The UK is pretty easy breezy in its attitudes towards LGBTQ+ people and their rights, right? Same-sex marriage was legalised in 2014, 46 of our MPs identify as LGBTQ+, and we’re able to watch RuPaul’s Drag Race UK on the BBC for goodness sake. But you just need to look at the statistics to see we're not the progressive, inclusive and accepting country we think we are.

One in five LGBTQ+ people, and two in five trans people, have experienced a hate crime in the past year because of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity. And we've seen an increase in ‘gender critical feminist’ campaign groups and ' TERFs ', who have sprung up in the past two years specifically to oppose reforms to the Gender Recognition Act - a law that seriously needs updating to enable trans and non-binary people to have their true gender legally recognised in a simpler, less dehumanising way.

Just five years ago the UK was ranked first by Rainbow Europe , meaning it was the best country for LGBTQ+ equality. The index looked at how a country’s laws impact the lives and rights of the LGBTQ+ people living in it. In 2018, we had dropped to fourth place. In 2019, we plummeted to seventh and were awarded a score of just 65% (0% being a gross violation of human rights, 100% being respect of human rights and full equality). “Sadly, this year, we see concrete evidence of roll-back at political and legislative levels in a growing number of countries,” ILGA-Europe’s Executive Director, Evelyne Paradis told The Independent . “There is no more time to waste.”

What does this have to do with the Gender Recognition Act?

When we look at the countries topping the Rainbow Index, like Malta and Norway, there is one huge distinction. Their laws that allow trans people to have their true gender legally recognised are simple and streamlined. Ireland's current system means trans people can change their legal gender by statutory self-declaration. Ours - known as the Gender Recognition Act (GRA) - was passed 14 years ago and requires trans people to receive a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria, which is still treated as a mental illness. It’s criticised by LGBTQ+ people and organisations for being dehumanising, bureaucratic, expensive and leaving non-binary people out altogether.

Jena Ardell

In 2017, the UK government confirmed this with the results of its ‘LGBT Survey’ which found current gender recognition laws do not adequately serve trans people - only 12% have used the process to have their gender legally recognised. This led to the government making a commitment to reform the act, with suggestions that trans people would be able to self-identify being backed by a number of MPs, including Theresa May.

Worryingly, the proposed reforms have been met with resistance from certain ‘gender critical’ campaign groups like Fair Play for Women . The pressure group, which believes a person can only be male or female, “strongly opposes these proposed changes because it will seriously undermine the meaning of what it is to be legally female and a woman.” It also believes “ self-ID would have a disastrous impact on women’s safety, privacy and dignity.”

So to cut through the misinformation, myths and let’s call a spade a spade: transphobic rhetoric, here’s a comprehensive guide to the Gender Recognition Act reforms and what they really mean for trans and cisgender people.

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What is the Gender Recognition Act?

The current Gender Recognition Act 2004 allows transgender people to change their legal gender by applying for a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC). Once a trans person has a GRC they can change their name and gender on their birth certificate - which allows them to be legally recognised as either male or female.

To apply for a GRC you currently have to:

Be 18 or over

Receive a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria , which is still classified as a mental illness

, which is still classified as a mental illness Prove you’ve ‘lived in role’ of your ‘acquired gender’ for two years

Pay £140 fee, which is more expensive than a marriage certificate, driving licence or passport

You do not have to:

Undergo any surgery

Take any hormones

Undergo any form of medical treatment

After applying, the next step is a Gender Recognition Panel. This involves a panel of medical and legal experts who decide whether to legally recognise your gender. There are no opportunities to present your case face-to-face, and you will never meet or even speak to the panel. If your application is successful, you will receive a GRC. If it is not, you will never know why or receive any feedback.

Why is the Gender Recognition Act being reformed?

“The way the system is currently set up means it's incredibly intrusive,” says Laura Russell, Director of Campaigns, Policy and Research at Stonewall . “The medicalisation of trans identities feeds into a wider narrative that being trans is a condition, and it’s something you have to prove over and over again. You have to jump through an incredible amount of hoops, including medical ones, and submit a lot of evidence about your life to a panel that you'll never get to meet.”

The current system also only allows you to change your gender marker from male to female, or female to male. “Non-binary people can't have their gender recognised under the current legislation,” Laura says. And as young people under 18 aren’t able to access legal gender recognition, this can make it incredibly hard for them while navigating big life changes. “Say you're going from school to college and want all of your exam certificates to be issued with the right gender marker, or you want your university application process to be as smooth as possible. At the moment, we're not allowing for those people to be able to go into those new situations with all their documents aligning,” she adds.

