Thread by @Nancy_M_K

The idea that the Scottish Gender Recognition Reform Bill was ‘rushed through’ is complete nonsense. Here, in excruciating detail is *why* it is nonsense, and why this is something no serious person should be saying: 🧵

https://twitter.com/stonewalluk/status/1612820460403818500

Consultation 1 on #GRRBill ran from 9 November 2017 to 1 March 2017. There were 15,697 responses. 60% of respondents supported proposals to introduce a self-declaration system for legal gender recognition.

Consultation 2 was on a draft #GRRBill. This ran from 17 December 2019 to 17 March 2020. 17,058 people responded. The majority of respondents were in favour of the draft bill.

The Scottish Parliament Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee ran a call for views between 21 March and 16 May 2022. As part of this, the public was able to respond to a short survey and/or share detailed views. Over 10,000 individual responses were submitted.

The EHRCJ heard 8 weeks of evidence - 17th May and 27th June. They heard from those for and opposed to the proposals including human rights, women’s, and children and young people’s orgs as well as academics and lawyers. Rough estimate: about 28 hours of evidence to Committee.

The EHRCJ Committee published its Stage One report 6th October 2022. The Committee by a majority of 5 to 2 recommended MSPs supported the proposals set out in the Draft Bill.

There were 11 hours of debate on the Bill at stage 2 as the Committee considered 155 amendments. This took place over two days: 15th and 22nd November.

The EHRCJ Committee met in a special session for over 3 hours on December 19 to hear evidence from the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls and the UN Independent Expert violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

There were 25 hours of debate over three days at Stage 3 where further amendments were voted upon. The final vote saw the #GRRBill pass VERY comfortably with 86 MSPs for, 39 against, 0 abstensions.

So in short –
•3 consultations and 43,025 responses
•67 hours of evidence/debate
•5 years and 2 months of thinking and talking about this policy.

This is one of the most consulted on bills in Scottish Government history. This is democracy and devolution in action. This is implementing a fundamental human right for trans people in Scotland. To consider triggering a constitutional crisis to block it is shocking.🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Whoops. Should, of course, be Nov 2017-March 2018!