The UK Government has ditched plans to adopt the biological definition of sex in the Equality Act.
In response to a written question from Shadow Paymaster General John Glen, Minister for Women and Equalities Anneliese Dodds stated that the Government “does not plan to amend legal definitions in the act”.
The previous Government had planned to amend the Equality Act 2010 to clarify that “sex” refers to biological sex, rather than gender identity. The Equality and Human Rights Commission has said this would make it simpler for single-sex groups and sport teams to exclude men who identify as women.
Single-sex spaces
Women’s group Sex Matters urged the Government to “listen to women”, as “confusion” around the Equality Act is helping men gain access to “women’s spaces, services and sports”.
It warned: “Men who identify as women are allowed to be Girlguiding leaders, to use women’s showers at the gym and to be employed in jobs where they strip-search women.”
Shadow Minister for Women and Equalities Mims Davies emphasised: “Only by legally enshrining the importance of single-sex spaces can this Labour Government give biological women the clarity, dignity, privacy and safety we need.”
EHRC
Last year, the Equality and Human Rights Commission advised the previous Government to clarify the definition of sex in the Equality Act.
Chairwoman Baroness Falkner of Margravine told former Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch that on balance, redefining ‘sex’ to mean biological sex “would create rationalisations, simplifications, clarity and/or reductions of risk” in a number of current areas of legal dispute.
These included, Lady Falkner said, making it simpler for service providers “to make a women’s-only ward a space for biological women” and for organisers of women’s sport to exclude men who identify as women.
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