The Supreme Court ruling on sex in the Equality Act? Hazardous garbage that urgently needs clearing up by Parliament

By Steph Polak

Towards the end of April 2025 the supreme court gave a ruling of the definition of sex as used within the Equality Act. While this ruling is supposed to have bought clarity to the law it has done precisely the opposite, which is, in turn, already causing considerable frightening harm.

This case was brought by a small group of transphobic women who were backed by the far-right and religious extremist campaign, started a decade ago, intent on eradicating transgender people from society, who provided the £250,000 and legal resources required. The case set out to get a simplistic, reductive and ideological definition of sex applied to the Equality Act, which the court subsequently upheld. To summarise the ruling:-

• It said the protected characteristic of sex in the Equality Act refers to biological sex, as determined at birth, and is binary i.e. only biological man or biological woman. This therefore excludes all transgender individuals regardless of whether or not they have had their true or ‘acquired’ gender, recognised under the Gender Recognition Act, an act that explicitly states that, for the purposes of the law, those acquiring a Gender Recognition Certificate will be deemed to be of the associated sex.

  
  

• It said that this applies only to the Equality Act and doesn’t affect any other gender and sex related legislation, where the Gender Recognition Act would still apply.

  
  

• It said it shouldn't change anything as the protections offered by the gender reassignment characteristic in the Equality Act still apply, which makes it illegal to discriminate against transgender individuals. Importantly the Equality Act has always specifically allowed for exclusions to these protections where these are both justifiable and proportionate.

  
  

• It said the ruling should not be used to seek to further discriminate against transgender individuals.

  
  

This ruling has been universally condemned by experts across disciplines, especially scientists, biologists and medics, lawyers and human rights experts, as well as a wide range other relevant expert bodies who state that the ruling is nonsensical, ignorant, ideological, legal navel gazing. They point out there are failings in the legal process that was followed, the ruling itself and the way this ruling is now being interpreted and applied, viz:-

• The court only heard arguments from the appellants and rejected requests from other parties, especially those who would be directly affected by this ruling, to be heard. They naively believed they had sufficient understanding of the subject and the nature of sex and gender to reach a meaningful judgement when, clearly, they didn’t.

  
  

• The court failed to consider the relevant human rights legislation, international conventions and trading agreements the UK is bound by and the likely implications of their judgement related to these. It actually dismissed the sole intervention allowed from Amnesty International on this without reason.

  
  

• The court failed to consider the extensively documented background to and parliamentary debates on the Gender Recognition Act and Equality Act and their inter-relationship and therefore what the will of parliament actually was with these.

  
  

• The court failed to consider the actual biological nature of sex and gender, the variations and differences between these, how effectively the law fits with the realities of these. In fact, it stated it had deliberately avoided doing this.

  
  

• The court failed to properly consider the nature and processes undertaken by transgender individuals that lead to them acquiring a Gender Recognition Certificate that justifies them being accepted as having the sex related to their acquired gender. (Contrary to the courts claim trans women can and do breastfeed!)

  
  

It was in effect an exercise in which the court was asked to rule that sex was based on what the was described in the bible, which it duly did, agreeing that this provided the appropriate legal definition without any regard to anything else, especially reality. As a result, the ruling:-

• Does not comply with the need for procedural fairness, as it excluded evidence from those who were directly impacted by the ruling, evidence that would quite probably have led to a different outcome.

  
  

• Contravenes international legislation, conventions and agreements that the UK is bound by including, among others, the European Convention on Human Rights including those of transgender and intersex people, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (as upheld by the  United Nations Human Rights Committee), the Istanbul Convention (clauses A5, A6, A4 and A2), the Good Friday Agreement, and amongst others its trading agreements with New Zealand and the EU, which have specific clauses that are breached.

  
  

• Goes against the original intentions of the legislation and the will of parliament in enacting these. This was confirmed by those who created the Equality Act legislation while it was extensively debated in parliament and Hansard records an agreement that contradicts the court ruling.  (see excerpts at end)

  
  

• Leaves transgender individuals with a Gender Recognition Certificate in an uncertain state. They are one sex for the Equality Act while another for the rest of legislation. That is hardly clarity.

