No doubt about it: this report is good. Or rather, the detail’s not bad.

Far more important is the fact that it has happened at all: that Parliament has finally, some 15 years after political campaigning on trans issues, got going in earnest, accepted gender and transgender issues as the serious business of politics. That is a genuine milestone moment, for which, thank you Ms Miller and all your committee.

It is good to note that MPs are now officially aware of what, for most who sit within the traditional trans narrative – “wrong body, medical intervention, transition” – is commonplace. Struggle: with the NHS; within the workplace; on the street; just one darn thing after another. And we are so tired of it. Never quite knowing when we will find our world turned upside down by this or that inane bureaucrat.

LGBT+ rights around the globe Show all 9 1 /9 LGBT+ rights around the globe LGBT+ rights around the globe Russia Russia’s antipathy towards homosexuality has been well established following the efforts of human rights campaigners. However, while it is legal to be homosexual, LGBT couples are offered no protections from discrimination. They are also actively discriminated against by a 2013 law criminalising LGBT “propaganda” allowing the arrest of numerous Russian LGBT activists. AFP/Getty LGBT+ rights around the globe Brunei Brunei recently introduced a law to make sodomy punishable by stoning to death. It was already illegal and punishable by up to 10 years in prison AFP/Getty LGBT+ rights around the globe Mauritania Men who are found having sex with other men face stoning, while lesbians can be imprisoned, under Sharia law. However, the state has reportedly not executed anyone for this ‘crime’ since 1987 Alamy LGBT+ rights around the globe Sudan Both male and female same-sex sexual activity is illegal under Sudanese law. Men can be executed on their third offence, women on their fourth Getty LGBT+ rights around the globe Saudi Arabia Homosexuality and gender realignment is illegal and punishable by death, imprisonment, whipping and chemical castration Getty LGBT+ rights around the globe Yemen The official position within the country is that there are no gays. LGBT inviduals, if discovered by the government, are likely to face intense pressure. Punishments range from flogging to the death penalty Getty LGBT+ rights around the globe Nigeria Both male and female same-sex sexual activity is illegal and in some northern states punishable with death by stoning. This is not a policy enacted across the entire country, although there is a prevalent anti-LGBT agenda pushed by the government. In 2007 a Pew survey established that 97% of the population felt that homosexuality should not be accepted. It is punishable by 14 years in prison Reuters LGBT+ rights around the globe Somalia Homosexuality was established as a crime in 1888 and under new Somali Penal Code established in 1973 homosexual sex can be punishable by three years in prison. A person can be put to death for being a homosexual Reuters LGBT+ rights around the globe Iraq Although same-sex relationships have been decriminalised, much of the population still suffer from intense discrimination. Additionally, in some of the country over-run by the extremist organisation Isis, LGBT individuals can face death by stoning Getty

Because while the powers that be began to gift us with “rights” a decade or so back, these are mostly negatives: the right not to be assaulted, abused, discriminated against just for being trans. Forgive me if I am slightly underwhelmed.

The process of turning those rights into practical detail has hardly started: many of the difficulties that afflict trans people nowadays result from systems and processes not getting the practical stuff right. It is to be hoped that this is the beginning of meaningful change.

It is wonderful, too, that Parliament has woken up to the fact of a non-traditional narrative – the non-binary, the gender-fluid – which sits, also, under the trans umbrella, but is beset by a host of other, different challenges. At base: how to exist without gender in a society that demands you identify yourself as male or female, while providing little (or no) legal protection for those who don’t.

A harder challenge and one that the Civil Service is likely to drag its heels on. But it, too, is now on the agenda.

Last, but by no means least, it is highly apt that this inquiry should be conducted under the auspices of the Women’s Committee. For gender may remain a helpful, albeit fallible guide in some circumstances – childbirth, for instance. Yet even more decades after sex discrimination was supposedly abolished, women remain woefully discriminated against. The roots of that discrimination are nourished by a society that considers gender matters an essential detail to be filed, stamped, indexed, and generally pushed upon every individual without exception.

Why? Because of security? Hardly. It’s more to do with mindset and “the proper way to do things” – no pink toys for boys! – and shaking up the gender landscape is likely to have beneficial effects far beyond the trans community.