Repeal the Gender Recognition Act

Time to ditch a law that falsifies sex

Now that Labour has been returned to government in the UK with a huge majority, it won’t be long before we can expect a renewed assault on sex-based rights. That assault will build on a foundation that was laid by a previous Labour government in 2004 - the Gender Recognition Act (GRA).

References in the Labour Party’s election manifesto to sex and ‘gender’ were riddled with contradictions. The manifesto claimed that “women’s equality will be at the heart of our missions”, yet promised to “modernise, simplify, and reform the intrusive and outdated gender recognition law”, ignoring that its proposed reform would weaken women’s rights to single-sex spaces. It also claimed that a Labour Government would “implement the expert recommendations of the Cass Review”, yet it promised to “finally deliver a full trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices”,  ignoring a key finding of the Cass Review that such a ban would privilege experimental medical interventions that are unethical and unsupported by evidence.

Today’s King’s Speech, which sets out Labour’s legislative agenda for the coming year, didn’t mention GRA reform. It did promise a draft Bill “to ban conversion practices”, and the background briefing notes confirm that this will be “trans-inclusive”.  They stress, though, that the ban “must not cover legitimate psychological support, treatment, or non-directive counselling”, which suggests there may now be some awareness that ‘transing the gay away ’ is not the vote winner Labour assumed it might be. 

Keir Starmer’s caution is probably influenced by having seen the over-the-top reaction to Health Secretary Wes Streeting’s announced intention to make permanent the puberty blocker ban recommended by Cass. The howls of protest this triggered will be familiar to anyone who has seen the false ‘trans genocide’ claims observed in Skirt Go Spinny’s recent film Wrong Bodies (now available on Odysee, here, as well as on X).

“There is already evidence of a huge surge in the deaths of young trans people since their healthcare provision was trashed.  A terrifying moment.”

(Guardian journalist Owen Jones, X 12 July 2024)

“Don’t underestimate the political tail of Wes Streeting’s decision. His colleagues will slowly be coming to terms with locking them into a future of bereaved parents tipping ashes outside No 10 and a revival of mass die-ins wherever they go.”

(Jo Maugham KC, Director of Good Law Project, X 17 July 2024)

Streeting’s intention to make the ban on puberty blockers permanent is welcome. Yet the vehement opposition expressed by many in his party means Starmer will need to play it long if he wants a smooth ride. He probably realises that continued support of child mutilation is not a good look, even if the BBC won't report it. He won’t want concern about children’s health to obstruct GRA reform and his support for the wider gender industry.  

Starmer’s choice of ministers responsible for policy on sex and ‘gender’ made his long term intentions crystal clear. He appointed two Ministers for Women and Equalities, and both are staunch ‘trans allies’. Bridget Phillipson (who is also Education Secretary) has said that men with a gender recognition certificate should be able to use women’s toilets, and that Labour would ditch guidelines that stop schoolchildren being taught that gender is a spectrum. Anneliese Dodds has said that how ‘woman’ is defined depends on the context, that wishes of men who “live as a woman”  to be “defined as a woman” should be respected, and that her role will be “advocating for women in all their diversity”. To oversee sports, another area where an accurate definition of what is a woman is critical,  Starmer appointed Lisa Nandy. She has gone so far down the ‘trans ally’ rabbit hole that she has stated publicly that a convicted rapist should be jailed in a woman’s prison if that’s where he’d feel most comfortable.

The main flash point, when it comes, will almost certainly be GRA reform, the issue that, more than any other, has stimulated opposition to the ‘trans’ lobby since the mid 2010s.  

The Gender Recognition Act (GRA)

The GRA gives an individual with ‘gender dysphoria’  the right to obtain a gender recognition certificate (GRC). The application needs to be supported by reports from two doctors or psychologists, including one ‘practising in the field of gender dysphoria’. The reports have to give details of the diagnosis and any surgery, and the application is adjudicated by a panel.

Tom Harwood, a right wing political pundit on GB News, claims that “GRCs do not magically alter access to gender segregated spaces”.  All they do, he suggests, is enable adults to change the sex marker on identity documents. For Harwood, granting a GRC is just a way of showing compassion for a small minority. It doesn’t, he argues, affect anyone else  - “It is a question of administration, not access to spaces’”.

It’s true that men who claim to be women haven’t needed a GRC to be able to demand access women’s spaces. But as opposition has grown, organisations are starting to fall back on allowing only men with GRCs to be treated as if they are women. As of yesterday, official guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission now backs this up:  “a sexed- based occupational requirement that an applicant is a woman -  as is common within specialist support services for women, such as rape counselling - will include women who are recorded female at birth and also transgender women who have obtained a GRC …. (It) cannot include transgender women who have not obtained a GRC, as they do not have the legal status of women under the Equality Act 2010”.

