Men in women’s toilets: yes or no?

Murdo Fraser sees lawsuits in the future.

The announcement last week from the author JK Rowling that she has established a women’s fund to support legal cases for women who wish to protect their sex-based rights should be causing sleepless nights for Scottish Government ministers, and for the finance directors of public bodies such as local authorities and NHS boards.

All these organisations are now at risk of litigation which could see extensive payouts of taxpayers’ cash to women whose rights have been denied. Rowling’s generosity is entirely in character with her robust stance in speaking up for women who have suffered discrimination because of their gender-critical views.

This latest initiative will mean that those, like NHS Fife nurse Sandie Peggie, who have lost out simply because they refused to quietly share spaces with biological men, will now be able to access funds to help them stand up to authorities who have endless sums of taxpayers’ money to defend legal cases.

All this just to get back to the normal state of things where men didn’t go into women’s toilets unless they felt like risking arrest.

One body which moved quickly, and appropriately, to ensure that the law was complied with was the Scottish Parliament itself. Earlier this month the Presiding Officer, Alison Johnstone MSP, set out an interim position in response to the court ruling, making it clear that toilets designated as male or female only are to be interpreted as meaning biological sex, whilst ensuring that there will be gender-neutral facilities available to everyone, including members of the trans community.

Why call them “members of the trans community”? Why not just “trans people”? Why do they get that extra bit of cuddling? He didn’t say “members of the male community” or “members of the female community” so why the trans one? Why do people keep on giving them extra hugs of this kind?

This ruling has now been challenged by some 17 MSPs from the SNP, Green, Liberal Democrat and Labour parties (no Scottish Conservatives were daft enough to sign up) in an open letter expressing “deep concern” about the decision, which they claim risks exposing trans and non-binary individuals to humiliation, harassment or worse.

What about the risks of exposing women to humiliation, harassment or worse? Why is that risk totally acceptable while the putative risk to men in skirts is not? Why are there still two sets of laws and norms and concerns, one for those tiresome people known as women and the other for members of the communniny communniny?

The letter has been written on the basis of legal advice from the ironically titled Good Law Project, headed up by the one-time fox-killer Jolyon Maugham KC, currently involved in an online spat with Rowling which might well end up with him being on the wrong end of a writ for defamation.

Far better lawyers than either I or the Good Law Project have been clear that the EHRC’s interim guidance accurately interprets the Supreme Court judgment, and it is disappointing to see this group of MSPs relying upon such poor-quality legal advice.

I would choose a stronger word than “disappointing.”