This can be incredibly distressing for some trans and non-binary people, and fundamentally erases their identity. “It's constantly having to go about your life not being recognised as who you are,” Laura explains. “Every time you want to travel. Every time you have to present a bit of documentation. If you go to the post office to pick up a parcel, there's something on [your ID] that somebody else is seeing that’s misrepresenting you as a person. That's going to have a huge impact on your life because you're constantly having to explain. People should people should have documentation that reflects their identity.”



Theresa May spoke of her commitment to GRA reforms at PinkNews Awards in 2017 Handout

Cara English, Policy Engagement at Gendered Intelligence tells Cosmopolitan UK, “For me [GRA reforms] would mean being able to marry my partner, who I have been together with for six years now and through transition, without having to be called a ‘husband’ in the ceremony.”

Lis Rowe and her fiancé are both trans, and therefore both need to get a GRC before they can get married. “It's expensive so it's not been something we've really looked at doing until other things are sorted, like getting moved out into our own place,” she tells Cosmopolitan UK. But not having her gender legally recognised also comes with other concerns surrounding the safety of trans people. “If I get arrested am I going to be put into a men's prison with breasts and vulva? My hubby doesn't want bottom surgery, if he gets a GRC and gets arrested, would he be placed in a men’s prison with vulva?”

Which MPs are on board with the reforms?

The announcement of the reforms came after the 2016 Women and Equalities Committee report, which was chaired by Conservative MP Maria Miller .

MP Maria Miller chaired the committee that announced the reforms Rosie Hallam

As Laura explains, “The reforms have loads of cross-party support. It's Labour party policy and it's Liberal Democrat Party policy. Theresa May, when she was Prime Minister said that being trans should no longer be treated as a mental illness , and stated her commitment to [the reforms]. When she was in Minister for Women and Equalities, Penny Mourdant was incredibly committed to pushing forward.”

So it seems the GRA reforms have support across all of parliament, as Laura says, it’s just “a case of getting it published.”

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When is the Gender Recognition Act being reformed?

The government made a commitment to streamline and de-medicalise the process, and announced a public consultation in 2017 . We know there were more than 100,000 responses, but since the consultation closed in October 2018 no results have been published.

So for now, we’re waiting on news as to what happens next. A Government Equalities Office Spokesperson told Cosmopolitan UK, "It is vital that the next steps on any potential reform of the Gender Recognition Act are carefully planned, and have the right backing so they can have a positive impact on the adult trans community in the UK. We will announce more detail on our proposed next steps in due course."

At the PinkNews Awards in October 2019, Baroness Williams, who was Minister for Women and Equalities at the time, said she remained "committed to the reform of the GRA.” She added, “I want as minister [of state] for equalities to live in a world where people at work and at home can be who they are."

Since, Conservative MP Liz Truss has become Minister for Women and Equalities, meaning she is now in charge of GRA reforms. As PinkNews reported in May 2020, her appointment and speeches about how she plans to roll out the reforms has caused "deep concern" to trans rights in the UK. On May 18, Tory peer Baroness Nicholson tweeted a letter from Truss, that stated she has made a "commitment to protecting single sex spaces for women and girls". This is in response to anti-trans arguments that trans people entering single sex spaces puts cisgender women at risk (this is detailed further below in under myths and misinformation surrounding the reforms.)

In the meantime, the government says it is commissioning research on non-binary experiences as part of the LGBT Action Plan announced back in July 2019. This research should be used to inform any decisions about legal reforms. But Laura says the long gap between the announcement of reform and any further clarity has allowed for misinformation to spread. “That's having an incredibly damaging impact on trans people at the moment,” she says. Speaking of the transphobic narratives currently being pushed by the national press she says, “You just have to see like endless articles which misrepresent [trans people]. So the sooner the government publishes [the recommendations], the better.”

What will the reforms look like?

To be honest, no one really knows exactly what the reforms will look like in practice. But we do know the government’s aim is to make gaining legal gender recognition simpler. “Trans and non-binary people are members of our society and should be treated with respect. Trans people already have the right to legally change their gender, and there is no suggestion of this right being removed,” the government has said . It explained the reforms are simply trying to set right how the government “might make the existing process under the Gender Recognition Act a better service for those trans and non-binary people who wish to use it.”

