EHRC chair: supreme court ruling ‘victory for common sense, but only if you recognise trans people exist’
Kishwer Falkner, chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), has described yesterday’s supreme court ruling as “a victory for common sense, but only if you recognise that trans people exist.”
Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, Falkner said:
It’s a victory for common sense, but only if you recognise that trans people exist. They have rights, and their rights must be respected – then it becomes a victory for common sense.
It’s not a victory for an increase in unpleasant actions against trans people. We will not tolerate that. We stand here to defend trans people as much as we do anyone else. So I want to make that very clear.
She stressed that trans people are still protected by law regarding gender reassignment and sex discrimination, telling listeners:
They are covered through gender reassignment … and they’re also covered by sex discrimination.
We’ll have to flesh this out in the reasoning, but I think if you were to have an equal pay claim, then depending on which aspect of it that it was, you could use sex discrimination legislation.
If a trans person was fired, lost their employment because they happen to be trans, that would be unlawful, still absolutely unlawful, and we stand ready to support those people and those claims.
Key events
Yesterday’s case was brought to the supreme court by the campaign group For Women Scotland, and was against the Scottish government.
BBC Radio Scotland this morning has interviewed MSPs for their view on the decision, with Green MSP Maggie Chapman saying transgender people now fear what could happen. She told listeners:
What the judge said yesterday morning about this ruling not being taken as a victory, the response by For Women Scotland and associated groups yesterday was very, very clear.
They are taking this as a victory and I think that’s something quite potentially dangerous about where they go next.
We’ve already heard people say they want to repeal the Gender Recognition Act 2004 and trans people are worried that people are coming after their right to exist.
Conservative MSP Rachael Hamilton took a differing view. Speaking later on the programme, PA Media reports she said:
For Women Scotland of course believe this is a victory, because they had to go to the supreme court to fight this. I listened to what Maggie Chapman said, I don’t believe this is a culture war and I don’t believe that this will stoke hatred. This just brings clarity to single-sex spaces.
As my colleague Archie Bland noted in the First Edition newsletter this morning, the actual voices of trans people have been few and far between in a lot of the commentary on yesterday’s supreme court decision, and indeed in the evidence-gathering that went into it.
ITV’s Good Morning Britain did speak to Ella Morgan, who explained her fears about healthcare settings. She told the programme:
In the middle of filming I was admitted into hospital for a problem, and I was so scared that they would know who I am – not being big-headed – and that they would put me in a male ward.
I was put on a female ward, and but I had my own room, purely because there wasn’t enough space for me with, you know, within the group.
You know, I will still continue to use a female toilet. I still see myself as a woman and always will, whether this legislation comes in and people agree with it or not.
Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, the chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said it will pursue the NHS if it does not change existing guidance on the treatment of trans women patients.
Current guidelines say trans people should be accommodated in single-sex accommodation according to their gender identity, rather than their assigned sex at birth. Kishwer Falkner told listeners “They have to change it. They now have clarity. We will be having conversations with them to update that guidance.”
The chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has suggested that there may be legal challenges around the efficacy of gender recognition certificates (GRC) ahead.
Asked on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme if yesterday’s supreme court ruling had rendered the legal document worthless, Kishwer Falkner said:
I think the next stage of litigation may well be tests as to the efficacy of the GRC, and or other areas. We don’t believe they are [worthless]. We think they’re quite important.
But I think there will be other areas, I mean, the Government is thinking of digital IDs, and if digital IDs come in, then what documentation will provide the identity of that person? So it’s going to be a space that we’ll have to watch very carefully as we go on.
EHRC chair: supreme court ruling ‘victory for common sense, but only if you recognise trans people exist’
Kishwer Falkner, chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), has described yesterday’s supreme court ruling as “a victory for common sense, but only if you recognise that trans people exist.”
Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, Falkner said:
It’s a victory for common sense, but only if you recognise that trans people exist. They have rights, and their rights must be respected – then it becomes a victory for common sense.
It’s not a victory for an increase in unpleasant actions against trans people. We will not tolerate that. We stand here to defend trans people as much as we do anyone else. So I want to make that very clear.
