'Woman' means female from birth: UK Supreme Court rules in landmark equal rights case

Britain’s Supreme Court on Wednesday issued a major judgement that can reshape sex based rights across the UK, ruling that the term “woman” in the Equality Act 2010 refers specifically to a person’s biological sex at birth.

In the unanimous decision, five senior judges declared that under the act, both “woman” and “sex” refer to biological females , siding with the Scottish gender-critical group For Women Scotland (FWS), which appealed the case.

The ruling came as a blow to those believing legal gender recognition should guarantee full inclusion under the law’s protections for women. However, the court made clear that those identifying as transgenders are still protected against discrimination under other provisions of the act.

Aidan O’Neill KC, who represented FWS in the appeal urged the court to take in consideration "the facts of biological reality rather than the fantasies of legal fiction."


LGBTQ+ activists have long argued that if the court ruled in favour of the gender critic campaigners, trans women will no longer be able to access benefits to many facilities including women’ shelters.

The decision followed years of legal tussle between the Scottish Government and FWS, the group believing that only those born as women should be legally protected as “women.”

Figuring out ‘women’

The debate was aimed to interpret the implication of the Equality Act 2010, which protected characteristics including sex, gender and described woman as a “female of any age,” AFP reported.

Scottish government believed that anyone who has transitioned to a female and has acquired a Gender Recognition Certificate, can be defined as a women under the Equality Act. On the other hand, FWS stood their ground believing that biological sex at birth is unchangeable and holds more importance than their gender identification. Hence arguing that trans women should not posses same legal protections as women who were born female.

The group approached the Supreme Court in November, launching a challenge against 2018 Scottish legislation, which was meant to hire more women in public sectors, however, it also included trans women who had a GRC.

GRC or Gender Recognition Certificate was introduced under the 2004 Gender Recognisation Act, allowing people to change their gender, identifying as a man or a woman.