Last week I was in Birmingham at the global summit run by the International Working Group on Women and Sport, which is held every four years in a different location. Several hundred women and some men spent three days discussing participation and representation of women in all levels of sport and everything sport-related, including coaching, media and management.

On the first morning, a panel host I’d never heard of called Michelle Moore said in her introduction: “When I talk about women I include trans and DSD athletes in that, just to make that clear.” There was a smattering of loud applause.

Two of the most powerful people in sport, Kirsty Coventry, the President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and Lord Coe, chair of World Athletics, separately addressed the conference and both mentioned the importance of protecting the female category. Coe said: “Gender cannot trump biology.”

That should have given attendees courage, but the mood was more “don’t ask, don’t tell”. When I told people about the work of Sex Matters, a few said they agreed. Others said, variously, that it was complicated, that of course transwomen should not be in elite sport but… and that trans people have difficult lives so…. The implication was that women should make room for trans-identifying men, regardless of the impact on women. This was a hall full of sports specialists, who know about sex differences in sport and sexism in sport. They were supposedly advocating for women. But still they couldn’t put women first. They couldn’t even name the elephant in the room.

Someone who was at the previous event, in New Zealand in 2022, told me that transgender inclusion had been a major agenda item, with a big push to make everything more trans-inclusive. This time it was not mentioned, although I had lobbied the organisers for months to get it onto the agenda.

Eventually, as the programme was being finalised, Dr Emma Hilton was invited to be on the panel for a workshop called “Tested to compete: the science, the politics and the price”. This was about sex testing in sport, though that was not obvious from the name; it could have been about anti-doping.

Emma explained where male advantage comes from, and the other three speakers argued that there is no evidence it exists. The researcher said that more research is needed; the sociologist said transwomen are women.

A woman in the workshop audience asked how “we” can oppose the new IOC policy, which restricts the female category to those who pass a sex screen – this means undergoing a once-in-a-lifetime cheek swab to show they are female. A speaker said: “We must fight it together.” No one said that maybe protecting the female category is a good thing. Neither Emma nor I had the opportunity to comment.

I went to the conference to advocate for male-free sport for women and girls. Some people I spoke to there quietly agreed, but overall the subject was still treated as taboo. More than one woman told me that the Sport England staffers are afraid of us. It’s hard to know what they’re afraid of.

I asked a couple of senior people from Sport England about their transgender guidance but didn’t get a straight answer. I can’t help thinking that anyone who was confident of their position would be willing and able to speak to me about it. These people were not.

I think this shows that everyone knows that it is not fair to allow male participants in a female category, but despite the clarity from the IOC they can’t speak the truth. Maybe they have spent so long pretending it’s complicated that they can’t believe it never was. Perhaps they can’t let go of the image of themselves as virtuous people who advocate for the most marginalised – and that doesn’t mean women and girls.

There can be no doubt that we are winning the argument: in global sports policy from the IOC down, in the US and UK Supreme Courts, and in public opinion. Who’d have thought the last people to get the message would be those advocating for women and girls? When you’ve denied the obvious for years and called it “the right side of history”, how do you find your way back to reality? We still have work to do.

The action we need to see is spelled out in our new sport report, Getting back on track, which I handed out to anyone who showed an interest. I’ve come back from the event with new contacts and as determined as ever to keep pressing for those in authority to restore fair policies.

Podcast

The Amnesty report

The charity is in trouble for defaming gender-critical organisations

A major row has erupted after Amnesty International UK published — and then quickly withdrew — a report labeling more than 100 organisations as “anti-rights”, including women’s rights groups, charities, support services, and campaigning organisations. Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena talk about the parlous state of democratic debate on human rights, when organisations are branded as threats simply for advocating sex-based rights. Amnesty is now facing demands for answers, calls for apologies and potential legal action.

Amnesty must answer

Amnesty is facing growing pressure after publishing a report branding organisations defending sex-based rights as “anti-rights”. This week, we joined 40 organisations targeted by Amnesty International in calling on the Charity Commission to uphold the Equality Act and end the culture of intolerance towards gender-critical views.

