Brigitte Phillipson blocking EHRC guidance

[lcakethereforeIam]

I'm not sure if there's anything new here though

Phillipson blocks trans guidance after landmark Supreme Court ruling https://share.google/P91PBE5Cy4ROwsdA1

It's a very stark article in the Telegraph.

I think that is also addressed in the Telegraph article I posted upthread

However, she also proposed to weaken the scheme by turning the OFS’s duty to consider complaints into a discretion and by excluding students altogether. A Department for Education policy paper published in June confirmed that the Government has “committed to seek a legislative vehicle at the earliest opportunity” to implement these changes.

As things stand, no such vehicle is in sight. Although the Act’s new duties on universities to secure and promote free speech commenced on Aug 1, they remain effectively unenforceable without a complaints procedure. The only recourse is judicial review, which is expensive, risky, and utterly impractical for individual academics to pursue. Employment Tribunals have no jurisdiction to enforce the Act’s duties and are already struggling with heavy caseloads.

From the Telegraph article.

It needs to have teeth or it might as well carry on keeping Phillipson's bottom warm.

She needs a new catchphrase
Procrastinatin' Phillipson?
Blockin' Bridgette?

The Charity Commission is showing disquiet about the delay in the publication of the statutory guidance following the Supreme Court ruling and has written to Bridget Phillipson to urge its publication. The Charity Commission's open letter is in response to an open letter from a charity governance consultant who is also a trans woman, and who represents Third Sector Against Transphobia. In her letter, she proposes a number of interim measures that can be taken until the guidance is published.

The letter makes clear that the aim continues to be for trans women and girls to have access to female-only spaces. I do not see how this can be achieved legally, given the Supreme Court's ruling.

Open letter to the Charity Commission
www.thirdsectoragainsttransphobia.org/

Reply from the Charity Commission
www.gov.uk/government/publications/response-to-open-letter-on-charity-governance-and-equality-act-2010/response-to-open-letter-on-charity-governance-and-equality-act-2010

I think the tras want it published so that, assuming it does maintain single sex spaces as single sex, they'll have the battle lines drawn and they can proceed to their next step. They've probably, to continue the martial theme, been wargaming for such an eventuality as seems clear from the open letter.

Phillipson IS having a busy old time. Being harangued by 370 senior academics over her vandalizing of the FE Free Speech Act, almost everyone (incl pro trans groups) over her inertia re the SC ruling/ECHR advice.
I mean, what DOES she do all day?
It's been suggested to me she's sniffing around the dog days of the Starmer premiership, and will use her frankly overtly political actions in these areas as purity tests for her as the hard left wing punt for Labour leader/PM.
Can you imagine a leadership husting with Phillipson, Rayner, Milliband, Starmer, Burnham, and the Q comes in
"Can a woman have a penis?"
Which one will say, "no, not a single one"?

I agree. Being in limbo is bad for everyone.

Oh FFS. That letter....

We therefore ask the Charity Commission to take the following actions:

1. Issue immediate interim guidance or a regulatory alert advising charities not to rush to make changes to their inclusion policies until forthcoming legal judgments are delivered. In particular, where a charity has previously been trans-inclusive and wishes to remain so, the Commission should advise that they wait for legal clarity before taking any action to exclude trans service users or members.

Issue immediate guidance that the law stands, is what it has always been, that failure to meet this leaves them legally vulnerable, that the Supreme Court judgment will not be outweighed by lower level cases, and there is a legal duty to ensure that single sex provision is in fact single sex. This does not preclude alternative facilities for those who need them, merely the respecting of women's existing legal rights and equality to trans interests.

2. Expedite applications from charities with single-sex objects that wish to amend those objects to include all genders, to prevent harmful pauses or gaps in service provision. This would also be an appropriate moment to remind charities of the correct process for amending their objects.

Remind charities that where they turn all single sex provisions mixed sex in partisan response to the interests of men with trans identities, they may leave themselves open to legal challenges over discrimination against women on the protected characteristic of sex, and risk accidentally engaging in unwanted behaviours on the grounds of perceived but not actual rights based on gender identity (see the Darlington judgment). Navigating equalities will require both women needing single sex provision and men with gender identities being equally treated.

3. Encourage any charity threatened with legal action for including trans people to file a Serious Incident Report, enabling the Commission to better identify and track this emerging trend. We also ask that you consider what additional guidance or support these charities need in such circumstances, and that you publish annual reporting on this data—retrospectively if possible.

