Britain’s Conservatives will explicitly define sex as biological in the Equality Act if they win the election on July 4, aiming to resolve an “ambiguity” that they claim jeopardises the safety of women and girls, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced.
Ahead of the vote, the Conservatives are focusing on key issues to secure their core voter base, including policies on protecting pensioners, tackling illegal immigration, and introducing mandatory national service for 18-year-olds.
“The safety of women and girls is too important to allow the current confusion around definitions of sex and gender to persist,” the party said. They argue that this will strengthen protections for women and girls while ensuring privacy and dignity for all.
Policy Implications and Reactions
The Conservatives assert that this legislative change will strengthen protections while respecting the privacy and dignity of everyone in society. Trailing the opposition Labour Party by approximately 20 percentage points in the polls, the Conservatives argue that the existing confusion has made single-sex service providers susceptible to challenges and legal actions.
John Healey, Labour’s defence policy chief, stated on Monday that the law does not require alteration; instead, clearer guidance for service providers is necessary. The 2010 Equality Act already permits service providers to offer single-sex and separate-sex services such as toilets, domestic abuse refuges, and changing rooms where justified and proportionate. When justified, providers may also exclude transgender individuals with Gender Recognition Certificates (GRC), the government has previously stated. A GRC changes a transgender person’s sex for most legal purposes.
The Conservatives clarified that the proposed legal change would not remove existing protections against discrimination based on gender reassignment. Those with a GRC would still have their sex align with their acquired gender in law outside the Equality Act, such as in marriage law, maintaining the current status quo, they said.
(With information from Reuters)
