Campaigners lodge legal action over gender rules for schools and prisons
Guidance for single-sex toilets in schools states young people "where possible" should be able to "use the facilities they feel most comfortable with".In prisons, current guidelines allow for a transgender woman to be admitted into the women's estate if the person does not meet the violence against women and girls criteria and there is no basis to "suppose" they pose an "unacceptable risk of harm" to those housed in the women's estate.
However, For Women Scotland allege those policies are "inconsistent" with the Supreme Court judgement and remain "stubbornly in place".It has raised an ordinary action for reduction - quashing - of the policies relating to schools and prisons, first reported by The Sunday Times.In a statement, the group claimed the rules remaining in place were to the "detriment of vulnerable women and girls".It said the Scottish government had 21 days to respond to the action."We are asking the court to issue a declarator that the school guidance and the prison guidance are unlawful and that they be reduced in whole," it said."We are also asking that both policies are suspended in the meantime."A Scottish government spokesperson said: "It would be inappropriate to comment on live court proceedings."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The National
an hour ago
- The National
MoD slammed after ministers not told about US troops on Scottish soil
Last year, it emerged that a new base in Lossiemouth, in Moray, would host American Poseidon P8 anti-submarine spy and war planes. When the site opened in May 2024, it became the first time the US military had a presence in Scotland since the end of the Cold War. The Scottish Greens raised concerns that the move signalled the UK Government forging 'closer military relations' with Donald Trump while he is cosying up to Russian president Vladimir Putin. Stop the War said that the decision to allow US troops to be stationed in Scotland without consulting Holyrood should be 'condemned'. READ MORE: Police Scotland 'breaching human rights to subdue Palestine protests' The National lodged a Freedom of Information (FOI) request with the Scottish Government for any correspondence from the MoD regarding the decision to allow US troops to have a presence in Scotland. 'The Scottish Government does not hold the information you have requested, as matters relating to Defence are reserved to the UK Government,' the response from an official in the Veteran's Unit said. 'As a result, this information is not shared with the Scottish Government. As such, I hereby provide you with formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.' The MoD previously refuted any suggestion there was a US military base in Scotland, following an investigation by the Ferret. Instead they insisted it was a US 'presence' with a 'US naval detachment' at Lossiemouth. The US navy helped to fund the construction of the new facility where its war planes will be housed, and are set to work alongside UK aircraft. Arianne Burgess, the Scottish Greens MSP who represents the area covering Lossiemouth, said: "A lot of local people will be shocked by these revelations and with the lack of any announcement or basic information. (Image: AP) "The last thing we should be doing is forging even closer military relations with Donald Trump, especially at a time when he is cozying up to Putin and arming genocide against the people of Gaza. "It's time for the Ministry of Defence to level with people and come clean about its arrangements. "With Keir Starmer seemingly joined at the hip with the White House it's more important than ever that Scotland forges its own foreign policy based on human rights, peace and a rejection of the values of Donald Trump." A spokesperson for Stop the War said that there should be 'no US troops or weapons on UK soil'. 'They do not make us any safer from the threats that the warmonger politicians are so enthusiastic about talking up in order to justify increases in defence spending while cutting welfare and hitting the most vulnerable in society the hardest,' they added. READ MORE: SNP councillor hits back at 'lie' he defected to Reform UK 'That the MoD has stationed US troops at RAF Lossiemouth without consultation with Holyrood is of course to be condemned, but comes as no surprise given the Westminster government also allowed US nuclear weapons to be placed at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk without any transparency or debate in Parliament." A spokesperson for the MoD said: "The United States is the UK's closest defence and security partner. As NATO allies, we regularly conduct exercises and operations together to support European and global security. "Defence supports hundreds of thousands of high-skilled jobs across the UK, including over 26,000 in Scotland." US troops had been based in Scotland since the 1960s, including nuclear armed submarines at Holy Loch on the Clyde. After the Cold War ended in 1991, US forces left Holy Loch in 1992. They then left Machranish on the Mull of Kintyre, where nuclear mines were housed, in 1995, and Edzell in Aberdeenshire, a signals intelligence network, in 1997. It comes amid concerns that Trump is in favour of a Russian land grab to end the war in Ukraine, following a meeting with Putin in Alaska. Following the summit, the US President suggested he wants to move straight to a full peace deal, rather than negotiating a ceasefire first. The shift in Trump's position appears to echo the Russians' refusal to agree to a ceasefire before engaging in peace talks. Ukrainian president Vlodymyr Zelenskyy is set to visit the US on Monday, and is set to take UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and top European leaders with him to DC for crunch talks with the US President.
