Dear EHRC,

My response to your consultation follows. It was written some months ago and, without doubt, remains unread by human eyes and folded (more likely discarded) into the bulk of critical responses that would have been negatively weighted to induce the EHRC's AI to smush the responses into one of overarching approval for the rules they want in place.

It was withheld due to my increasing reluctance to engage further with SubStack for reasons many and various. and also because I questioned my use of AI to support my writing. Now there an entire article in itself.

My submission as an article of record - now available for human eyes:

I am writing as a transgender woman and pensioner who is directly affected by the Supreme Court’s decision in For Women Scotland Ltd v Scottish Ministers (2024).

Although I do not hold a Gender Recognition Certificate, I live and am recognised socially and institutionally as a woman. The Court’s ruling creates conditions in which that status can be undermined by any organisation that wishes to treat trans women as men for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010. That outcome has significant consequences for my safety, my dignity, and my ability to participate in public life without fear or humiliation.

The judgment gives legal permission - without the need for specific justification - for organisations to override a trans woman’s affirmed gender in favour of a 'biological sex' framework. That sets a precedent where our identity, presentation, and day-to-day social role are made legally irrelevant, and where organisations hostile to trans inclusion can exclude or segregate us without proper scrutiny.

This is not an abstract or theoretical risk. It affects my access to services, to healthcare, to women’s spaces, and to protections under anti-discrimination law. In some cases, it allows the prejudices of individual institutions or providers to take priority over the realities of lived experience, effectively placing trans people outside the scope of meaningful legal protection.

I am particularly concerned that the Commission has, in recent years, adopted a framing that treats the existence of trans people as a policy tension to be 'balanced' rather than a group with rights to be upheld. The decision to support sex-based definitions that allow organisations to exclude trans women without clear criteria reflects this shift. It sends a message that the EHRC no longer considers the rights of transgender people to be integral to its mission.

I urge the Commission to reflect on the real-world harm that follows when abstract legal concepts are used to justify exclusion. Equality law should be a shield against prejudice, not a toolkit for reinforcing it. I ask that any guidance issued in response to the Supreme Court ruling include clear language to prevent discriminatory interpretations of the Equality Act and to reaffirm that trans people - whether or not we hold a GRC - have a right to live safely, access services, and be treated with dignity.

It's has taken some months for things to align but circumstances now allow me to be able to publish to my new Ghost platform independently; this site is built and paid for by me personally and I can take full advantage of this. There is no real need for subscribers and the pressures and obligations that would spring from that, so there's no pressure to be busy for their sake. Writing about what moves me.