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Maya Forstater Profile picture
Maya Forstater
@MForstater
Sex Matters. Stand up for single sex services https://t.co/Y1x50j1cVc This is not a culture war
84 subscribers
Dec 3 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
The judgment in the case of Maria Kelly v Leonardo is out and it is awful.

As bad as James Tayler’s judgment in Forstater v CGDE in 2019 (and just as likely to be turned over on appeal).

gov.uk/employment-tri…Image The phrase “gender identity” appears 36 times in the judgment Image
Dec 1 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
I am hugely grateful to Naomi Cunningham for the work that she has done as the first chair of Sex Matters, and for her equally important role as a barrister representing claimants using the law to fight for justice.

I wish her all the best in her future endeavours. There is not enough of Naomi to go around... ❤️ Image
Nov 15 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
Melanie Field reading list.

Field worked at the Government Equality Office when the Equality Act was being drafted, and then at the EHRC during the Stonewall years.

(Pictured here soon after leaving the job with Robin White, Stephen Whittle and Nancy Kelley) Image The day of the Supreme Court's judgment was "long and difficult" for Field who had long promoted a different view of the Equality Act.

Field's big theory is that the the Supreme Court's decision was driven by the problem of pregnant transmen with GRCs... Image
Nov 14 • 16 tweets • 6 min read
The arguments made on behalf of the Women and Equalities Minister yesterday were a desperate attempt to shoehorn "case-by-case" back into the single sex services following the Supreme Court judgment.

sex-matters.org/posts/publicat… At paragraph 36 she says there are there are no equivalent exceptions to the single sex service exceptions that apply to employers.

She seems to have forgotten the provisions about protection of women in Schedule 22! Image
Oct 31 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
The man in the middle here is Ollie Entwistle, OBE Deputy Director, LGBT+ Policy and Operations at the Office for Equality and Opportunity Ollie was Chair of the Civil Service Rainbow Alliance for 9 years from 2008 -2017, then held a number of roles in the GEO.

So all the time that the government was getting the law wrong and getting Stonewall prizes for he was leading this. Image
Jul 22 • 15 tweets • 4 min read
Peter Wilkins case exposes another public body (this one part of @DefenceHQ) that lost sight of the Equality Act and of civil service principles of impartiality and objectivity.

One colleague accused him of making a "threatening" FOI request when he tried to draw attention to @dstlmod 's Line Manager’s Guide.

The FOI was turned down but I tried again. At first DSTL said they couldn't find the document.

I said "have another look, its on your intranet" and they located it.

Then they thought long and hard about whether they could withhold it on security grounds.

Finally they decided they couldn't

whatdotheyknow.com/request/line_m…
Jul 22 • 24 tweets • 10 min read
Judgment in the case of Peter Wilkins v @dstlmod finally published.

It is quite a read.
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/687e55f1…Image DSTL run the MOD research centre at Porton Down.

Lynn O'Donnell had writen a document entitled Line Managers Guide to supporting LGBT+ Identifying staff.

It included the old Stonewall definition of transphobia (which has now been withdrawn). Image
Image
Jul 11 • 16 tweets • 7 min read
The High Court has granted an anonymity order in relation to three individual "trans and intersex" claimants in the Good Law Project's case against EHRC for its interim update.

judiciary.uk/judgments/good…Image Any information possibly identifying the claimants has been withheld from the public domain. Image
Jul 5 • 10 tweets • 4 min read
Stonewall has had another rebrand.

Gone is the shortlived EHRC teal and Pepto-Bismol pink theme and in comes a "going back to our roots" and grown up purple... Image
Image
Image The old flag is flying prominently Image
Jul 3 • 30 tweets • 12 min read
The nomination of Mary-Ann Stephenson as new chair of the EHRC brought the witch hunters out.

