Transgender women will be banned from single-sex public spaces under new guidance to be published by the UK’s equalities watchdog, reports say.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is set to submit its statutory guidance to ministers this month in response to the UK Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling that trans women are not legally women under the Equality Act.
The new guidance appears to be similar to its interim guidance issued in the wake of the ruling, which has been criticised by trans rights campaigners as discriminatory and has seen legal challenges launched against it.
According to The Times, the guidance will mean trans women will be banned from spaces such as women’s toilets and changing rooms.
It will apply to any organisation that provides a service to the public, including schools, shops, hospitals, prisons, leisure centres and government departments.
Private organisations or charities will also be subject to the guidance if they are providing a public service, and it is also reported that it will say transgender people can be excluded from single-sex sporting competitions.
The EHRC told The Times that the code has not yet been finalised, but that it will “remain consistent with the law as set out by the Supreme Court”.
The guidance will be submitted to Bridget Phillipson, the women and equalities minister, who will approve it if she deems it to be in line with the law, before putting it before parliament.
Trans rights campaigners have criticised the EHRC for its handling of the ruling, with legal challenges brought against the watchdog over its interpretation of the law.
The Good Law Project is one group that has launched legal action against the EHRC, arguing the guidance “goes far beyond” what the For Women Scotland judgment requires.
It argues: “It amounts to a bathroom ban for trans people, violating people’s right to privacy in their everyday lives.”
Following reports detailing the watchdog’s updated guidance, the Good Law Project executive director, Jo Maugham, said: “The EHRC’s guidance is subject to legal challenge – a hearing is scheduled for later this year – and a court will decide whether it is compatible with the Equality Act.
“Given the evident hostility of the guidance to the rights and dignities of trans people we are confident the Commission will lose.”
Campaigners have also criticised the EHRC’s consultation process, questioning how 50,000 responses could have been analysed so quickly.
The Good Law Project also wrote to the EHRC, accusing them of “ignoring” transgender people’s views as it used artificial intelligence to categorise the replies.
A spokesperson for the EHRC told The Independent: “We are using a combination of approaches to analyse the responses received to our consultation. With more than 50,000 responses received, we have commissioned an external supplier to support us in analysing them. Our approach will involve supervised use of AI alongside our expert legal assessment to ensure a balance of robustness, accuracy and speed, including promoting consistency and helping to avoid bias in managing this scale of responses.”
The Times reported the guidance, which is still being finalised, will not say services must provide single-sex spaces, but that if they do, they must only be used by biological women.
It will also reportedly allow services to request birth certificates and make inquiries about a person’s birth sex, but this could be discriminatory if not handled in a sensitive way.
The guidance will also say services need to consider if there is an alternative for trans people to use, and that, in cases such as toilets, it would not be proportionate to leave a trans person with no facilities.
A spokesman said: “The code of practice has not yet been finalised. We received an extremely high volume of responses to the consultation and are grateful to everyone who shared their feedback.
“To ensure we give these responses the consideration they merit, we are working at pace to analyse them and are amending the draft code of practice text where necessary to make it as clear and helpful as possible.
“But our code will remain consistent with the law as set out by the Supreme Court.”
