Pushing back on EHRC guidance

Over twenty charities and service providers have written to the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) asking for an extension to the consultation on new guidance for service providers following the April Supreme Court decision. These include providers of services like homeless hostels, refuges, and healthcare facilities worried by EHRC indications that they have to detect and block trans women.

There now exists useful guidance from Transactual on replying to the consultation, an adapted version, and a response from a lawyer.

The new guidance is to replace the deeply flawed, and probably illegal, EHRC “interim update”. So far the majority of service providers continue to ignore that interim. But exceptions exist like Ironmonger Row Baths in Islington, where the contractor GLL has announced it will ban trans women from the women’s changing room. So far, a visit shows no evidence at the baths of ban enforcement, but local Labour members seeking clarification via councillors have received no response.

The “interim update” continues to leave uncertainty as to whether it is reasonable to use a trans person’s sex at birth to ban them from one set of facilities in one instance, and their gender presentation to ban them from others. The risk of trans people having no legal recourse to any suitable facilities like toilets and changing rooms remains real.

The Good Law Project has useful information on the current legal impact of the Supreme Court decision.

Liberty’s legal challenge for an extension on the consultation failed at the High Court. Current EHRC chair Kishwer Falkner (appointed by Liz Truss) has defended that decision.

The government’s preferred replacement for Falkner, Mary-Ann Stephenson, may be no step forward in terms of trans rights.

At least one board member of Sex Matters (one of the groups pushing for the Supreme Court ruling against the Scottish government) has celebrated her appointment and The Times suggesting she has sympathy with “gender-critical” organisation.

Pride in Labour has expressed concern at the preferred candidate.