  
  

• Is biologically/scientifically nonsensical and uses an ideological interpretation of sex long since disproven. The biology of sex and gender is extremely complex and non-binary (they are distinct biological attributes that both exist on spectrums). The statement that there is ‘binary biological sex that can be determined at birth’ is as the BMA puts it, ‘reductive, trans and intersex exclusionary biological nonsense’, and that this is ‘a scientifically illiterate ruling’.  This has also been pointed out by biologists, other scientists and medical professionals.

• Fails to recognise the difference between biological sex and biological gender, while conflating the two by using the words, mistakenly, interchangeably. It therefore fails to recognise the difference between sex segregation and gender segregation and which applies where.

  
  

Excerts from Hansard showing ruling goes against will of Parliament

Despite all of this the ruling continues to be heralded as a victory for women and common sense, while Ministers and the EHRC continue to vehemently reject any attempts to raise these failings. Instead, they have been supporting the far-right campaign that has subsequently and deliberately misinterpreted the ruling to seek to apply yet more restrictions and rights removal for transgender individuals, as follows:-

• They have been claiming this gives a legal definition of women as being ‘biological woman’ that applies across all legislation and that this doesn’t include trans women. While this is false propaganda it is what is being said publicly and, therefore, increasingly believed. This has already led to public misinterpretations of other laws.

  
  

• They are pushing for trans women to be excluded from so called ‘single sex’ spaces, such as loos and changing rooms because they claim the ruling says that single sex spaces are for ‘biological women’ only. This again is not what the ruling says, while the ruling does say the protections afforded to transgender people by the Equality Act still apply. They can only be excluded for justifiable reasons and proportionately neither of which this legal ruling provides. Added to this there are very few spaces that can be justified as being designated sex segregated spaces; nearly all, including loos, are actually gender segregated spaces, while those of us who have had gender affirming treatment and surgery would qualify for inclusion in sex segregated spaces. (When receiving medical treatment, I am always asked if I might be pregnant, to which I reply ‘I’m 66, so won’t be’!)

When challenged the justification being put forward is that trans women pose a threat to cis women and children in these spaces. This is fabricated nonsense. Trans women have always existed and used women’s facilities with virtually no recorded instances of them assaulting others, whereas there are many cases of cis women in such spaces assaulting cis and trans women. The follow on to this is that trans women are fine but accepting them allows predatory men pretending to be trans women to enter and assault women and children. This is total irrational fantasy that doesn’t stand up to even the most basic scrutiny. Why would a man go to all the trouble and risk, when they don’t need to? It just doesn’t happen, nor ever will.

However, this is all being ignored.  We are already experiencing increased harassment of and assaults on those who are identified as non conforming, and we are seeing numerous discriminatory exclusions for transgender women in the workplace, in sports and elsewhere. And the EHRC has now released highly confused updated guidance, that is being supported by Ministers and politicians, which sets out for trans folks be required to use the facilities based on their supposed ‘biological sex assigned at birth’.

This is lunacy; not only is this biological nonsense, it is impossible to police, unless, of course, we were to implement a modern equivalent of demanding the wearing of a pink triangle or Star of David. And while the EHRC should be protecting the rights of trans folks as much as anyone its is failing to do so. In fact, it has refused and continues to refuse to meet or consult with the transgender community and their experts, but has taken non-stop input from the far-right anti-trans pressure groups.  

Should this guidance be followed through we would find ourselves in the absurd situation where men would be required to use women’s facilities (opening the door for predatory cis men to pretend to be trans men!), women men’s, with the many men and women who don’t conform to stereotypes, as well as trans and intersex individuals, being put at great risk for no reason other than false dangerous ideology and unsubstantiated mendacious claims. It would be discriminatory, a direct violation of human rights (as repeatedly upheld by the ECtHR), indefinable and unenforceable.

