Closing summary
This blog will be closing shortly. Here is a summary of the day’s developments:
The UK supreme court has ruled that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act refer to a biological woman and biological sex, in a victory for gender critical campaigners.
Five judges from the UK supreme court ruled unanimously that the legal definition of a woman in the Equality Act 2010 did not include transgender women who hold gender recognition certificates (GRCs). In a significant defeat for the Scottish government, their decision will mean that transgender women can no longer sit on public boards in places set aside for women.
It could have far wider ramifications by leading to much greater restrictions on the rights of transgender women to use services and spaces reserved for women, and spark calls for the UK’s laws on gender recognition to be rewritten.
Lord Hodge told the court the Equality Act (EA) was very clear that its provisions dealt with biological sex at birth, and not with a person’s acquired gender, regardless of whether they held a gender recognition certificate. That affected policy-making on gender in sports and the armed services, hospitals, as well as women-only charities, and access to changing rooms and women-only spaces, he said.
Hodge urged people not to see the decision “as a triumph of one or more groups in our society at the expense of another”. He said all transgender people had clear legal protections under the 2010 act against discrimination and harassment.
Gender critical campaign group For Women Scotland, which is backed financially by JK Rowling, celebrated outside the supreme court in London, alongside other campaigners, after the ruling was announced.
A government spokesperson said on Wednesday that the supreme court ruling on the definition of a woman under the Equality Act bought “clarity and confidence, for women and service providers such as hospitals, refuges, and sports clubs”. The spokesperson said: “Single-sex spaces are protected in law and will always be protected by this government.”
Maya Forstater, a gender critical activist who helped set up the campaign group Sex Matters, which took part in the supreme court case by supporting For Women Scotland, said the decision was correct: “We are delighted that the supreme court has accepted the arguments of For Women Scotland and rejected the position of the Scottish government. The court has given us the right answer: the protected characteristic of sex – male and female – refers to reality, not to paperwork.”
Kemi Badenoch described the supreme court ruling as a “victory”. The leader of the Conservative party said: “Saying ‘trans women are women’ was never true in fact, and now isn’t true in law either. This is a victory for all of the women who faced personal abuse or lost their jobs for stating the obvious. Women are women and men are men: you cannot change your biological sex.” The leader of the Scottish Tories called the supreme court decision a “victory for women across the United Kingdom”. Russell Findlay hailed the decision, which confirmed that the definition of woman in the 2010 Equality Act refers to biological women, as an “abject humiliation for the SNP”.
Trans rights campaigners urged trans people and their supporters to remain calm about the decision. The campaign group Scottish Trans said on social media that they’d “urge people not to panic”, while LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall has said there was “deep concern at the widespread implications” of the court ruling, which it said is “incredibly worrying for the trans community”. Amnesty International UK ruling as “disappointing” with “potentially concerning consequences for trans people”.
The Scottish Greens described the supreme court ruling as “deeply concerning for human rights”. The party said it would “continue to stand with trans people and resist culture war being waged against them”.
Kishwer Falkner, the chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which had intervened in the case to support the Scottish government’s stance, said it would need time to fully interpret the ruling’s implications. However, the commission was pleased it had dealt with its concerns about the lack of clarity around single-sex and lesbian-only spaces.
Amnesty International UK described the supreme court ruling as “disappointing” with “potentially concerning consequences for trans people”.
Chief executive Sacha Deshmukh said:
The outcome of today’s judgment is clearly disappointing. It is a long and complex judgment and we will take time to analyse its full implications.
There are potentially concerning consequences for trans people, but it is important to stress that the court has been clear that trans people are protected under the Equality Act against discrimination and harassment.
The ruling does not change the protection trans people are afforded under the protected characteristic of ‘gender reassignment’, as well as other provisions under the Equality Act.
Amnesty intervened in this case to remind the court that legal gender recognition is essential for trans people to enjoy the full spectrum of rights each of us is entitled to, including safety, health and family life.
