The Scottish Government has dropped its unlawful toilets policy following legal challenge by Sex Matters

[IwantToRetire]

On 30th September, Sex Matters lodged a petition for judicial review of the failure by the Scottish Government to restore and protect the provision of single-sex toilet facilities in its buildings.

Our legal challenge was against paragraph 4.6 of the Scottish Government’s Trans and Non Binary Equality and Inclusion Policy, which said: “Trans staff should choose to use the facilities they feel most comfortable with.” This meant allowing male staff into women’s toilets and changing facilities. We said that this was authorising harassment related to sex, and was unlawful.

Following news reports last week of this change, the Scottish Government’s lawyers have now confirmed to us that it has removed this paragraph from the policy. We can now confirm that we have written to the Scottish Government withdrawing our application for judicial review.

Statement continues at https://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/the-scottish-government-has-dropped-its-unlawful-toilets-policy/

(I think this has come up on existing threads but thought it worth drawing attention to. So 6 days after Sex Matters lodged a petition for a judicial review the Scottish Government gave in!)

for Sex Matters

Excellent stuff.

Wonder if it will have any effect on, eg Hampstead ponds?

Thank you. This is safer. Now hopefully the single sex designs with floor to door gaps (for greater health and safety) will return. This will help save lives of both sexes and prevent assaults, the majority of which are women and children.

Well, sort of. PCS union sent an email to staff based in Leith explicitly telling trans staff to use any toilet they like, and there is some kind of survey I think from SG being shared to LGBT networks on toilets but not shared with all staff or even the Women's network. So there is a fierce rearguard action and a LOT of nonsense being spouted (my hitherto sensible middle aged female union rep said she didn't know what sex she was in front of us all. I think she does know.).

To be fair, PCS corporate put out an email saying staff should use toilets by sex, but sent it to personal (not work) email addresses and used obfuscatory language that only close followers of all this would understand.

I'm SG and despair. Who do you complain to when your union goes mad? I'm in a small agency, my reps are very captured and an anonymous Slido Q on how the union might support women who did not want males in their toilets due to trauma or religious belief prompted a 10 min diatribe about bigots. I don't dare raise a concern under my own name and I can't see that SG HR have a role as they don't oversee the union. Any thoughts about what I can do? I used to strongly believe in unions and am now tempted to resign from PCS as they actively try to shut my views down.

SEEN? Darlington?

SEEN covers the devolved administrations as well, and work is under way to establish a Scottish SEEN chapter to serve as a staff network for SG and agencies. If you go to the joining page on the SEEN website and let them know that you're interested in the Scotland network I'm sure they'd put you in touch. I've also heard of a number of people resigning from PCS over their bonkers communications recently. I'm considering joining the FDA myself.

Oooh, good to know, thanks!

Yes as PP said a SEEN Scottish chapter is up and running! 🙂