Trans identifying male Harriet Haynes loses court case to play in women's pool

[ArabellaScott]

A great win for Lynn Pinches!

Congratulations to her, and the EBPF.

'CASE DISMISSED! The case against EBPF by Harriet Haynes. '

Haynes to pay costs.

Earlier articles:

Males banned from women's pool:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/articles/c1k4gd2vge9o

Haynes sues:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/2025/04/08/transgender-pool-player-harriet-hayes-suing-governing-body/

Pool Federation:

https://ebpf.uk/

Judgement:

https://jrlevins.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/K01CT207-judgment-1-8-25-handed-down.pdf

'CONCLUSION
267 Having come to the end of what is essentially a long footnote to this judgment, I reiterate that in my view the effect of the decision in FWS is that the claim fails at the first hurdle because there has been no gender reassignment discrimination. The claim must therefore be dismissed. '

The judgement is well worth reading! Fantastic result!!

Well done Lynn in huge effort in protecting female sports!

Another excellent result as the scales continue to tip back towards common sense and biological reality. Generations from now will look back at this time and think wtaf.

Heartening to read that Mr Haynes will pay costs.

This is good to read.

We are pleased to announce that our clients, the English Blackball Pool Federation, have successfully defended the discrimination claim brought against them by the transgender player, Harriet Haynes.

This is the first case to apply FWS and to consider the sport exception under s. 195 EqA. We will be publishing the judgment on our website shortly.

https://x.com/jrlevinslaw/status/1951219812048248915?s=46

Good news.

Great that Haynes has to pay costs. If only the same could be said for Upton.

A win for Common Sense (which can often not be common) 🎉

I'm very glad they won and grateful to Lynne Pinches for standing up.

Reading the judgement, it was disappointing to see, re. encouraging women's participation (my bolding):

"266 As to the second aim, I accept that women have been historically underrepresented among pool players. The FargoRate data indicates that in America they still are, and that is likely to be the case in the UK as well. Encouraging greater female participation is a clearly legitimate aim. I do not accept, however, that (were it not for the need to achieve fairness) excluding trans women from female competitions would be a proportionate means of achieving it. The Defendants’ evidence was that the only complaints they received other than those about fair competition were objections to sharing toilets, and that is an issue which could arise whenever trans women are present, whether or not they are competing in the same event."

The judge makes clear that if there hadn't been physical differences in performance he(?) would have thought it reasonable for trans women to play in women's tournaments to increase female participation.

Women have the right to compete against and socialise in a competitive environment exclusively with other women.

Yeah. At least the SC judges carefully considered the matter and made a ruling that hopefully protects women anyway.

Another win, thank god.

Excellent news.

It’s not been a great week for Jane Russell.

More good news. Women being given our sports back

I don’t see how any week can be, if she’s going to carry on pretending that the FWS Supreme Court ruling is just a little thing in Scotland to do with public boards.

This. Some of the arguments in this case are frankly silly.

Just noticed that the BBC headline is "Transgender women banned from female pool category"
Instead of the expected "Transgender women banned from pool"

Another small win?

Maybe?

It perhaps makes it clearer (a little) that so called 'transgender women' are men. But given that up to a third of people think that 'transgender women' refers to females identifying as men, who knows?

Oh well. Baby steps.

Yep.

I would have preferred something more accurate like 'Transwomen loses case of sex discrimination against being banned from female category'.

The BBC is such a waste of space. 🤬

I hate the way these people always say they were 'banned'. No you're not banned, you were never meant to be in the female category and therefore should go in the mens. You are not excluded from the sport.

My guess is you don't want to play against your biological equals because you'd come up as mediocre.

Like if a boxer was a bit shite at middleweight, saying, ok well I'm going to 'identify' as flyweight and if I don't get to compete at that weight category despite being heavier, then I'm barred from the sport entirely. Boo hoo.

Exactly - they had already been banned, this was the challenge to it. Which was lame, poorly articulated, confusing, and ultimately unsuccessful

My guess is you don't want to play against your biological equals because you'd come up as mediocre.

No, in this case, it's because they want the validation of playing against women. We are all supposed to perform for their fantasy.

RMW and JR - a winning combo for the GC side 😃

Even more accurate would have been "Trans identified man loses case... etc"

JR and RMW have beclowned themselves for the ideology.

In their minds I suppose, society has been sufficiently steeped in queer theory that a legal argument does not have to be right to win. In fact it is better to be non-normative. Men are women! SC rulings are the opposite to what the Judges say they are!