Find out more

Amnesty faces backlash

The Charity Commission must act

Media coverage

Amnesty International UK came under heavy criticism for branding Sex Matters and other organisations defending sex-based rights as part of an “anti-rights movement”. The Times (Alex Massie) and The Telegraph (Suzanne Moore) argued that the groups named had instead challenged unlawful claims and helped secure clarity that sex in the Equality Act means biological sex. Helen discussed the report on GB News’s Free Speech Nation with Josh Howie. Amnesty’s hasty retraction of the report was covered by The Telegraph (Jacob Freedland), GB News (Dan McDonald) and the Scottish Daily Mail (Dan Barker, print only).

The Telegraph (Jacob Freedland) reported on the joint letter from Sex Matters and others calling to the Charity Commission. The Times (Aaliyah Ahmed) and the Daily Mail (Dan Barker and Tom Gordon) confirmed that the commission is assessing concerns about Amnesty International and that its charitable trust has submitted a serious incident report. The Times (Aaliyah Ahmed) also drew attention to a second report portraying gender-critical people as opposed to LGBT rights. Maya said this showed a longstanding pattern of misrepresenting and denigrating those who recognise the biological and legal importance of the two sexes.

In other news

The Telegraph (Sabrina Miller) reported that the Green Party is considering adopting a policy to oppose sex-based exclusions in sport and support “trans-inclusive” sporting projects. Fiona said that, in practice, this means allowing men into the female category and denying women and girls fair competition, and that the party is once again prioritising the feelings of trans-identifying men over women’s rights.

The Telegraph (Janet Murray) revealed, with follow-up coverage in the Daily Mail (Shaun Wooller), that South East Coast Ambulance Service issued a policy allowing trans-identifying staff to use single-sex facilities according to gender identity since the Supreme Court ruling. Fiona said the trust was breaking the law by denying female paramedics privacy from men.

Calls for the Scottish Government to introduce a broader ban on conversion practices than proposed in England and Wales were covered by the Scottish Daily Express (Ben Borland). The article referred to our warning that the draft Conversion Practices Bill could lead to parents, teachers and therapists being investigated by police for lawful, loving actions such as telling a child they will not pay for puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones.

The Telegraph (Daniel Martin) wrote about the EHRC’s long-delayed code of practice for service providers, which has finally been laid before Parliament.. Maya welcomed the fact that organisations can no longer use the lack of guidance as an excuse for failing to bring their policies in line with the law.

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Read the letters to Amnesty.
Read our letter to the Charity Commission.

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Sex Matters, together with forty of the organisations targeted by Amnesty International, has written to Dame Julia Unwin, chair of the Charity Commission, calling for a reset on the culture of intolerance towards gender-critical views in the sector. Charities should be leading the way in upholding human rights and the law, not smearing those who do.

The Charity Commission should clarify that every charity must follow the Equality Act and ensure that trustees have an accurate, lawful understanding of its purposes as set out in its governing document. This includes where that refers to women and girls or men and boys, to sex or sexual orientation, and to equality and human rights.

Read our letter to the Charity Commission

Dear Dame Julia Unwin,

On 8th July Amnesty International UK, together with Amnesty International UK Section Charitable Trust, published a report entitled A growing threat: the anti-rights movement in the UK. This presented 117 organisations and grassroots groups as an “organised anti-rights movement targeting the rights of women and LGBT+ people”. After widespread criticism Amnesty has withdrawn the report for review, but it has not apologised. A sister report, Like a snowball: the growth and impact of the gender critical movement in the UK (May 2026), made similar accusations. That remains live (with a list of organisations included in the technical annex).

The impugned organisations include several charities, as well as other groups defending the rights of women, girls, children and gay, lesbian and bisexual people; charities and organisations concerned more broadly with human rights; Christian charities and organisations; organisations of parents and clinicians concerned about paediatric transition; grassroots women’s-rights organisations doing vital work domestically and internationally with vulnerable women and children; and a rape crisis centre and support service for female survivors of male violence.

The characteristic that unites them all is that they are associated with the “gender critical” belief that there are two sexes, that human beings cannot change sex and that sex matters.

Smearing groups as “anti-rights” because of their philosophical or religious beliefs, as Amnesty does, paints a target on those groups. Calling for the Charity Commission, funders and the media to subject them to less favourable treatment because of their beliefs – as the most recent report does – is an explicit call for these groups to be subjected to unlawful discrimination.

