.
@stonewalluk
's challenge to
@EHRC
's status as an A-rated National Human Rights Institution has been dismissed by the
@UN
@Ganhri1
.
We must move forward with mutual respect and work together to advance equality and human rights across our society.
Delighted with this vindication for my client
@JamesEsses
. It was a real pleasure to work with him and the legendary
@peter_daly
and others at
@Doyle_Clayton
to achieve this outstanding result (however much I was looking forward to the trial)
🚨Case Update: Settlement Reached🚨
Having been expelled from my Masters’ degree in Psychotherapy over 3 years ago, after speaking out about the impact of gender ideology on child safeguarding, I am extremely pleased to announce that I have agreed a settlement with the Metanoia
I’m surprised & shocked that
@bphillipsonMP
has announced that the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 won’t come into force on 1 August & may be repealed. The Act was not perfect, but it’s quite evident that free speech and academic freedom are in peril in universities
The
@EHRC
has retained it's A Status accreditation as a National Human Rights Institution following
@stonewalluk
's request to
@Ganhri1
for a special review of the Commission.
Fantastic work by colleagues defending the Commission.
Now we move on.
I am honoured and absolutely delighted to be appointed to this important role helping the
@EHRC
in its vital work as a strong and authoritative voice challenging unlawful discrimination, supporting those who need it most and holding organisations to account.
Akua Reindorf is a highly respected equality and discrimination legal expert. Her valuable experience will provide great insight in our work as the regulator of the Equality Act, so we can stand up for the rights of everyone in Great Britain.
New from
@EHRC
– our revised Equality Act guidance on the provision of separate and single-sex services, to help any organisation that provides services like toilets, changing rooms, refuges or hospital wards to understand the law and balance everybody’s rights.
#EHRCSSSG
We have published a new practical guide to the law for providers of single-sex spaces 📄
This will help service providers to make lawful decisions about any services they offer to women and men separately.
Read more:
Phoenix v Open University is a extraordinary judgment. Everyone in Higher Ed should take the time to read & absorb its 156 pages. Needless to say, people should also think carefully about the evidence they give in a court of law
#academicfreedom
#freespeech
#PhoenixRising
have received the Tribunal’s judgment in my case against the OU today: I won! The Tribunal found that I was discriminated against and harassed because of my gender critical beliefs, and that I was constructively dismissed.
We are delighted that the tribunal found in our favour and that Mermaids and the LGBT Consortium have failed in their bid to remove our charitable status.
#LGBAllianceWin
See our statement here:
I’m delighted to be appointed to KC. Big thanks to my clerks
@CloistersLaw
(best in the Temple), my brilliant loyal solicitors, the clients who’ve put their trust in me, the opponents & judges who’ve tested me & my friend and mentor Karon Monaghan
@k21fem
Thanks all!
#silk2022
📣 I’m honoured to have been invited to join
@LSElaw
as a Visiting Senior Fellow. I’ll be working with faculty and students on the law of academic freedom and freedom of speech in higher education. There was never a better time to do it.
@akuareindorf
appointed as Visiting Senior Fellow at
@LSELaw
. Cloisters’ Akua Reindorf KC takes up honorary 3yr appointment to work with world-leading academics and contribute to teaching and research in
#academicfreedom
and
#employmentlaw
. Read more 👉🏾
Looking forward to answering "If any man can be a woman, or any woman a man, what use is the Equality Act 2010 in preventing sex discrimination?" - & other topical sex & gender questions - at this
@women_outspoken
panel event with
@MForstater
,
@HJoyceGender
&
@JoPhoenix1
tonight
Please join us in Swansea on 1 July to hear
@JoPhoenix1
@MForstater
@HJoyceGender
@akuareindorf
discussion Sex, Discrimination and the Equality Act (and a lot of other stuff besides). Bring your own questions for the panel. Men welcome!
Widely predicted & legally entirely correct outcome. Really well reasoned judgment too. Helpful & necessary clarification that the threshold for whether a belief is “worthy of respect” is the ECHR Art 17 standard, ie a belief involving “a very grave violation of...
The Employment Appeal Tribunal handed down judgment today holding that gender critical beliefs including that sex is immutable are protected beliefs under the Equality Act 2010. Karon Monaghan QC (
@k21fem
) acted for the EHRC in this case.
Excellent summary of my talk on
#academicfreedom
at the
@lucaf_london
launch event last night.
And big shout out to the two kind security guards who smuggled me out of the back afterwards to avoid the small group of protesters who don't believe in academic freedom 🙏🏽
1/ Akua Reindorf KC delivered a superb lecture at LSE yesterday for the launch event of the London Universities' Council for Academic Freedom (LUCAF) which I am proud to be a founder member of. Thread below.
