Caroline ffiske was a Conservative Councillor for Eight Years. Published on 6 May 2021.

Since last year the Government has been planning to reduce the cost of getting a legal gender change via a 'gender recognition certificate'. This has been widely reported. For example, the BBC said that 'Ministers pledged ... to slash the cost of legally changing gender from £140'. The Times said that 'the fee to make a change to legal gender will be cut from £140...'

Finally the Government Equalities Office confirmed the change via a press release on Tuesday. But in time-honoured fashion, the GEO seems committed to inaccurate language, poor representation of law, and no understanding of basic science. The GEO press release stated that 'the Government hopes that modernising the process of applying will allow more transgender people to legally change their sex with a GRC should they wish to do so'.

The Gender Recognition Act is called the Gender Recognition Act. Its entire preamble setting out terms and purpose refers to gender. There is a reason for this. Language matters. Law needs to be clear. Biology is real. You cannot change sex. The Equality Act and the Gender Recognition Act both recognise situations where people with a gender recognition certificate should not be treated according to their legally acquired gender but rather by reference to their sex. This is overt legal recognition of the biological reality that you cannot change sex. It matters greatly that we hold on to this reality. It matters particularly for women who have fought hard for their sex based rights and single sex spaces and opportunities.

The remit of the Government Equalities Office is to lead work on 'policy relating to women, sexual orientation and transgender equality'. It had plenty of time to prepare this press release. How could it get something so basic, yet so important, wrong? It is not acceptable that the GEO gets in such a muddle over core matters at the very heart of its remit.