Minister blames 'slow' EHRC for trans guidance delay

[IwantToRetire]

Asked why the publication of the guidance had been delayed, Phillipson told the BBC: "I asked the EHRC for information that I needed to inform that decision.

"That unfortunately was slow in being forthcoming."

She added: "I asked for the information you would expect routinely as part of this process, for example an equalities impact assessment, that the EHRC just checks that this doesn't mean a burden on business.

"This doesn't have to be a long and drawn out process. I'm determined to do this properly but I absolutely am committed to making sure that women, whether it's in rape crises centres, women's refuges, or in access to other provisions and accommodations, have got what they need to feel safe."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr4k61dqnzlo

It was interesting to see that the Welsh statutory guidance on toilets acknowledges this, what with the Welsh administration being quite a bastion of gender ideology:

2.10 ....despite women making up more than half of the UK population, and with a higher proportion of older people being women, there is more provision for men, primarily because of the smaller space that urinals take up. Historically, the ideal ratio of 1 male facility to 2 female facilities has not been delivered, which results in insufficient provision for women.
32533 The Provision of Toilets in Wales: Local Toilets Strategies, English Version

This document dates from 2018 - I haven't been able to find anything more recent, so it would appear to still be the relevant statutory guidance.

Because Phillipson doesn't want to commit to agreeing that spaces must be split by sex not gender.

By using the word 'safe' she's weaselly leaving the (toilet, changing room, refuge and prison) door open to using risk assessments for trans women. And thus allowing these men into women-only spaces.

Hence her treacherous nonsense intervention in the recent case brought by the Good Laff Project.

I do not trust Phillipson at all.

Exactly! Heather Binning of WRN fame couldn’t get her first job due to that reason. How ridiculous that we are going back to that

Oo I never knew that factoid. Thanks Knotty

Starmer consistently used “safe spaces” when the subject arose during the last election campaign. Carefully chosen weasel words yes.

Falkner already called Phillipson's bluff. In a number of interviews towards the end of her period as head of EHRC, Falkner stated that the information given to Phillipson is sufficient and meets the requirements and that no further studies need to be carried out and that's why EHRC are not minded to carry them out.

She also stated that Phillipson has had the Code of Practice since May rather than September and so has been sitting on it for much longer than is mentioned regularly in the media.

for example an equalities impact assessment

What for? The law hasn't changed?

it's not the job of the EHRC to change the law.

She said she wants an Equalities Impact Assessment to check for any burden on businesses. What? That is not the purpose of an EIA. It might note any burden on people with protected characteristics, but it is not going to say 'ooh that might be expensive though'

They are writing the guidelines one word a day and the person responsible has been off sick a few times.

Either that or theirs no political will at the EHRC or by Phillipson to do their actual job properly.

Perhaps I have put two different points together where she meant, she wants both these things.

"for example an equalities impact assessment, that the EHRC just checks that this doesn't mean a burden on business."

Sometimes I feel like MPs are low level management types who are promoted above their pay grade and don't really understand anything about their job and simply learn certain words from being in meetings a lot and can use enough of those words in the right order to make it look like they are doing something vaguely competent. I can spot it because I have been in a few jobs where thats how I operated, because im lazy and have a life. I wouldnt choose to be an MP because I would expect an MP to be a complete obsessive 24 hours a day about their brief. Am I asking too much? I don't think so.

The judgment itself was an impact statement, as it went into great detail on the impact of acting as if Gender Identity was the exact same thing as Sex on several protected categories in the equalities act.

I had hoped we'd seen the last of the Sex Fudge.

Safe Spaces has been the Labour mantra for years.

Dont forget they were the one who drafted the SSE for the EA that put the rights of trans women above the rights of biological women.

ie the majority group, actually women could only of a few occassions and if it was "proportionate" have acess to services based on biological sex.

and the minority group, TW, were presumes to have the right to access women's services.

Logically in terms of a law, it should have been the other way round.

But right from the start Labour always assumed that the protected characteristic of gender re-assignment would become self identity.

Added to this, or exploiting it we had years of Stonewall "advisint" people that self identity was enough to justify inclusion into single sex services or facilities.

Labour is still so committed to this concept, that they wont (or cant) bring themselves to say they were wrong to begin with.

ie even making out in all their statements that the only important group are trans people. Yet again the implication is that even if actual women have rights, and a court clarifies that. Labour will never put women first.

Women know your place.

At the back of the queue.