@lucaf_london
@akuareindorf
@LSELaw
This report is an interesting contribution to the debate on free speech in higher education. There’s quite a lot I disagree with – a few initial thoughts in 🧵⬇️. For more lively debate on this subject don’t forget to sign up for the
@officestudents
#OfSInsight
event next week!
🚨🚨
New Report: 'Universities Legal Obligations in the Context of Trans Inclusion, Trans Equality, and 'Gender Critical' Activities on Campus'
🚨🚨
Intended to be a balanced look at expression on campus, aimed at students and university staff 1/
Very chuffed with this (it's been a while since anyone described me as hot). Many thanks to
@TheLawyermag
! Some great names on the list including my extremely worthy colleague
@galbraithmarten
and one of my favourite solicitors
@peter_daly
.
Having started her career in publishing,
@CloistersLaw
's
@akuareindorf
came to law relatively late, but her impact has been huge in the high-profile arena of employment law.
#TheLawyerHot100
🔥
6a. §70 says that “people holding anti-trans opinions” are protected by law (if cogent). However it’s not “anti-trans” opinions that are protected – it’s gender critical beliefs, as defined in Forstater. This conflation of GC & ‘anti-trans’ is confusing and misleading.
3b. Neither of these definitions is helpful if the intention (as stated) is to tell people what their legal rights & responsibilities are. The definition of gender critical belief that has been found to be protected by law is clearly stated in Forstater v CGD:
2. The report says (p5) that the law protects employees from disciplinary action because of their opinions, but that this protection “does not apply to actions (manifestations of such beliefs)”. This is wrong. Art 9.2 ECHR expressly protects manifestation of belief:
💥 NEW: really important UN ruling that the criminalisation of lesbians & bisexual women breaches CEDAW - congrats to
@k21fem
on another step forward in the fight for liberation.
In a landmark decision released today, a UN women’s rights committee found that the criminalisation of consensual, same-sex intimacy between women is a human rights violation
@HumanDignityT
@k21fem
@intlawninja
@DLA_Piper
My article in the
@NewStatesman
on the possible repeal of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023 - academic freedom is worth having, and without enforceable legislation it's under threat
My article in
@timeshighered
on why the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act isn't a "hate spech charter"
Blocking Tories’ free speech law will not help to protect Jewish students
Cloisters Chambers (
@CloistersLaw
) is delighted to announce that we have been shortlisted in 2 categories at the Legal business awards 2023 (
@LegalBusinessUK
).
Read more here:
#LBAwards2023
5. §42 says that the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill will only safeguard the academic freedom of staff “within their field of expertise”. This is not the case – that phrase was removed from the Bill in Spring of this year. The premise of §43 is therefore wrong.
4. The report says (§31) that the effect of Art 14 ECHR is that free speech must not take a discriminatory form. I don’t understand this at all. Art 14 says that Convention rights must be *enjoyed* without discrimination, not that they must be *exercised* without discrimination.
Roll up! I'll be speaking at the
@AllianceLGB
conference in October on SEX, LIES AND VICTORIES - commenting on the recent extraordinary run of gender critical philosophical belief discrimination cases following
@MForstater
's landmark victory
7b. This is wrong. There’s no vicarious liability for 3rd party harassment. The only liability for the uni would be if its refusal to cancel the talk was *because of* the protected characteristic of the affected person(s). This would be a discrete act of direct discrimination.
9. Those are some of my preliminary thoughts. There’s a lot to be said on this subject, and a lot yet to be done to help higher ed institutions find the right balance. A very erudite analysis of the relevant law by
@jamesmurray88
can be found here:
Academic freedom and the Equality Act. TL;DR - unless the harassment is purposeful, it will be difficult to show that it is objectively reasonable for academic free expression to have the effect of unlawful harassment.
8. §96 suggests that harassment under the EqA is conduct which is done “because of” a protected characteristic. The statutory test is not “because of” – it is “related to”. This is a basic but important error.
We are very proud to announce our next open event, "Academic Freedom and the Law" featuring Akua Reindorf KC (speaker) and Joanna Cherry KC MP (discussant). Please join us on May 20th 2-4pm for what promises to be a fantastic, important discussion.
6b. Eg §§75-6 comments on EHRC guidance which says it is lawful to hold the view that transwomen with GRCs are still men. The report curiously extrapolates from that that the EHRC is saying that “all anti-trans speech is always, by definition, permitted under Article 10”.
3a. The report gives a definition of “gender critical” (fn3) taken from the OED, and comments that “in practice” the label is “used by people who campaign against the extension of legal right [sic] for trans people, or for the rolling back of existing legal rights”.