Discrimination and disadvantage experienced by women and girls is persistent, endemic, and deeply entrenched. It ought to be shocking that one of the country’s most respected human-rights charities is openly campaigning for systematic unlawful discrimination against groups that stand up for women’s rights. But the prejudice displayed in Amnesty’s report is ubiquitous in the charity sector.

The Like a snowball report openly laments that the application of the Equality Act has “contributed to the normalisation of all manifestations of gender critical belief”. The Amnesty employees who wrote it and signed it off, and those who have been giving interviews, making conference presentations and producing social-media content with the same discriminatory message, may not have thought they were doing anything wrong because this form of unlawful discrimination is the norm in large parts of the sector. Anyone who speaks out about this discrimination is risking their career or position on a charity board.

As you have set out in your speeches and to Parliament, charities may hold different and sometimes competing views, and the role of the Commission is to ensure that they are well governed, operate within their remit, pursue their agenda appropriately and do so in a civil way.

But charities that have adopted a discriminatory approach to individuals with gender-critical beliefs, stereotyping those individuals as harmful or hateful, are acting unlawfully, as shown in the cases of Forstater v Centre for Global Development and Adams v Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre. Charities that refuse to comply with the law are not well-governed. And a sector that systematically misunderstands the law is a problem for its regulator.

While other sectors are getting on with complying with the Equality Act following the For Women Scotland judgment, senior leaders and trustees across the charity sector have been acting as if the law does not apply to them.

Amnesty International UK, which explicitly described itself as a registered charity in its application to intervene in the For Women Scotland case, tested its proposed interpretation of the law with the highest court in the land. It was found by the Supreme Court not to be inclusive, but rather to be incompatible with a “workable” and “coherent” legal system for protecting women, gay, lesbian and bisexual people and transgender people from discrimination.

The court agreed with For Women Scotland, Sex Matters, LGB Alliance and the other lesbian interveners that the terms “man” and “woman” in the Equality Act 2010 refer to sex, not self-declared gender identity or paperwork, and that services provided only for women or only for men must be provided on the basis of sex. Transgender people remain protected from discrimination and harassment in work, education, service provision, premises and associations, on the basis of both sex and gender reassignment. The new EHRC guidance provides detailed explanations of how mixed-sex and single-sex services can be provided lawfully in a way that treats everyone with respect.

In human-rights terms, although rights are universal, the rights to freedom of expression and to privacy, to freedom of association and to manifest beliefs are qualified and may be constrained by lawful mechanisms in a democratic society.

Debates over how to reconcile women’s rights and transgender people’s rights are debates of this kind.

Does Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects private life, mean that men who wish they were women have the right to undress in women’s changing rooms? Or does it mean that women and girls have the right to change in female-only spaces?

Is describing someone as a man when he wishes to be referred to as a woman a breach of dignity and of rights? Or is it simply stating ordinary facts that must be recognised in order to protect the dignity, privacy and autonomy of women and girls?

The Equality Act 2010 represents the settled, democratically agreed balance of rights in Britain. It recognises that men who identify as “trans women” remain men for the purpose of the law concerning sex discrimination, and therefore for the provision of lawful separate sex services, including by charities.

Amnesty’s longstanding argument that “trans women are women” and that there should be no debate about this is in opposition to the law and other people’s human rights.

The trustees of Amnesty International UK Section Charitable Trust are far from alone in allowing intolerance, prejudice, ideological fervour, fear of being blacklisted in the sector and conflicts of loyalty between their duty to their charity and the principle of trans allyship or trans-identifying friends and family to take hold in the charities they govern. There have been several instances of charities and their leaders publicly smearing those with gender-critical beliefs and advocating that they be excluded from the sector and from society:

• On 21st April 2021, around the time when LGB Alliance was awarded charitable status, the then chief executive of NCVO said: “This step will be painful and dangerous for transgender people harmed by the views and actions of the Alliance.” NCVO later rejected applications from both LGB Alliance and Sex Matters for membership, and admitted us only when we issued a discrimination claim against it.

• In June 2021 leaders of LGBTQ+ charities, including Stonewall, Mermaids, LGBT Foundation, LGBT Consortium and Gendered Intelligence, published an open letter expressing frustration and disappointment at the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s intervention in the Forstater case to say that “gender critical” beliefs are a protected philosophical belief.