Stephenson has a PhD in equality law. She is Director of the Women’s Budget Group, and has been director of the Fawcett Society, chair of the Early Education and Childcare Coalition and a board member of Coventry Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre.Image A bunch of charity CEOs (some of whom are part of "Equally Ours" with her) wrote a letter saying darkly she "previously supported views seen at odds with inclusivity for all" Image
Jun 3 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
In the case of Peter Wilkins v @dstlmod there is a bit about a "threatening FOI" Image Wilkins had requested disclosure of DSTL's strategy on gender identity and gender expression.

The request was refused because it was anonymous. Image
May 16 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
Just taking a look back at what Amnesty International said very confidently to the Gender Recognition Act reform consultation in 2018 (they were advocating for removing all safeguards and controls from getting a GRC)

Giving out more GRCs will not affect anyone else they said. Image It would have no effect on the operation of the single and separate sex exceptions in the Equality Act. Image
May 16 • 13 tweets • 6 min read
There has been much sound and fury about the Supreme Court judgment and claims that it is very *difficult* to tell who should use which toilets.

Remember: this has always been the law. Back in 2003 a group of transexual men sued a pub after it asked them not to use the ladies.

They were backed by the Equal Opportunities Commission.

They lost.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/n…Image
May 11 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
This, by one of the Darlington nurses is heartbreaking (CW: CSA)

Women should not have to tell these stories to get the basic dignity that is their right under workplace health and safety law.

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1… This is what we mean when we say sex matters. It is what the Supreme Court meant when they said you have to be clear about what the different groups are.

It's not a legal nicety. It's not complex. It's not difficult.

It's just basic respect for women's humanity, with common sense.Image
May 7 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
Minister @RhonddaBryant says “We are opposing the amendment and are not intending to introduce similar legislation.”

Let’s look at the knots he ties himself in

He says “data accuracy is important. That is equally true for any data used in a digital verification service.”

OK so your new law will enable people to prove their sex accurately then? 🤔 Bryant says “the government is already developing data standards on the monitoring of diversity information, including sex, via the Data Standards Authority.”

This is distraction.

Monitoring diversity information (which is about populations) is not the only reason why you want sex data.
Some times people want to make sure their sex is accurately recorded:

- For their own healthcare
- For social care
- For a job where sex matters
- For sport
- For safeguarding
- For use of single sex services
May 4 • 31 tweets • 8 min read
A 🧵about signs.

What do I mean by this sign excludes all men?

I mean the sign itself is discriminatory. Image It says women only, which means no men.
It is lawful because the situation meets one or more of the “gateway conditions” for a lawful single sex service in the EqA, and it is a proportionate means to a legitimate aim.
May 1 • 21 tweets • 4 min read
Here we are at @LSELaw for a legal panel discussion on the FWS case. Video will be available later. Image Naomi Cunningham says the ruling changes very little .. and it changes everything. Image
Apr 28 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Wow...

So the lineage of that policy that Sussex University has just been fined £0.5m for goes back via Advance HE and the Equality Challenge Unit to the SWP! 🤯 The Sussex policy comes almost word for word from the ECU policy which is based on the Association of Colleges Policy 2005 Image
Apr 18 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
I have seen quite a lot of this question going around.

Its called the "transman gotcha" and it is addressed in the Supreme Court judgment. Image It goes like this: If you exclude "trans women" from women's spaces then you must include burly, bearded "trans men" Image
Apr 15 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
There will be much talk of the single-sex exceptions in the Equality Act over the next few days.
These are the exceptions that allow service providers to offer services that are only open to one sex or the other (found at Schedule 3 Part 7 of the Act). (1/7) Image Without these provisions service providers would be committing sex discrimination by excluding men or women.
Service providers don’t need to “use these exceptions” to exclude people, they just provide the service in the normal way. If they were to get sued they (or a lawyer) can point to the exceptions to show the service is lawful. (2/7)
Apr 7 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Stonewall publishes a story about asexual "conversion therapy" to support its campaign for a new criminal law.

It is distinctly odd. Image Elizabeth gets married then tells her husband she isn't sexually attracted to him and doesn't want to have sex with him (or anyone else).

What was she doing getting married? 🤷‍♀️ Image