My thoughts on the report (first reading):
1. The report has a lot of useful and important information about the rights of protestors to freedom of expression. This is certainly an area that higher education institutions must pay attention to. However…
Thanks to everyone who came to my silk party last night! You all made it an amazing evening. Massive thanks to the team at
@WiltonMusicHall
, DJ Kemi and Ghanaian highlife band Boombaya. Brilliant all of you ❤️
7a. §74 says a uni can “adopt” – and thus be liable for – harassment by an external speaker if it refuses to cancel the speaker’s talk because of “a policy decision to always prioritise free expression over the demands of its trans & pro-trans [members]”.
Outstanding news. The minimum wage "au pair exemption" is a loophole for slavery, disproportionately affecting women from the global south. Govt promised to repeal it in March 2022. Looks like they've finally got round to it. Incredible, important work by Jamila
@ATLEUnit
🥳🥳🥳
Reg 57(3) NMWR 2015 -been a gateway to the exploitation of domestic workers will be repealed next April.
Down to the infatiguable work of Jamila Duncan-Bosu of
@ATLEUnit
instructing
@CloistersLaw
@akuareindorf
What employment lawyers do, matters.
📢 Major
@EHRC
investigation into suspicions that
@DWPgovuk
failed to make reasonable adjustments for benefits claimants with mental ill health / learning disabilities, after several coroners have linked DWP assessments to deaths by suicide / stress-related illness / starvation
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is investigating the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) over suspicions it broke the law in its treatment of disabled benefits claimants
...the rights of others, tantamount to the destruction of those rights” such as Nazism or totalitarianism (previously unclear in case law). Lots of other interesting bits to digest. Congrats to
@k21fem
, Ben Cooper QC,
@anyabike
and
@MccolganAileen
The “au pair exception” in the minimum wage regulations discriminated against disenfranchised and gravely exploited migrant women. It was a slavery loophole. I'm proud to have helped
@ATLEU
get it off the statute books. Good article in
@independent
but it deserves more coverage.
A really interesting evening debating diverse legal perspectives on the single sex services guidance. A thoughtful & lively discussion. Thanks to all who attended. We should do it again.
Latest episode of the top legal podcast featuring a fascinating interview with
@JoPhoenix1
by
@timowenqc
and
@KenMacdonaldKC
. Essential listening for anyone interested in academic freedom and the crisis in our universities
📖 New Episode 📖
Ep 50: Jo Phoenix - Gender and the Ducking Stool
Ken Macdonald and Tim Owen discuss cancellation and the politics of gender with criminologist Professor
@JoPhoenix1
Listen now 👉
Apple:
Spotify:
@Dunc_Disorderly
@EHRC
The starting point is that an occupational requirement to be a woman includes transgender women who have GRCs (as the law stands pending FWS in the SC). But by Sch 9 paras 1(1) & 1(3)(a) the employer can impose a further requirement "not to be a transsexual person", if justified.
Interesting & thought-provoking day at the AFAF conference yesterday. Particular highlight meeting
@omarloubak
who launched
#Speakeasy
, a forum where students get to discuss the things their debating societies won't touch. A vital
#freespeech
initiative for the higher ed sector
Happy birthday to my dear Dad – Joseph Daniel Reindorf, barrister at law, fan of whisky and solitaire – who would have been 100 today. God bless his soul (iyknk)
#Ghana
📢 Guidance from
@EHRC
on discriminatory adverts, explaining:
- who can be recruited to a sex-restricted job (under the Equality Act as currently interpreted)
- how private members' clubs can restrict membership by protected characteristic
and more...
Akua Reindorf KC (
@akuareindorf
) acts in historic win for LGB Alliance where the First Tier Tribunal ruled that Mermaids and the LGBT Consortium failed in their bid to remove their charitable status.
For further information please see below:
Congratulations
@akuareindorf
!!!!!!
Chambers would like to congratulate Akua who was awarded 'Employment Junior of the Year' at the Chambers and Partners awards ceremony last night.
#employmentlaw
1/ # EHRC SSS Guidance. Given the discussion that has followed the publication of the EHRC’s guidance on single sex spaces & services (SSS), I thought it would be helpful to set out what the Equality Act (EA) says.
Super proud of my children's other mother Isabelle Trowler 🥳CBE🥳 who's been given a well deserved New Year's honour for services to children's social care 👏👏👏
#NYHonours
We have been re-accredited as an ‘A status’ National Human Rights Institution, following a routine re-accreditation process with
@Ganhri1
.
