GLP are suing Virgin Active

[ByGreatGreenWriter]

https://goodlawproject.org/were-suing-virgin-active-over-their-transphobic-rules/

“So we’re taking legal action. We are representing two claimants who are members of Virgin Active gyms and who have been subject to discrimination solely because they are trans.

According to Virgin’s new policy, both of them can no longer use facilities like the pool and sauna because they can only be reached by going through either the men’s or women’s changing rooms.“

If true that sounds like discrimination?

Yes, trans identifying men and women are expected to comply with the law, just like everybody else. There is adequate provision, male and female facilities, and increasingly gender neutral.

So telling a male he’s a male isn’t ‘going to cut it’. In what way? What’s he going to do about the reality of his biologically male body? Stamp his feet until he gets his self declared identity validated by others?

I think telling men to use men’s facilities is great for the dignity and respect that should be shown towards women and their single sex spaces.

Maybe there are many men who may feel uncomfortable in communal changing rooms. Even if it only amongst their own sex. Why would you indulge the unreasonable wishes/demands of any group of men to gain access to the female changing room?

However many women felt uncomfortable in a communal changing room with other women present, would be joined by many more women who would be utterly creeped out by males wandering around in the women’s changing room. Even if he thinks he is extra special, and that trumps the rights of any women who object.

The solution is not to make many women uncomfortable in the women’s changing room (deliberately) because some bloke says he is uncomfortable in the male changing room.

As long as they stay out of the women’s, they can crack on with sorting themselves out. Not women’s problem to solve, or to be negatively impacted by any man who wants to do so.

Fearing rape because there's someone with a penis in the room goes a bit further than "feeling uncomfortable".

And let's not forget that this "logic" has led to a rape trial of two male psych patients who are alleged to have raped a female psych patient who identified as a man and was put in the men's secure ward.

Simply saying you’re a male it’ll be fine isn’t going to cut it.

I can't decode this. Who's saying who is a male? Are you talking about trans men going into male toilets? What is undignified about e.g. a group of transwomen, men, agender and non-binary people changing in a male space if they're all male?

But trans people can use the spaces provided. They just have to use the space provided for their sex. The problem is purely caused by people (men usually) refusing to comply with the law and demanding that everyone else defers to them. Virgin is being perfectly reasonable and is obeying the law.

Great. So once again disabled people are penalised to accommodate someone's feelz.

Does sound like it doesn’t it! Smacks of trying to find a back door they can exploit.

Someone who doesn’t realise the op posts are a different colour.

Has anyone else read the letter before action? It’s here: https://goodlawproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/REDACTED-Draft-PAP-15-Jan-2026-CLEAN-COPY.pdf

its a real doozy, with lots of (to my mind) specious claims to rights that don’t exist in law and claims of things being unlawful that obviously aren’t.

I don’t think Virgin has much to fear.

Although one interest and somewhat predictable point is the Virgin appear to concede in a communication with one of the claimants that the disabled facilities don’t have the same amenities as the men’s and women’s, like hairdryers. The obvious discrimination against disabled gym users goes whooshing by both parties, apparently.

But they do have access to appropriate spaces. For their sex. Like every other person.

Wouldn't surprise me if it was Jolyon himself starting these threads in an attempt to hone his argument.

Hence all the questions about 'reasonable solutions', etc.

I can’t imagine Jolyon being successful in honing anything other than than GLP’s bank accounts. If he spent time on here arguing his point he might realise why he keeps losing, but I imagine his ego would think he was still winning the debate.

It’s interesting, how some of the prominent legal voices seem so rubbish at winning cases or making coherent arguments. Strangio, RMW, Maugham…are they bad lawyers/solicitors barristers or is the material they have to work with just so poor, and they’re happy to look like losers?

That is just a feeling though and is about comfort rather than safety. You only have to look at the prison statistics to see it plain as day. 62% of the 245 trans identifying male prisoners are sex offenders. 62%!! In contrast, less than 10% of the 50 trans identifying female prisoners are sex offenders. The numbers are so small (5 or fewer) that they cannot give an accurate figure without potentially compromising the privacy of the individual(s) in question.

Trans identifying women in female spaces are not the dangerous gotcha that they are sometimes presented as. Yes sometimes their appearance will be so masculine as to render their being there impossible (refuges, trauma support groups), but for day to day scenarios, yes, they probably will make some women uncomfortable but that's not reason to exclude them.

The right to feel comfortable isn’t enshrined. In law I don’t think. Being a member of this gym isn’t a human need so they just go to another gym. One with the hell that is a changing village where everyone feels uncomfortable.

it’s part of being a woman i would suggest , feeling uncomfortable with men so it’s very accurately representing what women feel like. That must be a good thing?

It’s all down to how the gym was designed. My VA has a family changing zone also leading to the pool which is now labelled as “inclusive” with a wheelchair sign even though there are disabled changing facilities in both the men’s and women’s changing room (lockable room with shower toilet and space for changing).

I wondered this - there are no cubicles so no where for any privacy - at all.. some people wouldn’t like this.

The right to feel comfortable isn’t enshrined. In law I don’t think.

You are correct and it's worth reinforcing the point that while Virgin Active has a policty that everyone should feel comfortable, it's not practical for every customer to be made to feel that way.

Questions of harassment, for example, are raised in the letter before action that the GLP has published, and they gloss over the fact that for treatiment of someone to be harassment it has to be reasonable for the complainant to have perceived the treatment that way. I think there's a strong argument that where someone is treated a particular way in order to avoid breaking a law it must de facto be unreasonable for them to perceive it as harassment.

The GRA was created to serve certain purposes at a different time. Before gay marriage equality and before the adevnt of 'gender identity' such as we now know it. Repealing it and replacing it with something more appropriate would create gretaer clarity for everyone and would also iron out inconsistencies in its application alongside other protected characteristics.

Because they are men and women don’t want them in their changing room.

Society cannot create spaces for every single personal preference. When discrete facilities are required that tends to be on the basis of an obvious and identifiable characteristic, such as 'Sex' or 'Disability'. Toilet facilities, changing rooms and sporting categories are not predicated on personal identity or feelings about the self.

What you are calling 'gender neutral' is actually a mixed sex/unisex facility that anyone can use. And as you imply unisex facilities already do exist is many places, Most often it is a single occupancy room.

Then he wont be getting much help from here as were telling them to use the facilities for their sex.
The fox killer just doesn't release quite how pissed off with his bullshit the general public are with the excesses of the trans community.

You know, I'm really uncomfortable (heh) with the idea that trans people must be made comfortable in any situation. Why should we? No other group is guaranteed to feel comfortable at all times, so why should trans people get special privileges on that basis? We're not royalty. We're people who made a choice, and that choice will sometimes have uncomfortable consequences. It's our responsibility to shoulder those consequences, not expect other people to do it for us while we, what, cry in a corner?

So I guess, basically, I'm uncomfortable with this infantilisation of trans people.

Unless you are a woman - but only if your TiF looks do not cause alarm - the SC covered this one and said that such TiF cannot use female facilities. But presume if they pass that well they will be fine going through the mens? And would want to?

Reddit's r/transgenderuk has been speculating that Jolly has advance notice of the EHRC guidance challenge decision and has won, hence this action.

You've made me wonder whether the first part is true, but 'oh look, a squirrel' is being deployed.