My own situation demonstrates the absurdity of all of this. For many years, since I completed my transition and obtained a Gender Recognition Certificate (which means my birth certificate records me as female), I have gone swimming at the local Leisure Centre. Several times a week I go into the ladies changing room, get undressed in the open room and change into my bathing costume. After swimming, I take a shower in the ladies’ shower where I remove my costume to wash myself. I then go back into the open changing room, naked, to dry myself and get dressed. Everything I do is alongside and exactly as all the other women there do and, as many of us are regulars, we chat as we’re doing this. Some have known me since before my transition and they take no issue with my being there and we chat normally. The rest simply don’t know and neither do they need to know. I look like them, sound like them and behave like them. I do not stand out, in the way those with prejudiced images of trans women believe I would, and I have never nor ever will pose a threat to them, not least because I am actually attracted to men. There are some who come who are far more masculine in appearance than me while there is one regular who often repeats the far-right transphobic rhetoric – and yet prefaces this by saying ‘well we’re all women here and…’! And, of course, were a man to enter the changing room trying to claim gender rights I would be the first to call them out and get them to leave, as such behaviour would be a double threat to me both as a woman and to my hard-won rights as someone who was transgender. 

So am I now to be forced to ‘out’ myself and bare myself in the men’s changing room or to shower naked in the communal shower where everyone in the pool area can see me? Am I going to have to do this simply because a small group of extremists are falsely claiming I’m suddenly now ‘a threat’ to those I have been around for many years. Or am I going to have to do this on the even more nonsensical and totally unproven grounds that somehow my presence encourages men pretending to be me to try to use the women’s facilities, when the proposals will actually make it much easier for such men to enter these facilities? Am I and those women who are far more masculine in appearance than I going to be put at significant risk of harm simply because that small group’s bigoted and ignorant views on the biology of sex and gender and the ignorance of judges and others in position of power that they are exploiting? Do my human rights really come second to those of a small group of far-right extremists and their false and dangerous ideologies and demonising lies? Will the leisure centre really be forced to try to police this when it is impossible to do so (remember my birth certificate says I’m female and for the majority of the law that is what I am)? And are they really going to be forced to implement discriminatory policies that put their customers at significant risk, especially the very women this is supposed to be protecting?

Parliament needs to sort this out and do so quickly. But to do this they must first understand:-

• The real nature and biology of sex and gender, as per science, and how this is at odds with the false ideological basis on which our law is currently based and the confusion and harm this causes. This 8 minute video explains this.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson, the American astrophysicist and science communicator, has said ‘The good thing about science is that it’s true whether you believe in it or not’. You can legislate that the sun goes round the earth, as the Roman Catholic Church did, but it won’t stop the earth going round the sun. As all political and religious ideologies learn nature, as revealed by science, will always win over false ideology – its just a matter of how much harm is done, how many must die, before this is accepted.

• The far-right campaign intent on eradicating transgender people, a vulnerable minority, for political gain, the various strategies and tactics being used, and how this is being used as a wedge to subsequently target removal of others protections and rights, as we are seeing elsewhere in the world. Such a campaign exploits ignorance and is only defeated through superior knowledge. This 30 minute video explains this in detail

  
  

So what to do? Well, herewith some thoughts:-

1. The EHRC be required to immediately withdraw its interim guidance as it does not follow the law or the ruling, while exposing those it is required to protect (cis and trans) to considerable harm, as is already being experienced. This includes withdrawing the ridiculously short ‘consultation period’, which is a deliberate attempt to force this guidance through without adequate feedback and consideration.

   
   

2. A considerable delay be introduced to allow the process that was undertaken within the case, the ruling itself and its interpretation to be carefully and fully considered by parliament. Failings should be identified and action taken to rectify these.

   
   

3. This should be equally required of the EHRC and they must also be required to engage with the transgender community and their experts at length so as to ensure proper and non-prejudiced consideration of their needs and rights.

   
   

4. As the ruling says that it should not change anything and should not be used to further discriminate against transgender individuals such a delay is both essential and legitimate and would stop the government and EHRC succumbing to current loud and constant pressure from this small extremist group to enact policies and statutory guidelines, etc. (as currently proposed) that are actually contrary to the ruling and are discriminatory and against human rights.

