Updated on 28 May 2026
In 2022 the gender-critical (anti-trans) advocacy group "For Women Scotland" sought a judicial review of statutory guidance issued by the Scottish Government relating to the meaning of "sex" in the Equality Act 2010. This eventually led to the case "For Women Scotland Ltd v The Scottish Ministers" being debated by the UK Supreme Court in November 2024, with a ruling being issued in April 2025; the Supreme Court ruled in favour of For Women Scotland.
The ruling by the Supreme Court had the effect of changing the interpretation of "sex" in the Equality Act 2010 from "legal sex" (sex as defined by birth certificate, which for trans people with a GRC was their acquired gender) to "biological sex" (which has not been clearly defined). It also effectively nullified the ability of trans people without a GRC to be treated as though they had one (since you can't legally ask a trans person if they have a GRC and therefore had to assume that they did) because holding a GRC is no longer relevant for equalities law. A revised code of practice for interpreting equalities law was subsequently issued by the UK Equalities and Human Rights Commission, with a draft version being made available in September 2025 and the final version sent to Parliament for approval in May 2026.
The impact of this change for trans people is substantial. Under this revised interpretation, transfeminine people will always be treated as male, and transmasculine people will always be treated as female, regardless of whether they hold a GRC or not. People may also be excluded from sex-segregated areas based on perceived sex due to the distress this might cause others (e.g. a trans man can be excluded from mens spaces due to being considered female, and also excluded from female spaces due to being perceived as male). Provision of non-segregated facilities is permitted to allow trans people to have a space they can safely and legally use, but businesses appear to be entitled to omit these spaces if they believe the omission is proportionately reasonable (and in practice large numbers of establishments are likely to omit the provision of this space). This will often put trans people in a situation where there is no facility available for them to use (e.g. most pubs and restaurants in the UK do not have gender-neutral toilets, making it hard for trans people to safely visit those establishments) which has the impact of pushing trans people out of public life. It is likely to also impact cis people who have non-stereotypical gender presentations (e.g. butch women).
For example: The company you work for is having a social gathering at a nearby pub which will last all evening. Due to the length of the gathering, you will almost certainly need to pee at least once, but the pub does not offer any bathroom that you can safely and legally use; it is a listed building and constructing an extra bathroom is too costly for the business so they consider it proportionate not to provide a non-segregated toilet. Because of this, the Equality Act 2010 effectively pushes you to turn down the invitation and stay at home rather than attending the social gathering. Your coworkers get to have a fun evening at the pub while you have to stay at home and miss the event.
While it is possible that this situation would not be considered proportionately reasonable, the trans person would likely have to take the business to court at their own expense in order to get a judgement on this, which is not something that the vast majority of trans people can afford to do.
The revised guidance puts trans, intersex and gender non-conforming people in a very difficult position where they are effectively treated as second-class and third-sex citizens, and they will often be forced to decide to either (A) accept exclusion from society as a result, or (B) ignore the guidance entirely; in this situation most people are likely to go with option B where possible as it is the only option available that is not self-denigrating. Sometimes going with option B will not be realistic, and the person will end up having to stay at home rather than being able to participate normally in society - the act of Parliament designed to try to improve equality ends up substantially reducing it instead.
Issuing guidance like this helps to legitimize anti-trans behaviours, suggesting to the public that treating trans people poorly is not just acceptable, but is in fact the correct thing to do. Pushing this viewpoint into the mainstream has caused the rate of transphobic bullying to rise substantially (as well as the rate of trans people comitting suicide in the UK due to poor treatment); the revision of this guidance is likely to make the situation even worse.
In addition to causing confusion and distress, and putting trans and intersex people at substantially increased risk, the decision by the UK Supreme Court on this case, along with the subsequent revised guidance that followed on from it, appears to put the United Kingdom in breach of its international human rights obligations. The revised interpretation of the Equality Act 2010 seems to be incompatible with Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (as per Christine Goodwin v United Kingdom 2002). This would also imply that the revised interpretation of the Equality Act 2010 is legally incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998.
At the moment there seems to be no desire from the UK government to issue revisions or corrections to the Equality Act 2010 to resolve the situation adequately. This is unsurprising to me, as there is a large amount of anti-trans sentiment in the United Kingdom which makes it difficult for any incumbent government to be supportive (it is currently political suicide for the government to be pro-trans). Because of this, I expect that the guidance will remain as-is for the time being.
Assuming that the UK is not removed from the European Convention on Human Rights by a future Reform UK government, I strongly suspect this will end up going back to Strasbourg in an attempt to force the UK to honour its international human rights obligations. In the meantime, my intention is to try to avoid situations which may cause unintended controversy, with a priority focus being to keep myself as safe as possible.
Please do NOT contact me regarding this because you will just be directed back to this page.