She stressed that trans people are still protected by law regarding gender reassignment and sex discrimination, telling listeners:
They are covered through gender reassignment … and they’re also covered by sex discrimination.
We’ll have to flesh this out in the reasoning, but I think if you were to have an equal pay claim, then depending on which aspect of it that it was, you could use sex discrimination legislation.
If a trans person was fired, lost their employment because they happen to be trans, that would be unlawful, still absolutely unlawful, and we stand ready to support those people and those claims.
Archie Bland
My colleague Archie Bland has this to say in the opening of today’s First Edition newsletter, which has its focus on yesterday’s supreme court ruling:
The supreme court’s judgment was 88 pages long, but in much of the coverage today it has been boiled down to a very blunt conclusion: “The concept of sex is binary”, and as far as equality legislation is concerned, trans women are not women.
That is an oversimplification of a complex ruling yesterday that was careful to say it did not seek to delegitimise the existence of trans people, and insisted it did not represent the triumph of one group over another.
Whatever the court says, though, gender-critical campaigners and many newspaper front pages were clear: this constituted “victory”. Marion Calder, a director of For Women Scotland, said: “If there is a female sign on the door, that is now a single-sex space. That is crystal clear as a result of today’s ruling.”
The decision was meanwhile greeted with deep trepidation and dismay by many trans people, who wondered how such a verdict had been reached without the evidence of a single trans woman being heard by the court.
There have been sensible warnings against over-interpreting the ruling – but there is little doubt that it will have lasting consequences.
You can read more from Archie Bland on the subject here: Thursday briefing – what a landmark supreme court ruling on biological sex does – and doesn’t – mean
Shadow chancellor Mel Stride has highlighted the recent report by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) which suggested business confidence in the UK has dipped severely.
In a post to social media, the recently knighted MP said:
I take no pleasure in the ICAEW’s latest survey, which reveals UK business confidence has slipped into negative territory for the first three months of 2025, thanks to Labour’s anti-business budget.
Tax burden tops the list of concerns for the second quarter in a row, with 56% of businesses saying it’s their greatest challenge. Red tape follows closely, with 43% of companies reporting increased strain. Rising costs and wage pressures continue to squeeze profits, with investment growth remaining sluggish.
Stride added “The full report makes for uncomfortable reading for the Labour chancellor.”
Supreme court ruling ‘enormously consequential’, says chair of Equality and Human Rights Commission
The chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has described yesterday’s ruling by the supreme court over gender recognition and biological sex as “enormously consequential”.
She told listeners of the BBC Radio 4 Today programme “The ruling is enormously consequential, and it does bring clarity, that is undoubtedly the case. It’s a very readable judgment, and organisations should be taking care to read it and to understand that it does bring clarity, helps them decide what they should do.”
With regard to single-sex spaces, she said:
Single-sex services like changing rooms must be based on biological sex. If a male person is allowed to use a women-only service or facility, it isn’t any longer single-sex, then it becomes a mixed-sex space.
But I have to say, there’s no law that forces organisations, service providers, to provide a single-sex space, and there is no law against them providing a third space, an additional space, such as unisex toilets, for example, or changing rooms.
There isn’t any law saying that you cannot use a neutral third space, and they [trans rights organisations] should be using their powers of advocacy to ask for those third spaces.
Falkner said, though, the ruling made it clear that people assigned male at birth cannot take part in women’s sport.
The co-leader of the Green party of England and Wales, Carla Denyer, has accused the government of treating asylum seekers as “like pawns on a chess board.”
Responding to reports that the UK and France are in discussions about a possible migrant return deal, the MP for Bristol Central said:
The government is treating human beings like pawns on a chess board, indifferent to the human suffering caused by this inhumane system. Keeping someone apart from their family, who they’re entitled to join in the UK, as a negotiation tactic, is heartbreaking.
Government needs to instead step up and offer safe and legal routes to pull the rug from the illegal people smugglers. As it stands, many of those with legitimate asylum claims have no legitimate way of reaching the UK – this intolerable situation cannot be allowed to continue.
Health minister Karin Smyth has said there had been “a lot of ill-informed and often quite offensive debate” in recent years around gender and biological sex.