   
   

5. That Parliament recognises and addresses the confused, contradictory situation that people like myself are in where we are actually two sexes, in law, at once! This will require going back to the original creation of the Equality Act and recognising, as was stated by its creators, that trans women with a GRC were considered for the purposes of the Equality Act to have the sex of their ‘acquired’ gender in accordance with the Gender Recognition Act, and that this was debated and agreed when the legislation was enacted. This would require an amendment to the act and its wording to do this. In other words, the intention of the act and the will of parliament in enacting it needs confirming: I should be covered under the sex characteristic in the Equality Act, as a GRC holder, in precisely the same way I am in all other laws. (And I would suggest I am no longer covered by gender reassignment as I am no longer undergoing this, having completed it many years ago, but am now covered under the sex characteristic as per my GRC)

   
   

6. That parliament instigates a review of legislation regarding sex and gender to remove the current outdated, disproven, oversimplistic ideological basis used in these and the fudges subsequently implemented to handle the mismatches between these and reality.  Law and policy should be based on accurate complete evidence and the realities of nature, not outdated disproven ideology.  Gender, sex and sexuality need to be decoupled and recognised as distinct biological attributes, that are not intrinsically tied, and that they are not, nor ever can be defined as binary in nature. This would enable recognition for all forms of naturally occurring characteristics such as intersex, non-binary, trans, cis, etc. and would bring the UK legislation up to date and in line with the many jurisdictions who have implemented modern legislation along these lines. This, coupled with international rights laws, has proven to be a powerful defence in those jurisdictions who have done this against the same extremists and their attempts to obtain similar ideological discriminatory rulings.

If these actions are not undertaken in some manner, not only will there be increasing confusion, but a significant number of people will be put at risk of harm, and be harmed unnecessarily, while there will be further legal cases, which will become increasingly difficult and embarrassing for the government. In short, Parliament needs to sort this out before the ECtHR does it for them and Reform and the anti ECHR people use the judgement to take us out of the ECHR, which will harm everyone not just the transgender community.

Bridget Phillipson, the equalities minister, may have recently said to the house ‘The ruling of the supreme court was clear about the importance of biological sex and I would not want any trans person…  anywhere across the country to be fearful’.

But we are all fearful and are right to be so. The responses she and the government have made so far show an alarming lack of understanding and, as a result, we simply don’t have any confidence she and they will take the strong steps necessary to address this situation and protect the rights of not just the transgender community but all those, including women, whose rights are being attacked and withdrawn.  

At the moment those in positions of power are having their ignorance, their fears and inability to mount an effective challenge, exploited without realising it. They are pandering to this small group of extremists: They are failing to call out their dangerous lies and false propaganda and are caving into the loud demands for rights removal and segregation despite this being wrong on so many different levels. And in doing so they are digging ever deeper holes that will become their political graves, buried by the far right, having done their dirty work for them. And yet, as I have personally witnessed, these are neither the views nor will of the overwhelming majority of people, which is why they are turning their backs on them, to the benefit of the far right.

This deeply flawed ruling is yet another step in the campaign to eradicate transgender individuals and impose far right ideology on this country. I and all the transgender community are fearful, and rightfully so. We have been on the receiving end of 10 years of hate and false demonisation and a campaign to try to remove us, that politicians and the government have actually supported, a campaign that we do not, on our own, have the means to counter.  And we have seen where that leads in the long term.

Recently a peer reviewed research paper was published that tore the Cass report, the much-hailed report on healthcare for transgender youth, to pieces. This was yet another such paper by scientific and medical experts that forensically analysed a report that was created by someone with no relevant experience or expertise and which was not peer reviewed. And yet the government refuses to take these on board and instead continues to implement policies and practices that are deeply harmful and indeed life threatening, based on this. This cannot be allowed to happen with this ruling and is why we are asking all to help challenge this.

Addendum:  A note on transitioning

There is a significant difference between those transgender folks who transition and those that do not. Transitioning is a hugely challenging and multifaceted process that takes many years to complete. The social elements of transitioning are vastly greater and more challenging than the relatively small medical elements and all are undertaken out of necessity not choice. The first requirement of transition is living in role. One must live socially as male or female, including using the equivalent gender facilities for an extended period. Only then will any medical treatment be provided and only after that has been completed and one is ‘fully transitioned’ can one apply for a gender recognition certificate and recognition of having acquired the sex related to your gender. This ruling if implemented as is being claimed and proposed would make this prescribed pathway considerably harder to undertake. This is probably well understood by those behind this campaign and ruling who want this and who are relying on those in relevant decision-making positions being completely ignorant of this.