Legal system
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Anneliese Dodds must listen to women
Anneliese Dodds, the Minister for Women and Equalities, has said in response to a written question asking whether the government plans to amend the legal definition of what a woman is: “We are proud of the Equality Act and the rights and protections it affords women. The Government does...
9th September 2024
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Council admits discriminating against social worker over her gender-critical views
Cambridgeshire county council has paid social work manager Lizzy Pitts £54,000 in compensation after admitting discriminating against her for her gender-critical views.
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Equal Treatment Bench Book – July 2024 edition
This edition represents the first major revision for three years.
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The five tests that must be passed before any new law banning “conversion practices”
The government has announced in the King’s speech that a “draft bill will be brought forward to ban conversion practices”. In the briefing notes accompanying the King’s speech the government says: “There is genuine cross party and cross society consensus to see these practices banned”. Of course there is...
17th July 2024
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EHRC issues guidance on discriminatory adverts
As the EHRC says, an advert is a notice or announcement – written or oral – promoting a job opportunity, product, service or event. Adverts might appear in newspapers or magazines, on the television or radio, in shop windows or emails or on a website. They can also appear...
16th July 2024
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Sex matters and the new government
The UK has a new prime minister and we now know there will be a new Labour government, with a significant majority in the House of Commons. The Labour Party has pledged to provide greater support for victims of violence against women and greater protection for women’s rights at...
5th July 2024
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New poll finds voters want to make the Equality Act clear
As reported in the Telegraph, Daily Mail, Express and Sun today, voters across the political spectrum are more supportive of making the Equality Act clear than making it easier for people to change their birth certificates. Sex Matters commissioned a representative survey from an independent polling company to find...
1st July 2024
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Briefing on new poll on sex and gender
The law on sex and gender: what policies do the public want? Results of Sex Matters poll.
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Applying for a gender-recognition certificate: the facts
Is the process “intrusive, outdated and humiliating”? We examine the evidence.
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Another fall in public support for changing sex on birth certificates
The latest results from the annual British Social Attitudes survey show a further fall in support for the law that allows people to change the sex recorded on their birth certificate. It seems that the more this is talked about, the less people like it. Each year the British...
12th June 2024
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This damning judgment should be a wake-up call for the women’s sector
Adams v Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre This week, an employment tribunal ruled that caseworker Roz Adams was subjected to unlawful discrimination and constructive dismissal by Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre (ERCC). The tribunal agreed with Adams’ description of what she had suffered as a “heresy hunt” at the hands of...
22nd May 2024
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The government wants examples of bad guidance on single-sex services
Send in the evidence! The government has issued a call for the public to input evidence of bad policies and guidance on single-sex services. UPDATE: Read Sex Matters’ guidance on how to submit evidence The Equality Act allows for clear single-sex services – including everyday facilities like toilets, showers ...
2nd May 2024
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Legal opinion says promotion policy discriminates on basis of gender-critical beliefs
Earlier this year Sex Matters was approached by Dr John Armstrong, a reader in mathematics at King’s College London (KCL). Dr Armstrong was applying for promotion, but was concerned that the “EDI” (equality, diversity and inclusion) section of the application, which required applicants to demonstrate their commitment to ideas...
20th April 2024
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Counsel’s opinion in the matter of King’s College London academic promotions criteria
KCL’s promotion policy discriminates on the basis of gender-critical beliefs, and will also be likely to contravene the new law on academic freedom due to come into force in August 2024.
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Digital verification services
– how the government can solve the problem about sex (or else sleepwalk into chaos)
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A Woman’s Guide to the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021
A brief guide to what the Act says, and other relevant legal references, explaining when you are entitled to free legal advice, and ways to find it.
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“Misgendering” and the Scottish Hate Crime Act
On 1st April, the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act came into force. The law has generated headlines across the world, mainly due to concerns about its potential impact on freedom of speech; in particular, gender-critical speech. One of the most controversial aspects is the extension of so-called...
5th April 2024
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What does the law say about “gender-questioning children” in schools?
An analysis of the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s response to the Department for Education’s draft guidance for schools on gender-questioning children. See all our updates about this guidance.
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Health and Equality Acts (Amendment) Bill – briefing
This private member’s bill‘s second reading is on the House of Commons agenda for the morning of Friday 15th March 2024. This single-page briefing explains why it’s important.
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Will you ask your MP to support a bill to protect women and children?
This Friday a private member’s bill in the House of Commons presents MPs with a chance to discuss changing the law to clarify the meaning of “sex” in the Equality Act, stop the social transitioning of children in schools and ban healthcare providers from prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex...
11th March 2024
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Bias at the BBC
What’s the issue? The BBC’s director of complaints has ruled that the presenter Justin Webb broke the BBC’s rules on impartiality when he commented, in a discussion about a women’s chess tournament on Radio 4’s Today programme, that “trans women” are male. This is shocking behaviour from the BBC:...
1st March 2024
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Lords debate conversion therapy
On Friday 9th February 2024 Baroness Burt’s Private Member’s Bill proposing a ban on “conversion therapy” was debated in the House of Lords. Twenty-nine peers spoke against it and fifteen in favour. This was the first time some important arguments had been heard in Parliament. While those in favour...
21st February 2024
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How identity politics infiltrated the judiciary
Laurie Wastell writes for The Spectator about the Equal Treatment Bench Book, quoting Sex Matters.
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Police SEEN UK
UK policing’s national sex equality and equity network, launched in January 2024 with a mission to restore fairness, impartiality and trust to policing. For all serving police officers and police staff who hold lawful sex-realist and gender-critical beliefs. Aims to ensure that police forces return focus to the Peelian...
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Sex and the police: confusion over the law and state-sanctioned sexual assault
Update on the review into activism and impartiality in policing HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) has today published a letter with interim findings from his review of the politicisation of the police, which was started in September 2023 at the request of the Home...
10th January 2024
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State sanctioned sexual assault: women pay the price for policing beyond the law
In December 2021, the Police Chiefs' Council approved a policy that permitted officers to strip and even intimately search suspects of the opposite sex if they self-identified as the same “gender” as the person being searched.
The WRN confirmed that of the 47 forces consulted, 35 have implemented, or are... -
Gender-critical civil society submits report to GREVIO on sex and the law
Sex Matters, Fair Play For Women and Transgender Trend, together with LGB Alliance, the Women’s Rights Network, For Women Scotland and Merched Cymru, have submitted a report on the UK’s implementation of the Istanbul Convention. The Istanbul Convention is about violence against women The “Istanbul Convention” is the Council of...
31st December 2023
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Sex and the law in December 2023 – a briefing
Briefing from Sex Matters for a meeting of the Women and Equalities Committee on 13th December 2023
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Resisting violations of women-only spaces
The chair of Sex Matters’ board, barrister Naomi Cunningham, was asked to speak at a conference in Edinburgh on Tuesday 5th December to celebrate the first anniversary of the opening of Beira’s Place. Beira’s Place, based in Edinburgh but covering the whole Lothian region, is a trauma-informed service for...
7th December 2023
