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This June may be the most harried for the Supreme Court's justices in some time. On top of 30-odd rulings due by Independence Day, the court faces a steady stream of emergency pleas. Over 16 years, George W. Bush and Barack Obama filed a total of eight emergency applications in the Supreme Court. In the past 20 weeks, as many of his executive orders have been blocked by lower courts, Donald Trump has filed 18.
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The Independent
19 minutes ago
- The Independent
Liberty loses bid to bring legal action against equalities body
Human rights group Liberty has lost a bid to bring legal action against the equalities watchdog over its consultation in the wake of the Supreme Court's ruling on gender. The UK's highest court ruled in April that the words 'woman' and 'sex' in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex, after a challenge against the Scottish Government by campaign group For Women Scotland. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is consulting on proposed amendments to part of its guidance, after interim guidance was published last month related to trans people's use of certain spaces including toilets and participation in sports following the judgment. The commission increased the length of time for feedback from an original proposal of two weeks to six weeks, but campaign group Liberty said that it should be at least 12 weeks, claiming the current period would be 'wholly insufficient' and unlawful. Liberty made a bid to bring a legal challenge over the length of the consultation, but in a decision on Friday afternoon Mr Justice Swift said it was not arguable. In his ruling, Mr Justice Swift said: 'There is no 12-week rule. The requirements of fairness are measured in specifics and context is important.' 'I am not satisfied that it is arguable that the six-week consultation period that the EHRC has chosen to use is unfair,' he added. At the hearing on Friday, Sarah Hannett KC, for Liberty, said in written submissions that the Supreme Court's decision 'has altered the landscape radically and suddenly' and potentially changes the way trans people access single-sex spaces and services. The barrister said this included some businesses preventing trans women from using female toilets and trans men from using male toilets, as well as British Transport Police updating its policy on strip searches, which have caused 'understandable distress to trans people'. Ms Hannett said a six-week consultation period would be unlawful because the EHRC has not given 'sufficient time' for consultees to give 'intelligent consideration and an intelligent response'. She told the London court: 'There is a desire amongst the bigger trans organisations to assist the smaller trans organisations in responding… That is something that is going to take some time.' Later in her written submissions, the barrister described the trans community as 'particularly vulnerable and currently subject to intense scrutiny and frequent harassment'. Ms Hannett added: 'There is evidence of distrust of both consultation processes and the commission within the community.' Lawyers for the EHRC said the legal challenge should not go ahead and that six weeks was 'adequate'. James Goudie KC, for the commission, told the hearing there is 'no magic at all in 12 weeks'. He said in written submissions: 'Guidance consistent with the Supreme Court's decision has become urgently needed. The law as declared by the Supreme Court is not to come in at some future point. 'It applies now, and has been applying for some time.' The barrister later said that misinformation had been spreading about the judgment, adding that it was 'stoking what was already an often heated and divisive debate about gender in society'. He continued: 'The longer it takes for EHRC to issue final guidance in the form of the code, the greater the opportunity for misinformation and disinformation to take hold, to the detriment of persons with different protected characteristics.' Mr Goudie also said that there was a previous 12-week consultation on the guidance at large starting in October 2024. Following the ruling, EHRC chairwoman Baroness Kishwer Falkner said the commission's approach 'has been fair and appropriate throughout'. She continued: 'Our six-week consultation period represents a balance between gathering comprehensive stakeholder input and addressing the urgent need for clarity. We're particularly encouraged by the thousands of consultation responses already received and look forward to further meaningful engagement through the rest of the process. 'The current climate of legal uncertainty and widespread misinformation serves nobody – particularly those with protected characteristics who rightly expect clarity about their rights. A swift resolution to this uncertainty will benefit everyone, including trans people.'
Powys County Times
an hour ago
- Powys County Times
US Supreme Court asked to pause order reinstating Education Department staff
The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to pause a court order to reinstate Education Department employees who were fired in mass lay-offs as part of President Donald Trump's plan to dismantle the agency. The Justice Department's emergency appeal to the high court on Friday said US District Judge Myong Joun in Boston exceeded his authority last month when he issued a preliminary injunction reversing the lay-offs of nearly 1,400 people and putting the broader plan on hold. Mr Joun's order has blocked one of Mr Trump's biggest campaign promises and effectively stalled the effort to wind down the department. A federal appeals court refused to put the order on hold while the administration appealed. The judge wrote that the lay-offs 'will likely cripple the department'. But Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote on Friday that Mr Joun was substituting his policy preferences for those of the Trump administration. The lay-offs help put in place the 'policy of streamlining the department and eliminating discretionary functions that, in the administration's view, are better left to the states', Mr Sauer wrote. He also pointed out that the Supreme Court in April voted 5-4 to block Mr Joun's earlier order seeking to keep in place Education Department teacher-training grants. The current case involves two consolidated lawsuits that said Mr Trump's plan amounted to an illegal closure of the Education Department. One suit was filed by the Somerville and Easthampton school districts in Massachusetts along with the American Federation of Teachers and other education groups. The other suit was filed by a coalition of 21 Democratic attorneys general. The suits argued that the lay-offs left the department unable to carry out responsibilities required by Congress, including duties to support special education, distribute financial aid and enforce civil rights laws. Mr Trump has made it a priority to shut down the Education Department, though he has acknowledged that only Congress has the authority to do that. In the meantime, Mr Trump issued a March order directing Education Secretary Linda McMahon to wind it down 'to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law'. Mr Trump later said the department's functions will be parcelled to other agencies, suggesting federal student loans should be managed by the Small Business Administration and programmes involving students with disabilities would be absorbed by the Department of Health and Human Services. Those changes have not yet happened. The president argues that the Education Department has been overtaken by liberals and has failed to spur improvements to the nation's lagging academic scores. He has promised to 'return education to the states'. Opponents note that K-12 education is already mostly overseen by states and cities. Democrats have blasted the Trump administration's Education Department budget, which seeks a 15% budget cut including a 4.5 billion dollar cut in K-12 funding as part of the agency's downsizing.
The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
A novel idea for men's emotional growth
Sarah Moss's contribution to your debate ('Men need liberation too': do we need more male novelists?, 31 May) strikes at the heart of the matter: the issue is not whether men are being published, but whether they are reading – and being supported to develop emotional lives that fiction can help foster. As a researcher on men's health behaviours, I see growing evidence that restrictive models of masculinity – stoicism, self-reliance, emotional detachment – are linked to poorer mental and physical health outcomes. Literature offers an antidote: access to emotional nuance, empathy and self-reflection. But boys are rarely encouraged to see reading in this way. As a teenager, I rarely discussed books with male friends, even though I secretly read them. One long summer I immersed myself in Madame Bovary, Anna Karenina and Effi Briest. These novels (by male authors) opened up inner worlds I hadn't been taught to name. That emotional expansion is a gift literature offers – one that boys in particular are too often denied. If we want to steer young men away from isolation or online extremism, we need more men to speak publicly about the books that moved them – and to reach out, to each other and to their sons. Dear men, when was the last time you read something to another man? Role models like Barack Obama and Bill Gates have shown the power of reading, but we need them to champion fiction too. And we must protect public and school libraries. The National Literacy Trust reports that children born into communities with the most serious literacy challenges have some of the lowest life expectancies in England. Those who enjoy reading are also happier with their lives. If men's reading is in crisis, the solution won't come from publishing alone. It must be cultural – and StraubPhD candidate, University of Oxford Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