Asked about direct implications of the ruling for where people would be placed on wards in the NHS, she told viewers of ITV’s Good Morning Britain programme:
I think your key word there is compromise. We’ve seen a lot of ill-informed and often quite offensive debate over recent years.
I think that this ruling, clarifying that tin he Equality Act that parliament intended, that sex means biological sex, and that other people with other characteristics are also protected, is welcome. And I hope that compromise, working together, is absolutely the order of the day.
We need to move forward. I think the whole country is generally very supportive of individual rights. We’re a very tolerant society. We do want clarity around the law, and that’s what we’ve received yesterday. So moving forward … making sure we work together to protect all rights.
Smyth said that there was a public misconception about NHS institutions having large wards where people were forced to mingle, saying it was not everywhere, but that “most people don’t see the inside of a hospital ward when they encounter the NHS and where they do, many of those areas have single sex rooms anyway.”
She said she expected “transgender people … also have their dignity and privacy respected” in healthcare settings.
In the judgement delivered yesterday, Lord Hodge said “the unanimous decision of this court is that the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex. But we counsel against reading this judgment as a triumph of one or more groups in our society at the expense of another. It is not.”
Tories call for legislation to codify supreme court gender ruling in law
The shadow paymaster general has welcomed the supreme court rulling yesterday on gender recognition, and called for the government to codify it in law to protect the decision against future court action.
Speaking to GB News, Richard Holden, hailed it as “a very sensible ruling”, and was at pains to point out that it echoed concerns that had been in the Conservative manifesto at the 2024 general election.
He told viewers:
I think it’s a very sensible ruling. It’s something which was in the Conservative manifesto the last general election that we would ensure that the Equality Act in legislation would be defined properly as biological women. That’s exactly what we would have done. The court seems to have done it for us.
I hope that the government reinforces that with legislation as well as we would do, but I think it’s a victory for common sense. I think that now that guidance is going to be absolutely crucial, and they have to get it right on this to ensure that single sex spaces can protect women.
I still think that, rather than relying purely on a court judgment, actually, we should also go further and ensure that is enshrined in legislation like we proposed in the Conservative manifesto too. Belt and braces it. Because I don’t want a court in future to change its mind in this area, although I think the unanimous ruling of the supreme court gives a very clear sense of direction and actually really helps people as well to understand what the thinking is around biological sex.
Minister hopes supreme court ruling on gender will ‘draw a line’ under debate
A minister has said she hopes the outcome of the supreme court’s ruling on the legal definition of the term woman will draw a line under arguments over gender recognition.
Asked if she welcomed the ruling, health minister Karin Smyth told Sky News: “Yes. I think it’s good that we have clarity for women, and the women who brought this case, and for service providers providing services.”
Asked whether she thought the ruling would further inflame arguments, the minister said: “No, I really hope that it does draw a line under it by clarifying what sex means, by clarifying that people have different protected rights under the Equality Act and being very clear to all organisations what that means.”
Questioned on what she would say to trans people worried about the ruling, Smyth said:
Rights remain enshrined in the Equality Act. There are protected characteristics for trans people under the gender recognition part of the Equality Act.
If there are changes to be made, that needs to be looked at carefully with the guidance, but this law was about women’s rights and rights under the Equality Act for [biological] sex, and for service providers making sure they are compliant with that.
Welcome and opening summary …
Good morning, and welcome to our rolling UK politics coverage for Thursday. Here are your headlines …
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Health minister Karin Smyth has said she hopes the outcome of the supreme court’s ruling on the legal definition of the term woman will draw a line under arguments over gender recognition
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Shadow cabinet member Richard Holden called for the government to pass legislation to codify the judgement in
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Ministers are having an “active conversation” with UK pharmaceutical firms about the potential impact of US tariffs
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People are being warned of Easter disruption to the rail network, with over 300 engineering works being undertaken. National Highways said it has removed roadworks from 1,127 miles of motorways and major A roads in England
It is Martin Belam with you again today. You can reach me at martin.belam@theguardian.com if you have spotted typos or what you consider to be errors or omissions.