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Speaker 1: Now over in the UK, the Supreme Court has ruled

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Speaker 1: on the definition of what a woman is and it

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Speaker 1: is ruled that a woman is someone who was born

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Speaker 1: as a biological woman and does not include trans women. Now,

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Speaker 1: the case came about because of a Scottish government plan

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Speaker 1: to include transgender women in quotas where account women on

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Speaker 1: boards and try to get to fifty percent. Liam here

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Speaker 1: is a lawyer and commentator and is with us. Now,

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Speaker 1: Hey Liam, Hello, Hey, how specific is this ruling?

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Speaker 2: Is this?

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Speaker 1: I mean, is this only about whether you can count

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Speaker 1: women and trans women on boards to make your quota

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Speaker 1: or is this also going to bleed into other things

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Speaker 1: like where the trans women can play sport and stuff.

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Speaker 2: Well it's wider than that, but not as wide as

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Speaker 2: some people think either. So the legislation involved is the

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Speaker 2: Quality Act, a twenty ten human rights Act, and that

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Speaker 2: is the act of the UK Parliament, not the Scottish Parliament,

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Speaker 2: but applies to the whole of the UK, which is

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Speaker 2: the more the framework that kind of enables you to

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Speaker 2: have these quotas, right, So it applies to anything that

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Speaker 2: comes within the framework of the Quality Act. So that's

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Speaker 2: not just board quotas. That is other things, but it's

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Speaker 2: also not legal, it's not throughout the whole of the

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Speaker 2: legal system, right, so it's it's a significant ruling for

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Speaker 2: the purposes of that act, but it's got it's got

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Speaker 2: its boundaries.

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Speaker 1: Would would the boundaries include where the trans women can place.

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Speaker 2: Bored well like that? Yeah, there's certainly our regulations there

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Speaker 2: around sort of female only spaces, and that's certainly one

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Speaker 2: and certainly that's implicated in the Act, and that's that's

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Speaker 2: certainly yeah. So yes, the answer and answer is.

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Speaker 1: Yes, okay, I mean all practicality, though you can't always

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Speaker 1: be sure, like how are they actually going to know

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Speaker 1: whether someone who says I'm a woman is actually a

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Speaker 1: biological woman or a trans woman?

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Speaker 2: Well, you know, we've been grappling with that for a

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Speaker 2: long time. You know, the sex testing at the Olympics

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Speaker 2: has to be a big thing. You know, sometimes sometimes

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Speaker 2: dore I say, it's more obvious than than other cases.

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Speaker 2: But like everything, you know, like the law relies on

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Speaker 2: people being honest about how they're reporting on things, and

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Speaker 2: you know, people sometimes say that they are things that

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Speaker 2: they're not, and that's not uncommon either. So it's really

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Speaker 2: a question is are you're going to get caught out

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Speaker 2: and secularly, you're a law or a biding person who

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Speaker 2: obeys the law because it's the right thing to do.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Liam, I mean, undoubtedly this is going to be

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Speaker 1: picked up in the culture war and it's going to

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Speaker 1: become part of the ammunition. But in terms of what

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Speaker 1: happens in this country legally, will this affect us?

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Speaker 2: No, not certainly, not directly. So we have a separate

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Speaker 2: legal system to the UK. But of course the UK

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Speaker 2: is a jurisdiction that's held in a lot of esteem here,

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Speaker 2: and our laws are you know that a lot of

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Speaker 2: them are modeled on UK laws, and for a long time,

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Speaker 2: you know, we were sort of indirectly hopped into the

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Speaker 2: UK legal system. So when a judge has to make

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Speaker 2: a decision about a question of New Zealand law, they're

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Speaker 2: entitled to look at something that's been decided in the

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Speaker 2: UK or Australia or Canada and say, look, this is

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Speaker 2: a similar case. The reasoning here was solid, So I'm

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Speaker 2: sort of persuaded by that reasoning and I'm going to

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Speaker 2: apply it here. So New Zealand courts could easily look

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Speaker 2: at the precedent that's been set in the UK and

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Speaker 2: apply it here too if they chose to. But we

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Speaker 2: do also have a different judicial culture, as we've seen

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Speaker 2: over the years New Zealand. New Zealand judges are quite

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Speaker 2: willing to try to update the law or to push

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Speaker 2: the boundaries of the law, and they're probably a little

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Speaker 2: bit less different to the meaning that Parliament intended than

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Speaker 2: the UK courts are. So I wouldn't be I wouldn't

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Speaker 2: be surprised if the New Zealand courts looked at it

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Speaker 2: and said, no, that's not the way we want to go.

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Speaker 1: Interesting, Helly, Liam, thanks very much, really appreciate it. Lim

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Speaker 1: here lawyer and commentator. For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive,

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Speaker 1: listen live to news talks the'd be from four pm weekdays,

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