The full impact of the GRA is measured not by the relatively small number of birth certificates that have been falsified, but by the far-reaching normalisation of sex deception and reinforcement of sex role stereotypes that it has encouraged. Legally validated sex falsification has massive implications for women’s safety, the safeguarding of children, ‘trans widows’, same-sex and different-sex attraction, fair sport, and, not least, respect for truth. Surgery is not required to obtain a GRC. But the GRA has normalised body dissociation, a key precursor of the growth in demand for body mutilating 'medical' procedures. 

The GRA is far from being just ”a question of administration.” 

Self-declaration of ‘gender’

In 2015 the UK parliament’s newly formed  Women and Equalities Committee chose ‘transgender equality’ for its first inquiry. It invited submissions, including on GRA reform. Evidence sessions, which can still be viewed on parliamentlive.tv, called witnesses who were all either ‘trans’ or ‘trans allies’. They testified that the process of acquiring a GRC was too intrusive, and that medical assessment should be replaced by self-declaration. Apart from some discussion of whether or not ‘spousal consent’ should be retained, impacts on women and other protected groups were ignored.

The Committee’s conclusion was uncompromising - “Within the current Parliament, the Government must bring forward proposals to update the Gender Recognition Act, in line with the principles of gender self-declaration that have been developed in other jurisdictions.” 

The Conservative Government responded in 2018 by consulting on possible changes to the GRA, with a questionnaire that gave little scope for expressing anything other than a choice between keeping the GRA unchanged, or changing it to make a GRC easier to obtain. Only the last question,‘Do you have any further comments about the Gender Recognition Act 2004?’, gave an opening for alternative opinions to be expressed. The 41,700 replies to this question were condensed into just two pages of the government’s 176 page analysis of the consultation results. These paragraphs acknowledged widespread concern about the lack of attention given to impacts on women and on the safeguarding of children. None of the responses questioning the GRA’s promotion of sex falsification, or arguing that the GRA should be repealed, were mentioned.

Aware of the strength of opposition to self-declaration, the UK government in 2020 retained the medical diagnosis requirement. But self declaration continued to be pursued by the devolved government in Scotland. Intense public debate, ignited by the case of ‘trans’ double rapist Isla Bryson, centred on the issue of male offenders being incarcerated in women’s prisons. Despite public outrage, the Scottish parliament in December 2022 voted self-declaration into Scottish law. That month, a Scottish judge, Lady Haldane, created further confusion with a contested ruling  that the protected characteristic of sex in the 2010 Equality Act “is not limited to biological or birth sex, but includes those in possession of a GRC obtained in accordance with the 2004 Act stating their acquired gender, and thus their sex.”

The Scottish Government’s reform was blocked by the UK government, on the  grounds that different gender recognition regimes within the UK would interfere with UK-wide equality law. So it’s back to the 2004  Act, and the current Labour government’s proposals for reform. Labour’s manifesto promise to modify and simplify the GRA leaves room for manoeuvre. What seems likely is a compromise between its earlier support for full self-declaration and the existing requirement of a diagnosis of ‘gender dysphoria’ - a compromise that retains medical diagnosis, but one that is signed off by a single doctor.

Time to end the confusion

The ‘trans’ lobby wlll complain that Labour’s proposed reform runs counter to their belief that only a ‘trans’ person is qualified to say what their ‘gender’ is. They will know, though, that there are plenty of doctors who will sign on the dotted line, with no questions asked. Many supposedly ‘gender critical’ organisations will be drawn into discussions about how to define sex (something about which even Lady Haldane is confused) and about who can be included in single sex spaces and services (something about which most service providers are confused).

Labour politicians added to this confusion during the election campaign. Repeatedly asked whether Labour would protect women’s ‘single sex spaces’, Keir Starmer would apparently agree, but changing the wording in his reply to ‘safe spaces’. Which, of course, allows for different interpretations of what is ‘safe’. Are only refuges and rape crisis centres to be allowed to exclude men? And are only men who have been convicted of violent offences to be excluded? Or is it to be assumed that men with a GRC are automatically deemed to be no threat? Medical diagnosis doesn’t assess safeguarding risk, it merely affirms the discredited notion of gender dysphoria, and under Labour’s proposed reform acquiring a GRC would become a formality.

One ‘gender critical’ organisation, Sex Matters, thinks redefining the Equality Act’s protected characteristic of ‘sex’ as ‘biological sex’ would clear up the confusion. But suggesting that there are two types of women - ‘biological women’ (ie women) and ‘legal women’ (ie men with a GRC) - would accept that a man’s possession of a piece of paper magically changes him into a woman, Far from clearing up the confusion, this would just add to it.

There’s one way to end the confusion - remove the foundation for sex falsification, by repealing the GRA.

The one upside of the government’s determination to reopen debate about GRA reform is the opportunity it raises to air the case for repeal. We should make the most of it.