Michael Foran
@michaelpforan
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Incoming Associate Professor of Law @OxfordLawFac & Tutorial Fellow @KebleOxford | Public Law, Equality & Jurisprudence | Sex, Gender Identity & the Law (2026)
Glasgow, Scotland
Joined April 2017
My book Sex, Gender Identity, and the Law will be published next year with Cambridge University Press. In advance of this, I've prepared a draft chapter on the criminal law regulating sexual activity induced by deceptions as to the defendant's sex. Link:
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A must-read piece from Ben Cooper KC on For Women Scotland v The Scottish Ministers:.
Characteristically impeccable, detailed analysis of the Supreme Court judgment in @ForWomenScot from the winning barrister Ben Cooper KC.
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RT @ChloeJSKennedy: The Legal Studies article Michael discusses is here and my book (the more recent and more expan….
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RT @Scott_Wortley: @AudreySuffolk @elniedunne @SVPhillimore @michaelpforan @QcWynter @Jebadoo2 my post here is a general consideration of i….
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When I finished this draft I sent emails to Chloë Kennedy and Alex Sharpe to ask them if I had misunderstood their work. Chloë and I have had a constructive discussion and the draft has been updated to better reflect her work. That is particularly important for this topic imo.
My book Sex, Gender Identity, and the Law will be published next year with Cambridge University Press. In advance of this, I've prepared a draft chapter on the criminal law regulating sexual activity induced by deceptions as to the defendant's sex. Link:
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RT @EHRC: We’ve now closed our consultation on updates to our Code of Practice. We received 25,825 responses. We’re grateful to all who sh….
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I set out some of that background in the context of trans inclusive services here: .
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Explaining how the law gets to this position is much more complex and involves highly specialist discrimination law expertise to engage with decades of case law on this issue which formed the background into which the Supreme Court judgment was introduced.
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The legal position can now be stated clearly: for the purposes of the Equality Act sex means biological sex, including for the operation of single-sex services. If you are not operating a single-sex service based on biological sex you are exposed to significant risk of liability.
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The ambiguity that the Supreme Court resolved was whether a GRC makes a difference for the purposes of the single-sex exceptions. Since most service providers were operating self-ID policies and not GRC-based policies, they were always acting unlawfully.
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It was never the case that people could use single-sex services based on self-ID (Croft v Royal Mail; Green v SoS for Justice; FWS 1; FWS 2 CSIH). The Supreme Court didn't introduce that as a new development, it merely confirmed it.
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It's also clear that most of the opposition to the judgment has nothing to do with what was decided and everything to do with that background legal context that the Supreme Court affirmed in its reasoning.
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Since the Supreme Court judgment we have seen politicians and advocacy groups present it as if the EHRC is introducing new legal rules which go beyond the judgment. This is incorrect. Once the judgment is placed within is full legal context that is clear.
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Today is the last day to respond to the EHRC consultation on its Code of Practice following FWS. This is important because it explains the law to service providers who can't afford specialist legal advice, but it's important to be clear that the Code is not making new law.
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RT @NewsLetter_Pols: Further uncertainty over the Supreme Court Sex ruling - Northern Ireland’s equality watchdog has stalled its long anti….
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RT @EHRC: We welcome the Court of Appeal's decision in upholding the length of our Code of Practice consultation as lawful and refusing per….
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This stuff used to upset me. Now it doesn’t. It’s amazing what three years of near constant abuse and personal insults can do to thicken your skin.
@speakoutsister Michael is a theoretical law scholar with no legal practical experience. His gender critical beliefs got lucky in FWS, and fall apart when you actually deconstruct them. His reply to me clearly demonstrates that, especially as he misses the whole point of Goodwin.
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RT @magpiemixture: Falconer is wrong about the role of the HL. See the thread below, and see also this excellent post .
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RT @EHRC: We have added a clarification to our interim update on the practical implications of the Supreme Court’s judgment, in relation to….
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RT @philipmurraylaw: A regrettably skewed presentation of the constitution on @BBCr4today this morning. The interview with @charliefalconer….
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