Transgender women are not ‘women’ under equalities law, Supreme Court rules

A big decision.

The court hearing arose after a campaign group For Women Scotland (FWS) contested the Scottish government's definition of a "woman" in laws governing female representation on public boards.

The group argued that extending the definition of a woman to transgender women would impact female equality.

The court hearing was a dispute between the Scottish government and the Scottish charity, however, the Supreme Court concerns the entire nation meaning the ruling is nationwide.

Furthermore, the Equality Act 2010 in reference covers the entirety of Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales).

The ruling was announced by UK Supreme Court judge Lord Hodge he declared that the Equality Act's definition of a woman is based on biological sex.

He said: "The unanimous decision of this court is that the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex."

Lord Hodge counselled that this ruling should not be seen as a triumph for one side over an other and emphasised the protection trans people still have under the law.

The judge said: "But we counsel against reading this judgement as a triumph of one or more groups in our society at the expense of another, it is not."

He added: "As I shall explain later in this hand down speech, the Equality Act 2010 gives transgender people protection, not only against discrimination through the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, but also against direct discrimination, indirect discrimination and harassment in substance in their acquired gender."

The judge explained that after "painstaking analysis", the Equality Act would read in an "incoherent way" if people with Gender Reassignment Certificates were considered "women".

They ruled that issues relating to pregnancy and maternity can only related to biological sex and that other parts of the act reference "certificated sex" as well.