Under the Equality Act 2006, if the minister does not approve draft guidance, she must provide the EHRC with reasons for rejecting the draft code of practise. Those reasons can be judicially reviewed for error of law, among other things.

https://twitter.com/akuareindorf/status/1984024920603652592

This means that the Secretary of State is required, without unreasonable delay, to decide whether or not to reject the draft code and to provide reasons for a rejection. I do not think it would be lawful to refuse to make that decision while waiting for a RIA.

A point to note about the evidence today in Peggie v NHS Fife: Jane Russell KC was the first to suggest that the expert evidence on Dr Upton’s phone notes suggests that Upton has lied about the contemporaneousness of the notes. And she did it twice. First, when she suggested that the expert was paid by Sandie Peggies legal team to come up with a report to say that Upton was lying - at which point Charlotte Elves asked her to clarify if she was accusing her opponents of professional misconduct and she apologised and withdrew.

When the Supreme Court hands down a judgment it states the law as it is and has always been. There is nothing to rush. If, following this decision, an organisation has unlawful policies, it is no defence to say “oh but we didn’t want to be hasty”.

heraldscotland.com/politics/viewp… If you are responsible for a large employer or service provider, seek legal advice about the lawfulness of your policies following For Women Scotland. If you can’t afford that, please read this excellent explainer by Ben Cooper KC:

oldsquare.co.uk/wp-content/upl…

Important point re: last week's Supreme Court decision on the meaning of sex in equality law. Several outlets are saying ‘The Court ruled that trans women with a GRC can be excluded from single-sex spaces if it is proportionate to do so’. This is not accurate. The above statement implies that the legal default is that single-sex services must include members of the opposite sex with GRCs unless on a case-by-case basis it is proportionate to exclude that individual. This is not correct.

Expected to be back soon, all parties in the room again. Not sure if I should be starting new threads but hopefully people can follow. J just before we continue - remote access system is at risk of crashing due to high numbers. Been told that access will be restricted to media and Tribunal Tweets so they can report on proceedings.

We're back in - I'm not sure whether @tribunaltweets have full access so I'll try to continue with notes for now. @tribunaltweets J: how are we for time
NC unlikely to finish xx today.
J how long anticioation
NC afraid going over a day
J we had 3 hour estimate
NC quite a lot has changed since then. Best guess is mid-morning tomorrow to finish

I'm going to try to do a contemporaneous log of cross-examination of Dr Upton but I am not skilled at this, expect innacuracies and delay - apologies. NC on resus incident, you give broad date range
DU yes
NC When you say between Oct and 18 Dec how do you place it?
DU bc my last recorded incidents

Jane Russell in Peggie v NHS referring to the EHCR code of practice for public services rather than that for Employment. Relevant given the 1992 Workplace Regulations don't refer to public services they states that separate changing facilities must be provided for men and women. Russell arguing that a male nurse required to share a chaining room with a trans man would be treated the same.

I feel bad for the people who made life choices based on misrepresentation of the law. If you’ve been told by lobby groups that you have a legal right to use single sex services based on self-ID, finding out the law says the opposite is hurtful. But it’s still the law.

https://twitter.com/claire54783043/status/1853930565273071990

It’s been the law for 30 years, from the moment gender reassignment discrimination arose, that the comparator test requires a court to consider biological sex. It was the case in Croft v Royal Mail when the Court of Appeal held that being trans does not give you that right:

Prof Whittle has blocked me so this thread (including the tagging of my employer with an encouragement for HR to investigate me) was hidden from me until
It was drawn to my attention. These attacks on my employment are disgraceful. University security needed to be informed.

I’m going to set things out in this thread to be as clear as I can about how irresponsible this behaviour has been. It started with this exchange. Someone gender critical asked me what the legal basis of excluding someone from a female-only service would be. I gave the law.

There are three characteristics that someone with a non-binary identity might be covered under the Equality Act: gender reassignment, philosophical belief, and disability.

https://twitter.com/profalices/status/1842476770622165486

To be covered under gender reassignment, you must have made a settled decision to undergo a process or part of a process of reassigning sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex. If you’ve done that and also have a non-binary identity you will likely be covered.