Daily Record
an hour ago
- Daily Record
Scots MP blasts Nicola Sturgeon for refusing to say she was wrong on gender reform in book
Joani Reid said the former first minister's "deranged gender reform bill... would have endangered thousands of women." A Scottish Labour MP has blasted Nicola Sturgeon for failing to "admit she was wrong" about gender reform in her book. Joani Reid said the former first minister's "deranged gender reform bill... would have endangered thousands of women." She also blasted Sturgeon's memoir - which was released last week - as "self-serving" with "all the same narcissistic traits, arrogance and moral superiority we saw from her in government." East Kilbride and Strathaven MP Reid told the Record: "It's hard to think of a fall from grace so spectacular - Nicola Sturgeon was once hailed across the UK, including by people who should have known better, as some sort of progressive beacon. It all went to her head and she got drunk on her own hype. "Her deranged 'gender reform' bill would have allowed creepy men pretending to be women access to our toilets and female-only spaces. She ignored legal and expert warnings and anyone raising common sense safety issues was branded as bigots. "It was a crazy plan that would have endangered thousands of women. Fortunately, it was outside the powers of the Scottish Government, but they spent a fortune getting humiliated in the Supreme Court and yet she still can't admit she was wrong. "This self-serving, self-regarding memoir is full of petty score-settling and reveals all the same narcissistic traits, arrogance and moral superiority we saw from her in government. "Scotland needed a leader who would protect our rights, not sacrifice them on the altar of political vanity. Beyond the gimmicks and woke virtue signalling, she achieved little of substance during her eight years at the helm, and it all caught up with her in the end." Sturgeon's memoir, Frankly, was officially released on Thursday. Copies of it were on sale in Waterstones shops earlier in the week. In it, she accused JK Rowling of helping create a a "toxic" climate around Scotland's gender reform debate. The MSP said the Harry Potter author's decision to wear a T-shirt branding her a 'destroyer of women's rights' marked the point at which "rational debate" on the issue became "impossible" and "any hope of finding common ground disappeared". Sturgeon's Government passed a bill which would have made it possible for trans people to change gender without a medical diagnosis. But the bill was stopped from becoming law by Tory Scotland Secretary Alister Jack, who said it breached UK Equalities law. At the same time, there was public outrage after convicted double rapist Isla Bryson - who identified as female - was initially sent to a women's prison. Sturgeon then refused to say if Bryson was a man or woman, but said last week that male rapists should "probably" lose the right to choose their gender. Earlier this year there was a landmark ruling where the Supreme Court said that the words 'woman' and 'sex' in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex. The SNP was approached for comment.
The Independent
6 hours ago
- The Independent
Rachel Reeves to take aim at environmental protections in bid to speed up infrastructure projects, say reports
Rachel Reeves is preparing to strip back environmental protections in an attempt to accelerate infrastructure building and boost the economy, according to reports. The chancellor is considering major reforms that would make it more difficult for wildlife concerns to hold up developments, according to The Times. Treasury officials are said to be drafting another planning reform bill, the publication reported. The move reportedly involves tearing up parts of European environmental rules, which developers have argued slow down crucial projects. While Labour ministers have previously insisted their current planning overhaul would balance growth with nature, Ms Reeves is understood to believe that the government must go further. The Planning and Infrastructure Bill going through Parliament overrides existing habitat and nature protections, which, if passed, would allow developers to make general environmental improvements and pay into a nature restoration fund that improves habitats on other sites. But Ms Reeves is considering more contentious reforms that are likely to trigger further backlash from environmental groups, according to The Times. Among the changes under discussion are plans for a smaller, UK-only list of protected species, which would give less weight to wildlife considered rare across Europe but relatively common in Britain, The Times said. Ms Reeves is also reportedly considering abolishing the EU 'precautionary principle' that forces developers to prove projects will have no impact on protected natural sites. Instead, a new test would assess the risks and benefits of building. The chancellor is also exploring limits on legal challenges from environmental campaigners. Speaking to the House of Lords economic affairs committee last month, Ms Reeves said: 'The reason that HS2 is not coming to my city of Leeds anymore anytime soon, is because I'm afraid, as a country, we've cared more about the bats than we have about the commuter times for people in Leeds and West Yorkshire, and we've got to change that, 'Because I care more about a young family getting on the housing ladder than I do about protecting some snails, and I care more about my energy bills and my constituents than I do about the views of people from their windows.' High-profile examples of costly protections include the £100m Buckinghamshire 'bat tunnel' built to protect wildlife from HS2 trains and the so-called 'fish disco' at Hinkley Point C nuclear plant, which uses sound to deter fish from cooling system intakes. The existing Planning and Infrastructure Bill already proposes a 'nature restoration fund' under which developers could offset environmental damage by paying for conservation schemes elsewhere. But the bill has faced criticism from both environmental groups and developers, who fear it will fail to speed up construction. Paul Miner of the countryside charity CPRE told The Times that targeting habitats regulations would 'take us backwards rather than forwards on nature recovery'.