We are delighted that our vital work in defending human rights has been recognised internationally again.
More:
📖 New Episode 📖
Sex, Lies & Women’s Rights
Ken Macdonald & Tim Owen discuss the Scottish Gender Bill & its impact on women’s rights with leading discrimination barrister Karon Monaghan KC.
Listen now 👉
Apple:
Spotify:
Interesting article but it raises some questions.
(1)There’s a line of case law incl Grainger which protects beliefs / expressions of beliefs – is this also wrong?
(2) What is “belief” *for* in Art 9 if it’s not different to “religion”?...
Is holding trans critical views the same as belief in God? Human rights have kept religion & belief separate from other rights. Believing in something doesn't necessarily give a right to belief. The two have now been conflated under the Equality Act. Chaos
Here’s a talk I gave on academic freedom at
@LSELaw
last November for the launch of the London Universities’ Council For Academic Freedom
@lucaf_london
last year, when the future looked a little different
@LSELaw
@lucaf_london
And here’s my recent article on the possible repeal of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023, published on
@bindelj
’s Substack
@JasonBraier
I don't really see the problem with this example, or why it would be affected by the decision in Forstater. It'll be a decision on the facts as to whether the manifestation of the belief amounted to harassment / discrim, not whether the belief itself is protected.
Don't know if this is the female or the male, but s/he rather spectacularly took off from the stone eagle representing John the Evangelist on top of St Botolph's yesterday evening
@camperegrines
After last week's chaos the govt needs to work hard to regain trust on COVID-19 racial disparity. First step: implement the PHE recommendations. Glad to have written this blog with
@MilsomChr
and
@declanod3
looking at govt's legal duties not to kick it into the long grass
Racial Equality and COVID-19: where now? Akua Reindorf, Declan O’Dempsey and Chris Milsom consider the legal consequences of the Public Health England Review.
#humanrights
#coronavirus
#raceequality
Thanks to
@ATLEUnit
the Employment Tribunal's decision in Puthenveettil v Thukalil has been upheld on appeal: the
#familyworkerexemption
in the Minimum Wage legislation indirectly discriminates against women.
Time to get rid of it, as promised. It's a loophole for slavery.
We urge
@biztradegovuk
and
@KemiBadenoch
to carry out their pledge and take steps for the immediate removal of the exemption. It remains a loophole for exploitation and
#slavery
.
The two remaining peregrine chicks getting quite bold on the ledge this evening. There were a couple of hairy moments but they managed to stay on their feet while mum looked on unperturbed
@camperegrines
@moira_robin
@nellstock
What I said was it is my understanding that we are reviewing the code of practice during the course of this year. I also said the guidance was urgent and the code of practice is a bigger job that will take longer. Needless to say we do not resile from the guidance.
Roll up! Big event for fans of
#academicfreedom
old & new. Official launch of
@lucaf_london
tomorrow at LSE.
For a taster here's founding member
@ianpacemain
on the ideas & events that led to the formation of the Council ➡️
Do come to the event ‘Academic Freedom and Freedom from Harassment in Universities’ tomorrow, Mon 20 Nov, 18:30, at LSE which is the official launch event for the London Universities’ Council for Academic Freedom. With
@akuareindorf
Really enjoyed recording this podcast with the legendary Ken Macdonald and
@timowenqc
on the Freedom of Speech (Higher Education) Act 2023 and associated issues
📖 New Episode 📖
Twisting the Law
Ken and Tim discuss intolerance, Stonewall and free speech in universities with employment lawyer and author of the Reindorf Report,
@AkuaReindorf
KC
Listen now 👉
Apple:
Spotify:
(3) The EAT in Forstater expressly sought to read s.10EqA compatibly with both Arts 9 & 10 so freedom of expression is covered. (4) The EAT in Forstater found that the Claimant was also protected by having the *absence* of the gender identity belief - is that also wrong?...
@Michael37615957
@MsGiveZeroFox
I'm afraid I simply don't understand your point. There are several explainers on Twitter relating to this case which you might find helpful. I'm going to leave the conversation here.
This interesting panel discussion about proposed legislation on
#freedomofspeech
in higher education has now been moved online (because of the transport strike). Next Wednesday at 6pm. Follow the link to sign up if you're interested
#COVID
finally got me 2yrs to the day after 1st lockdown. It’s hit me hard. They weren’t joking when they said I was clinically extremely vulnerable. But less than a day after +ve test a courier brought me absolutely miraculous antiviral meds. Just wanted to say
#thankyouNHS
@EHRCChair
@EHRC
Thank you
@EHRCChair
. I am honoured and delighted, and very much looking forward to working with you to continue the Commission's vital work.