many women are aware of that when they sign up?
Going further, I wonder how many WI members are aware that they are expected to offer “support” and “acceptance” to validate the feelings of TiM to help improve their mental health?
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But there is one big thing that is overlooked in the defence (whether deliberately or not). It is that the WI is a charity with a constitution. Well, actually, it’s several thousand separate charities all of which are required to have the constitution that the NFWI provide for them.
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Please forgive my step into the history of the WI here but I found it very interesting.
The first WI group in the UK was set up in 1915 and then the national governing body (the NFWI) was set up in 1917. I’m not too sure when they first became a registered charity but the NFWI reorganised as a charitable company limited by guarantee in 1990.
Prior to that, from 1948 the objects of the WI were:
“The main purpose of the Women's Institute movement is to improve and develop conditions of rural life. It seeks to give to all countrywomen the opportunity of working together through the Women's Institute organisation, and of putting into practice those ideals for which it stands.”
Up until 1965 they actually had a rule that local WIs could only be formed in places with a population of less than 4,000.
The constitution was then changed in 1970 and it’s interesting reading the governing document from back in 1990 when the NFWI became an incorporated organisation. In the 1990 document it states that “The objects are unchanged”, which is in relation to the 1970 constitution:
“The National Federation is established to provide an organisation with the object of enabling countrywomen to take an effective part in the improvement and development of the conditions of rural life and to make provision to advance their education in citizenship, in public questions both national and international, in music, drama and other cultural subjects, and also to secure training for them, in all branches of agriculture, handicrafts, home economics, health and social welfare.
It exists to give all Women the opportunity of working together through the Women’s Institute organisation, and of putting into practice those ideals for which it stands.”
In case you’re wondering, “countrywomen” were defined in the 1970s and into the 1990s as:
“Countrywomen means women living in rural areas and women living elsewhere who are interested in the promotion of the arts, crafts, and sciences associated with rural life”
There was a further minor change in the constitution in 2002 but then there was a very big change in 2013. This change brought in a number of different objects which I thought that they might rely on in the Defence but they haven’t mentioned that.
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The WI argue that they have a separate EDI policy that allows them to alter the meaning of the word “women” in their constitution.
However, a policy is separate and distinct from the constitution. The constitution focuses on the charity's purpose, membership and governance, while policies address specific areas of activity as well as legal and regulatory compliance.
If the policy had been incorporated by reference into the constitution then what the WI is arguing would be correct. But the constitution does not reference any other policy and so it is a stand alone document. Indeed the current constitution does not mention the words “equality”, “diversity” or “inclusion” anywhere within it.
If the constitution had said something like “The WI will follow its most current EDI policy” then that would have effect. But the constitution doesn’t say that.
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Even if they were to try and argue that the meaning of the word “women” in the constitution includes anyone who sees themselves as living as a woman, regardless of the EDI policy not being incorporated, then I still don’t see how they could do that.
Up until 2002 membership was restricted to “countrywomen”. That was gradually expanded to include all women by 2013. The “concept” or “category” of WI membership has expanded from one group of women to all women through express changes in the wording of the constitution.
Even without express changes in wording though, it is possible for what is included in a concept or category (women in this case) to change over time.
The classic example of this is the Bill of Rights 1688 that forbade “cruel and unusual punishments”. The concept of “cruelty” is the same today as it was then but, due to changes in social standards, punishments that wouldn’t have been considered cruel in 1688 will be regarded so today.
Or the concept of a child’s “welfare”. The word was used in the Guardianship of Infants Act 1925, now the Children Act 1989. The concept of welfare is, no doubt, the same today as it was in 1925 but the contents of that concept (what “welfare” actually looks like in a practical way), is to be judged today by the standards of reasonable men and women in 2025 – not the standards of their great great grandparents a 100 years ago or their parents back in 1989.
However, this does not mean that you can construe the language of the WI constitution to mean something conceptually different from what was intended. To try and include a group (men) that is conceptually different from the ordinary, accepted, meaning of “women”, seems to me to not be possible without expressly altering the constitution to reflect that change.
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So, these are my thoughts, anyone else have any thoughts?