Suggest that the Charity Commission take note of the many threats of legal action plus much harassment carried out by activist groups on behalf of men with trans identities in the attempt to punish and destroy services that met the needs of women without submitting to the dominance of men's interests. And do a bit of sauce for the goose and gander here for obvious bloody reasons.

Remind charities threatened with legal action for breaking actual rather than imaginary/rumoured law involving discrimination against and harassment of women on behalf of trans activism that they are wide open to action and expensive outcomes.

4. Publicly clarify that the Charity Commission will not take regulatory action against charities with single-sex objects solely because they choose not to immediately exclude trans people. Misunderstandings on this point are already circulating in the public domain and require urgent correction.

Publicly clarify that the law is the law, and women's rights cannot be overturned in the interests of men with gender identities who refuse to tolerate charities or services with single sex objects. And confirm that this kind of attitude and behaviour is precisely why women require this protection in law, and why the SCJ was necessary to confirm it.

5. Remind charities that they are entitled to rely on their internal policies to support their position on trans inclusion, and that the Commission supports trustees’ autonomy and discretion in determining how best to serve their beneficiaries.

Remind charities that they are bound by law, and that participating in misogynist anti woman activism and oppression to further gender activism is not supported by the Commission or anyone else sane, and that such actions may lead to them trying to justify this in court and across the national dailies.

I know exactly what Bridget Phillipson does all day. She practises keeping her voice devoid of all emotion and as patronising as any human voice in the history of people- kind has ever managed to be. Vocal control at that level is a full- time job.

She's got some tough competition
Sir Keir "I-am-not-a-Dalek!" Starmer
Rachel "I'm not a malfunctioning drone even if it sounds like it" Reeves
Politics, especially for those at the highest levels, preselects those who are only 10% human, and then the race for the bottom cuts out the remaining bit.

Both have dreadful speaking voices. Rachel Reeves takes pauses in odd places mid-sentence. Keir Starmer uses 'My number one priority' for everything, meaning nothing is a priority. Conversely, Angela Raynor speaks like a 100% human being and Wes Streeting is close behind at 90%.

Are we likely to have the outcome of the GLP judicial review in the next few weeks?

She's very capable of getting in a snit and giving out stink to journalists, or other pols, when she's on the media. She did it recently, on the BBC, by getting on her high horse (i.e.doing a Jess Phillips) with a Tory MP and claiming that she had nothing to feel ashamed about when it comes to women's rights and the EHRC guidance delay - she went on about her history of working in a women's shelter.

Just because she can sound impassioned on an issue doesn't mean she'll hurry anything up when she gets back to her office. She, like an awful lot of our politicians, and public servants, is incapable of feeling shame.

The last decade has been a wake up call to me, black pilling, reality checking.
Sure, I was already aware MPs were feckless (expenses scandal), hypocritical (Major's back to basics), and mostly useless (how many examples do you need?).
But I still assumed things got done, cabinet ministers would make things happen, the state still worked, and critically, that ministers weren't total sociopaths.
That's all gone from my mind.
Even if I vote Reform, I'll be expecting "business as usual". If any future govt surprises me pleasantly, I'll be the happiest voter ever.
My emotion towards the likes of the Tory party, my default choice, runs very deep, but I genuinely didn't expect this level of politicking from the likes of Phillipson, especially as Starmer repeats "rule of law, otherwise all is anarchy" every other sentence.
My ire is also reserved for the likes of Sunak and, yes, Badenoch.
They had two clear years to lock this down, to leave no wiggle room for the likes of Phillipson to do what she's doing now.
Sunak wasn't interested any further than humiliating Sturgeon over Section 20, Badenoch talked a good fight but was instrumental in not opposing DEI in the NHS which is the main motor for trans ideology rinsing out nurses Peggie, Mellie, Darlington crew.
Last but not least, the media.
For every one proudly GC interviewer like Justin Webb, there are hundreds who are TRA themselves (like Lewis Goodall) or give it no thought.
Phillipson and Starmer are getting an absolute free ride on this. There is zero media holding to account.
This is the stew we're in.
A Tory govt who let things run.
A politicized Labour govt happy to stonewall.
A media class who are both captured and a waste of space.
The perfect storm for trans to, even on the backfoot since Cass and the SC ruling, still keep pushing back and make progress, even if that progress is simply total inertia in civic society.

