Many moons ago - 60s - my dad moved out of industrial nursing at a power station to become a welfare officer for the CEGB north west which meant he was responsible for making sure all the apprentices received proper on the job training, including first aid, and also got to go off on what we would now call team building exercises up in the Lake District every year - challenges such as rock climbing, fell trekking, lake swimming, camp fires and so on. He loved it. Not so keen on the Personnel side of the job which meant disciplining or letting go the ones who didn't work out. I've never yet met a personnel/HR person I've liked or trusted but then they are there for the company and not the employees. As for loos, they're much more relaxed about it over here. My MIL was always fascinated when I took her to Wavre market and we started with coffee or hot chocolate in a café where the women had to walk past the men's urinals to get to their loos. Some cafés and restaurants here only have space for one big loo which has to serve men, women, children, baby changing and the disabled or they'll have one door leading to two separate loos and a shared wash basin.
That's certainly true at Primary school level. Is it as true at Secondary level? When I was at Primary school, many decades ago, only the Head Teacher and one other were male.
My wife worked as PA to a manager and was asked to bring a person up for interview. The guy seemed OK, if a bit stand offish, but ended up being recruited. On arrival for their first day at work, about a month later, my wife was sent down to reception to collect him. The only problem was that him was now her, complete with female clothing. He/she hadn't informed anybody at the company so there was total confusion at to which facilities they should use. The women were adamant that they didn't want the person using female facilities and the person was adamant they wouldn't use male. Thankfully there were disabled toilets and that was accepted as a compromise. What made the situation even more awkward for my wife was that this individual had the same initial and surname as my wife
I'm amazed the women were consulted. There's an employment tribunal currently ongoing, Sandie Peggie vs NHS Fife. Sandie is a nurse with 30 years experience. Dr "Beth" Upton is a young male doctor who was recruited to her hospital. He was asked on arrival if he would be happy using the nurses' changing rooms - the nurses were not consulted. It was considered to breach his confidentiality to say anything to them. The most stunning thing about this tribunal - which was tweeted live by the TribunalTweets account - is that multiple very senior NHS employees swore under oath that Dr Upton was a woman, although they didn't really know what a women was because that was complicated, nor did they understand how sex was "assigned" to a baby at birth.
When I was working, last century, someone from the local authority asked to come in to inspect our premises to see whether we could be given an equal opportunity award to put in the window. They said that although we passed most of the criteria we couldn't be awarded it as we didn't have an Equal Opportunities statement displayed in the staff room and they tried to persuade me to do so. I did point out that if they checked my staff they were of many religions, both sexes, some were gay (don't know whether that is an allowed word now ) and all were on the same pay scale. They reiterated that it must be displayed on the staff room wall. So I asked what would be the rule if I did away with the staff room (lots of giggles from my staff ) and they didn't have an answer. The next day they delivered the award to me so that it could be displayed in the window and I put it in the bin whilst they were there! A look of shock on their faces - they were two females and not one female and one male . I told them that neither my staff nor my customers needed to be told that we don't discriminate. What the two of them didn't know was that the CEO of the council was there in one of the chairs listening to the conversation. his only comment was 'Well done"' I'm not President of the Grumpy Old Men's Club for nothing
@KT53 , my OH was a teacher for many years and before he retired( years ago) he was saying then that make teachers were in short supply then.
Oh for... My local newspaper has published an article that in the "expert opinion" of a resident gardener, we should now be rated as a 7a growing zone According to him, cold frames, greenhouses etc, and despite our brutal winters, we should consider ourselves in this tropical garden. Whaaattttt the ..... h e double hockey sticks...
Actually at conception when two sets of chromosomes come together, there is always the odd genetic mutation that can mess things up, but essentially that's it until death. Once you are old enough to decide you can identify as whatever you like and have whatever physical or chemical modifications you can afford or persuade the NHS to carry out. The one thing you can never do is change the chromosomes you were given at conception, that runs through you like the letters through seaside rock.
Yes activists like to make a lot of fuss about "intersex", but actually only about 1 in 4500 babies are born with these conditions. In the past they might have been incorrectly identified at birth, which explains people like Caster Semenya and Imane Kelif. But genetic testing today can identify the correct sex. "Intersex" is an outdated term and today the medical profession uses "Differences of Sexual Development" (DSD). There are male DSDs and female DSDs.
All this confusion (crap) about gender identification can be removed by the simple act of requesting 'gender at birth' on any application form, or other identification form. @Escarpment has corrected my by saying it should be 'sex at birth' not 'gender. There's a very old cartoon with two country yokels leaning on a farm gate watching a Scottish regiment in kilts marching past. 'What are they?' one asks. The other replies "They bain't be men and they bain't be women. Must be that Middlesex regimen we bin hearing about".
Not gender at birth - sex. And did you know that people who get a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC) are allowed to change their birth certificate?
