MP: ‘We must be clear about the definition of women’

Parliament must be “clear and courageous” about the definition of women, a senior MP has stated.

Speaking in the House of Commons, Sir Bernard Jenkin highlighted the Shadow Minister for Women and Equalities’ unwillingness to define the word woman during a radio interview.

The MP for Harwich and North Essex said: “The responsibility for clarity starts with us as legislators. We have to be clear about what words mean in our legislation — but, astonishingly, some of us are reluctant to be clear. A woman is an adult female human.”

‘Threatened’

Sir Bernard, an MP since 1992, also warned that “the rights of women to women-only safe spaces are threatened — safe spaces such as public toilets, women’s hospital wards and women’s prisons”.

A woman is an adult female human

He said “there is a new and growing category of violence against women committed by people who call themselves women but are biologically male”.

The MP quoted Crown Prosecution Service reports stating that over 436 rapes between 2012 and 2018 were perpetrated by women. But he said that since rape can only be committed by men, “these rapes are committed by men presenting themselves as women”.

Government Minister Trudy Harrison welcomed his comments, saying “it is so important we protect the language of females”.

Definitions

Last week, both Labour’s Shadow Minister for Women and Equalities, Anneliese Dodds, and Shadow Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, dodged questions on the definition of women multiple times in radio interviews.

Labour has pledged to remove safeguards in the Gender Recognition Act and enable people to ‘change sex’ by self-declaration. The Party would remove the need for a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria and to have lived as though a member of the opposite sex for at least two years.

Speaking to Emma Barnett on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, Dodds struggled to define what a woman is, in light of listeners’ concerns about the push to change the term’s meaning.

Dodds claimed there were “different definitions legally around what a woman actually is”, listing “the biological definition, legal definition” and “all kinds of things”.