"This is a small change that would just make a small part of people's lives a little easier"

“The reforms are just about making sure that this process, which is time consuming and costly and invasive, is a little simpler for trans people,” Laura says. “Access to health care is incredibly limited and there are huge waiting lists. This is a small change that would just make a small part of people's lives a little easier.”

Stonewall’s recommendations include:

Ending the requirement to provide medical evidence to support your gender identity

Introducing self-determination in line with Ireland, Norway, Malta and Argentina

Legal recognition for non-binary people

Lower the age to access gender recognition to 16

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Myths and misinformation surrounding the reforms

The impacts of the GRA reform have been wildly overstated by Fair Play for Women and other ‘gender critical feminist’ minority groups, which aren't long-standing organisations and exist for the sole purpose of fighting the reforms.

But the truth is: If you’re not trans, the reforms won’t affect you. And it's incredibly damaging that the conversation around these changes has - in some spaces i.e. online - become framed by cisgender people's concerns, rather than the needs of trans people.

These groups claim the GRA reform will put cisgender women at risk, and impact on their safety by giving trans people to access women-only spaces like rape crisis centres, refuges and prisons. But trans people have been able to legally access single-sex spaces (with a few exceptions) since the Equality Act was passed in 2010. The Gender Recognition Act is a completely different piece of legislation all together. The government had previously confirmed loud and clear that there will be no changes to the Equality Act.



However, in a speech in April 2020, Liz Truss said, "We’ve been doing a lot of work internally, making sure we’re in a position to respond to that consultation and launch what we propose to do on the future of the Gender Recognition Act. We will be in a position to do that by the summer, and there are three very important principles that I will be putting place."

The first she mention was "the protection of single-sex spaces", adding, "which is extremely important." She continued, "Secondly making sure that transgender adults are free to live their lives as they wish without fear of persecution, whilst maintaining the proper checks and balances in the system.

"Finally, which is not a direct issue concerning the Gender Recognition Act, but is relevant, making sure that the under 18s are protected from decisions that they could make, that are irreversible in the future. I believe strongly that adults should have the freedom to lead their lives as they see fit, but I think it’s very important that while people are still developing their decision-making capabilities that we protect them from making those irreversible decisions."

“Single sex spaces, like women’s refuges, undertake risk assessments to determine who is safe to enter. They have to do this, otherwise they could unwittingly unleash an abusive or violent lesbian on their female partner who is seeking refuge. That won’t change,” Helen Belcher of Trans Media Watch previously told Gay Star News .

These groups also claim men will use the reformed laws to legally change gender, enter single-sex spaces and harm cisgender women. As Lis explains, “The myths that someone would get a GRC for whatever dumb reason is ridiculous, it's a legal document done in a legal setting, and doing it fraudulently would be just that: fraud. It's never happened in any of the countries that have it. But that won't stop the 'concern', which is really just trans people (women) having rights to a legal sex at all.”

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Since the Irish government passed a law enabling trans people to self-identify by statutory self-declaration in 2015, no such issues have been reported. In research undertaken by The Guardian “there was no evidence of the legislation leading to individuals – in particular teenagers – being pressured to undertake medical transition, or men falsely declaring themselves female in order to invade women-only spaces, as some feminist activists have feared.”

This is also the case in Scotland where reforms have been discussed. “Scottish Women’s Aid and Rape Crisis Scotland have become trans-inclusive without any problems occurring, demonstrating that improving trans equality is fully compatible with improving women’s equality, and avoided misunderstandings about legal reform,” James Morton, manager of the Scottish Trans Alliance told the newspaper.

Cara believes the “debate” around the reforms has been used as an unnecessary distraction. “I think it says everything that something as minor as updating a piece of law to make it less difficult, less onerous and less exclusionary is causing such a stink. I don't think it bodes well for trans people that those who would prefer to see us pushed out of public life altogether have been so successful at convincing reasonable people that changes have to come at a cost to them, that trans liberation means something bad for non-trans people.”

Write to your MP and ask them to speak up for trans equality using Stonewall's handy letter template.

Paisley Gilmour Sex & Relationships Editor Paisley is sex & relationships editor at Cosmopolitan UK, and covers everything from sex toys, how to masturbate and sex positions, to all things LGBTQ. She definitely reveals too much about her personal life on the Internet.

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