I think it comes down to not having competent people as MPs, and having the civil service that we do. Also, to a lesser extent, pressure from unions for some MPs.

Michael Gove interviewed Dominic Cummins and they both said its so difficult to get anything done, and that for MPs who're interested. I get the impression most MPs are happy to sign things and let the system take over.

Lots of MPs are just pursuing a political career, and dont know or care about the department the have. And quite frankly, dont have the intelligence to begin to understand the complexities, or the character to make difficult decisions. They know theyll be reshuffled out before too long. If they dont do anything, they cant do anything wrong.

Starmer isnt intetested in the guidance, neither is the labour party, and nobody who is likely to be the next leader. In a way, it would be madness to not sit on it and hope it becomes someone else's problem.

So much of this comes down to the type of person who wants to do this job, and who gets into the high positions. As with unions. These are not our 'brightest and best'.

Wanting to do it should pretty much be a disqualifying factor.

A rather bleak view, but I'm sure it's pretty accurate. And no prospect of any great improvement in the foreseeable, either.

There are strong rumours that if Reform win the GE outright, Farage will run things like a company. He will effectively be a CEO, with a board acting as The office Of The PM.
Experts in their field will be enobled into the Lords and then airlifted into senior Cabinet Minister positions in the most important posts (Chancellor, Education, Health, Trade, Home Office etc), like Sunak brought Lord Cameron into the FO.
Underpinning this will be a Grand Restoration to unravel the HRA, GRA and EqA, leave the ECHR and likely the Refugees Convention, bring in a British Bill Of Rights, re-wire the state.
Right now, do we want a Bridgette Phillipson at Education, wholly unsuitable for the role and over politicised, or the likes of a eg Katherine Birbalsingh, who's done the hard yards and would bring real world experience to the role?
All I know is that by the time of the 2029 GE, we'll have had two decades of total failure from the Tories (incl LD for the first 5 years of that) and Labour.
The elevation of a wholly unqualified and undeserved Phillipson to a post as crucial as Education is testament to a totally broken political system.

The only part of your post I do not agree with is that the GE will be in 2029.

If Andy Burnham succeeds Starmer, I think he calls a GE early (avoid the Gordon Brown mistake to let things slide).
Whether circumstances in the bonds market forces an early GE otherwise, who knows.
You can tell from Farage ramping up the pressure on Tory MPs to defect no later than May 7th, that he's backing on a 2027 GE.
It'll be Badenoch who has most to lose from an early GE, she's still letting water into the hold, Starmer at least is just about floating.
Looking forward to maximum ick Polanski getting found out.

You have a lot more faith in Farage's long-term plans (?) than I do, @1984Now . How he's going to find the time and energy to re-structure the British state I'm not sure; won't he be too busy selling off the profitable bits to his rich American chums? And 'stopping the boats'?

I'm not sure I have any faith in him, that's what 15 years of failed politics does to you.
I'm wary of Farage as anyone else making big promises.
But what I'm gleaning from different sources suggests a big project is going to be put to the voters.
Sure, anti Faragistas will say this will be cover for a Trumpism fascist plot to run a far right govt.
They may be right, but I really don't think so.
I don't see Nadine Dorries and Danny Kruger signing up to such a project.
FWIW, the country is both broken and the inertia at the heart of govt and the state means nothing can get done.
Dom Cummings is elucidating this in recent interviews.
From the deeper stuff on re-wiring the state, to Farage relentless energy on making the political weather, and his breaking the Tory Party, his urgency of messaging, suggests strongly that he's going to make a big pitch to Brits, as early as 2027.
And what do we learn from Rob Jenrick? That Badenoch is aiming only to concentrate on 60 seats, half the number they have now.
If he's being accurate about this, means the Tories will become the 3rd or 4th party (depends if Labour reach 61 seats or not), behind Reform and the LDs, and for the first time lose their claim to be a national party.

Personally, I hope he does it by firing the bottom 10% performing civil servants. And rewarding the top 10%.

That's their plan and I love it.

How is their performance rated? I'm amazed so many of you are prepared to put any faith in Farage.

We measure outcomes in every part of our lives and work. Government seems t have forgotten this.

Yes, I realise that, I also know its possible for a system to be biased, or unable to fairly rate some types of work.