One of the Edinburgh festival fringe’s most popular venues could be at risk of legal action, lawyers have said, after staff refused to work at an event with the SNP MP Joanna Cherry.
The MP, who has been outspoken in her opposition to self-identification for transgender people, told the Guardian she was “considering her options” but that she would prefer to resolve the issue privately.The Stand comedy club said Cherry’s planned appearance during the festival fringe in August had been cancelled because “key operational staff” were unwilling to work with her.
Cherry said: “It’s clearly a case of unlawful discrimination and the Stand needs to think if that is something it really wants to do.”
She added: “The law is quite clear that my beliefs on gender are protected after the Forstater case.” Last year, Maya Forstater, a researcher who lost her job at a thinktank after tweeting that transgender women could not change their biological sex, won her claim that she was unfairly discriminated against because of her gender-critical beliefs.
Cherry added: “I am sick of being misrepresented. I have never said anything transphobic, but I am against self-identification.”
Cherry has over a number of years voiced her strong opposition to the Scottish government’s gender recognition reform bill – which was later vetoed by the UK government because of concerns about how it would affect UK-wide equality law – as well as being a critic of the leadership style of the former first minister Nicola Sturgeon.
A number of leading lawyers, including Roddy Dunlop KC, the dean of the Faculty of Advocates, said the Stand’s decision was unlawful. Dunlop tweeted: “Is the venue aware that they would be vulnerable to a discrimination claim?”
In a statement, the Stand said: “Following extensive discussions with our staff it has become clear that a number of key operational staff, including venue management and box office personnel, are unwilling to work on this event.
“We will ensure that their views are respected. We will not compel our staff to work on this event and so have concluded that the event is unable to proceed on a properly staffed, safe and legally compliant basis.”
The show was part of an “In Conversation With” series, organised by the independent producer Fair Pley, which will include the film director Ken Loach and the former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
Cherry said she wanted to stress that she was invited by the Stand, and then the producer, to participate and that she had not been asked to speak specifically about her gender-critical views about on a variety of subjects, including her work as an MP, her involvement in the prorogation case and Scottish independence.
She added: “Clearly the viewpoint I hold is out there now, despite the best efforts of others to silence it, with the public backlash against the gender recognition bill and the horror at the Isla Bryson case.”
There was outrage across the political and campaigning spectrum in January after Bryson, a transgender woman found guilty of raping two women before transitioning, was transferred to Scotland’s all-female Cornton Vale prison for assessment. Polling suggests that opposing the UK government’s veto of Holyrood’s gender recognition reforms is not a public priority.
Over the weekend, it emerged that students who blocked the screening of a film asserting that women are defined solely by their biological sex at Edinburgh University could face disciplinary action, after Sir Peter Mathieson, the principal and vice-chancellor, said he “condemned the actions which prevented freedom of expression and freedom of assembly on our campus”.