This is a crushing defeat for TransActual and the Good Law Project.

The Court upholds the standard principles of judicial review that GLP should know - the role of the court is not to make these decisions itself but to assess the lawfulness of it.

The Court was clear that any attempt to smear the Cass Review was unfounded and the Secretary of State is perfectly entitled, not just to rely on it, but to treat it as the best available evidence.

Gender recognition and gender reassignment are different legal terms with very different legal significance. A short 🧵 Gender reassignment came first. It is a ground of unlawful discrimination (protected characteristic in its current form under the Equality Act). It was initially introduced under EU law in the 90s as a part of discrimination law and has nothing to do with gender recognition.

In light of the Labour announcement on proposed reform of the Gender Recognition Act 2004, here is an overview and some background. The default position in UK law is that an individual's sex is determined biologically, "fixed at birth, at the latest" (Corbett v Corbett). This is not modified by identity claims, changes in appearance or medical intervention. None of this would change sex in law.

This is funny but its also either ignorant or bad faith. I write long threads to explain equality law on a very contested topic where people regularly run their mouth with next to no knowledge but just enough confidence to mislead people.

https://twitter.com/lousadzak/status/1779409030177251573

Take Mallory here who has the brass neck to opine that the considered opinion of Karon Monaghan KC, author of the leading practitioner text on the Equality Act is so bad that she needs someone from professional standards look at it:

https://x.com/Chican3ry/status/1779400346114121736

Some academic lawyers are very frustrated that some people are misunderstanding the letter of the law in the Hate Crime Act, eg believing that misgendering is now a crime, but who are not engaging with where that misinformation is coming from: the Scottish government & Police. On the government front we’ve seen a campaign focusing on hurt feelings and a government minister saying that whether misgendering is a crime is a matter for the police to decide (from 2.19 in: )bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0…

A thread on Lister v New College Swindon which was decided by the Employment Tribunal this week. The case deals with the use of preferred pronouns in a school setting.

The link to the judgment is here: judiciary.uk/wp-content/upl… New College Swindon is a further education college Mr Lister was employed by NCS as a lecturer. His employment contract required him to familiarise himself with NCS policies and procedures including safeguarding, staff conduct, disciplinary, and gender reassignment policies.

In January after a pile on against @RosieDuffield1, I explained the finding of a German court that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to show that trans people were targeted in the Holocaust. This led to a formal complaint to my employer that I was a holocaust denier.

https://twitter.com/michaelpforan/status/1743237231496605782

The complaint went nowhere because it was clear on any objective reading that I was describing the judgment and had sufficiently caveated that I’m not a native German speaker (the translation was later confirmed by German speakers).

A 🧵on the law to explain why these claims that @jk_rowling has committed a crime are baseless. The Equality Act doesn't regulate private relationships. It deals with employment & the provision of goods/services. Rowling owes India no duties under the Act. No breach has occurred.

https://twitter.com/BylineTV/status/1765484416275472570

The same is true of the GRA: it does not regulate private relationships. It speaks to an individuals relationship with the state. It creates no duty on others to refer to someone with a GRC by their acquired gender. No 'breach' has occurred here either.

Neither I nor @ForWomenScot are “pushing” for sex to have both an ordinary and a technical meaning post GRA. We’re recognising the reality of it as a matter of doctrinal law and arguing that sex in the EA engages the exception to the GRA and so takes on an ordinary meaning.

https://twitter.com/alessandraaster/status/1765384412697354638

Denying the fact that s9(1) provided for an acquired gender which changes sex in law for some purposes will not stop it from being true. The question here that will be decided by the Supreme Court is whether that provision applies to the Equality Act.

A long 🧵on the meaning of sex in UK law and how this has changed over the last few decades. This draws on the caselaw that I rely on for my forthcoming paper in LQR on this topic: deliverypdf.ssrn.com/delivery.php?I… Sex once had one meaning, fixed to biological sex. References to male and female or man and woman reflected ordinary meaning without any technical legal construct, except one: where sex was indeterminate the most 'predominant' characteristics determined sex