Single-sex spaces guidance delayed as Phillipson waits for costings
Details will not be released for four months as minister demands to know what it will cost businesses
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/single-sex-spaces-guidance-delayed-phillipson-fsw2m6kx3
And in full at https://archive.is/XPCEC

Worth reading for all the weasel word excuses they are making up.

Do they mean 4 months from now?

Wont that make it about a year from when the judgement was given.

I have nothing but contempt for their games.

The equalities minister has told the EHRC it must assess the financial impact of its guidance before it can be approved, despite the regulator arguing that such costs arise from the law itself rather than its interpretation of it.

Is there a caveat where you don't have to obey the law if it is too expensive?

It is shocking that a lawmaker has such a blatant contempt for the rule of law. Phillipson is a disgrace. She is unfit for office.

If Phillipson remains determined to block an updated EHRC Code of Practice, that confirms women-only spaces must exclude all men (however they identify), we will make this brutally clear via case law.

Bring on the court cases.

Well if there is I’ll cancel my car insurance tomorrow as it is far too expensive, not to mention my council tax and HMRC bill.
Sure I can find many more items I no longer need to cough up for as obeying laws seems to be optional now if there may be expense.

Not forgetting the fact that in many instances it will be businesses or whatever just reverting back to what was normal every where up until a couple of decades ago.

All those businesses moaning should have thought a bit harder before being Stonewalled.

Although I expect it has nothing to do with businesses, they are just being used by Labour as an excuse to not follow the law.

Not even an apology to women for making them wait longer than they should have to, to get their rights back.

I think part 1 of your comment is spot on.

But for part 2, this much feared reaction would really only amount to a (yes, arguably epic) toddler tantrum, but then what? While they might superficially agree, people outside the blue hair rentacause contingent don't really care that much - at least the ones who actually, physically vote and therefore matter to BP and co. Men for sure won't give a shiny shit, they never have.

I think it could easily be a big wah-wah! for a week and then we all just get on with the cost of living, and rolling our eyes over the latest gov u-turn/scandal/resignation, and who the Traitor was and so on. We (collectively) just don't have the bandwidth for this load of old tosh.

Do we really think that the Jolyon, India, Webberley and their anime hangers-on will get traction from The People when it has to be proactive and tangible, not just liking a FB post or Tweet? And those clowns at Bashback are doing a superb job of shooting themselves in the foot so they'll probably implode soon too.

She was Women’s minister and did absolutely nothing to ensure women’s rights were respected by every organisations in the country. Fuck all!

I'm not so sure. People do love a bandwagon to hop on these days. Look at all the people that started protesting for Palestine Action and not Palestine after the government proscribed it. That went on(and is till ongoing) for months.

Transactivists have already called in death threats and bomb threats, disrupted women gathering by releasing insects and forced cancellations of anything they deem transphobic. As well as using bodily wastes in dirty protests. That's not even going into the doxxings and general abuse hurled at anybody that put their heads above the parapet. I can see widespread tantrumming for a fair bit longer than a week. I think you're right that most people will get on with life but I can see a significant amount of protestors being more long term. Labour are not going to want all their social media being flooded with messages of hate towards them.

Look at JK Rowling and all the abuse she still gets. I still can't get my head around the fact that people thought putting dick picks on her Ickabog posts that children were participating in was acceptable. Imagine stuff like that on every MPs page. I genuinely think Labour are scared of the blowback. At this point, I can't see any other reason for them delaying publishing the guidance, other than fear of the reaction from one side in particular.

That's rubbish and has been discussed on many other threads.

She had actually done a lot of preparatory work on safeguarding women's sex based rights, and then Sunak suddenly called a General Election and everything she had done was dumped.

Not as if the Labour party would have taken it up, even if she was about to present something they agreed with.

I cant imagine if KB was still Minister for Women we would be having the Government sabotaging a Supreme Court ruling.

It just is so tedious when poster just drag out cliched comments like this.

As has been the case all along, for whatever reason the Tories have been more supportive of women's sex based rights.

And as you are on FWR, and read threads particularly around the time of the GE this was discussed.

Do keep up.

Couldn't agree more, and am a bit surprised that some some PP seem to give her the benefit of the doubt, but it sounds like the same old weasel words to me.

The “safe spaces” language is really bugging me, it’s not even accurate as single sex spaces are obviously for far more than safety. Weasel words during the election that persist today.

Good column by Sonia Sodha in the Times this morning, making the point that a leadership contest in the near future is reasonably likely.

Phillipson might well be hanging in there to keep in with captured backbenchers.