Trans Women Not 'Women' Under Equality Law : UK Supreme Court
'Women' mean only biological females as per the Equality Act, the Court said.;
The United Kingdom Supreme Court has ruled that trans women, including those who possess a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC), are not covered by the section 11 Equality Act 2010 definition of "woman." The Act's protected characteristic of "sex," the Court ruled, is only biological sex, thereby limiting equality protections in cases where the statute refers to "woman" as a category.The...
The United Kingdom Supreme Court has ruled that trans women, including those who possess a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC), are not covered by the section 11 Equality Act 2010 definition of "woman." The Act's protected characteristic of "sex," the Court ruled, is only biological sex, thereby limiting equality protections in cases where the statute refers to "woman" as a category.
The Court stated in the judgement that, “For all these reasons, we conclude that the Guidance issued by the Scottish Government is incorrect. A person with a GRC in the female gender does not come within the definition of 'woman' for the purposes of sex discrimination in section 11 of the EA 2010. That in turn means that the definition of 'woman' in section 2 of the 2018 Act, which Scottish Ministers accept must bear the same meaning as the term 'woman' in section 11 and section 212 of the EA 2010, is limited to biological women and does not include trans women with a GRC.”
“Because it is so limited, the 2018 Act does not stray beyond the exception permitted in section L2 of Schedule 5 to the Scotland Act into reserved matters. Therefore, construed in the way that we have held it is to be construed, the 2018 Act is within the competence of the Scottish Parliament and can operate to encourage the participation of women in senior positions in public life,” the Court added.
The ruling was delivered on 16 April 2025 by a five-judge bench comprising Lord Reed (President), Lord Hodge (Deputy President), Lord Lloyd-Jones, Lady Rose, and Lady Simler in a petition which concerned the legality of revised statutory guidance issued under the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018.
The case arose after For Women Scotland Ltd, a feminist advocacy group, challenged guidance issued by the Scottish Ministers in April 2022. That guidance had interpreted the term “woman” in the 2018 Act to include trans women who had obtained a GRC under the Gender Recognition Act 2004. This inclusion was based on the assumption that once a GRC is issued, a person's gender “becomes for all purposes” the acquired gender, under section 9(1) of the GRA 2004.
The appellant argued that such an interpretation unlawfully altered the meaning of a reserved matter under the Scotland Act 1998, namely “equal opportunities”, by extending the definition of “woman” beyond biological sex.
The Scottish Government, in response, argued that the revised guidance was lawful because a person with a GRC legally becomes female and is therefore entitled to be counted within the category of “woman” under the Equality Act 2010 and the 2018 Act.
The Court rejected that position, holding instead that the words “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 must be interpreted biologically, notwithstanding the provisions of the GRA 2004.
The justices confirmed that while the GRA 2004 does change a person's legal gender for many purposes, it does not displace the biological meaning of “sex” in contexts governed by the EA 2010.
By affirming that “woman” under the 2010 Act means a biological woman, the Court also concluded that the definition in section 2 of the 2018 Act, which the Scottish Ministers had accepted must mirror the EA 2010, is also limited to biological women.
The Court ruled, “There may well be public boards on which it is also important for trans people of either or both genders to be represented in order to ensure that their perspective is brought to bear in the board's deliberations and in the organisation's governance. Nothing in this judgment is intended to discourage the appointment of trans people to public boards or to minimise the importance of addressing their under-representation on such boards.”
“The issue here is only whether the appointment of a trans woman who has a GRC counts as the appointment of a woman and so counts towards achieving the goal set in the gender representation objective, namely that the board has 50% of non-executive members who are women. In our judgment it does not,” the Court concluded.
Case Title: For Women Scotland Ltd v. The Scottish Ministers