• On 3rd July 2023 the “I Stand with Trans” pledge, which referred to gender-critical beliefs as “anti-trans hate” and called on charity leaders to “stand united together against this hate”, was signed by chief executives of several major charities and many smaller ones. The signatories included the chief executives of NCVO, Co-op Foundation, Teenage Cancer Trust, LGBT Foundation, Young Trustees Movement, the Children’s Society, Alzheimer’s Society, Samaritans and Charity Finance Group as well as several major charity recruiters.

• On 3rd December 2025 15 mental-health charities, including the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Coalition, Mental Health Foundation, Mental Health Matters, Mental Health UK, MHFA England and Mind, wrote to the Minister for Women and Equalities arguing against the protection of single-sex services on the basis of sex, and instead for the inclusion of people on the basis of gender identity. They called for the government to halt the EHRC guidance.

• In January 2026 a group called Third Sector Against Transphobia published an open letter describing those who want to see single-sex charities pursue their objects “transphobic groups and individuals”.

It is now 15 months since the Supreme Court clarified that sex in law means what it always did, and that this interpretation is essential for protecting women’s rights and gay and lesbian rights. But the boards and senior leadership teams of many charities are still professing to be confused. Others are frightened of being blacklisted in the sector if they acknowledge that the law is clear and stand up for fairness and dignity for women and girls. The result is that across a range of services and activities, charities whose purpose is to benefit women, are using resources to benefit men who identify as women (see Murray Blackburn Mackenzie’s report).

Penny Wilson, writing on behalf of Third Sector Against Transphobia, recently wrote to the Charity Commission claiming that charities do not know how to comply with the law, and calling for more time and for charity-specific guidance.

There is no need for more detailed guidance. The charity sector is not above the law. If a service or facility is provided only for women, only for men or for both sexes, this has the same meaning whether that service is being provided by the public, private or voluntary sectors. Employees, service users and other individuals all have the same human rights. The charity sector needs to understand that the individuals and groups it has derided as “transphobes” and tried to exclude from public life are simply expressing a view that is in line with the Equality Act.

This is not a case of “both sides” needing to disagree well, but of systematic discrimination and harassment by some of the country’s most powerful and respected charities. It is happening openly and under the nose of the regulator.

We call on you to show leadership and reset expectations across the sector by making a statement. The Charity Commission needs to clarify that every charity must follow the Equality Act and ensure that its trustees have an accurate, lawful understanding of its purposes as set out in its governing document. This includes where that refers to women and girls or men and boys, to sex or sexual orientation, and to equality and human rights.

The commission should stand up against the culture of intolerance and discrimination towards people who express ordinary, lawful beliefs that has taken hold across the sector, and which has been demonstrated in the Amnesty reports.

It is unacceptable for a charity to call people or other organisations transphobes, bigots or anti-rights for using clear sex-based language, asking that the Equality Act be respected, raising concerns about safeguarding or medical evidence, being Christians or adhering to religious sexual ethics, just as it would be to commit unlawful discrimination and harassment on the basis of any other protected characteristic.

It does no favours to individuals who identify as transgender or to children exploring their identity to encourage them to think that the law does not apply to them or that they can disregard other people’s rights.

Yours sincerely,

LGB Alliance
FiLiA
Sex Matters
For Women Scotland
CAN SG
Genspect
Thoughtful Therapists
Children of Transitioners
Get the L Out UK
Gender Critical Greens
Labour Women’s Declaration
Legal Feminist
Lesbian Strength
Merched Cymru
OBJECT – Women Not Sex Objects!
Older Feminist Network
Protect and Teach
Trans Widows’ Voices
Virago Women’s Workshop
LGB Alliance Cymru
Conservatives for Women
Fair Play For Women
Gay Men’s Network
Let Women Speak (formerly Standing for Women)
The Lesbian Project
Transgender Trend
Women’s Declaration International (WDI)
Murray Blackburn Mackenzie
Women’s Rights Network (WRN)
LGB Christians
Liberal Voice for Women
ScotPAG Scottish Professionals Advising on Gender
SEEN in HR
SEEN in STEM
SEEN in Journalism
SEEN in Sport
SEEN in Health
TU SEEN
SEEN in Publishing
Third Sector SEEN

Related content

Amnesty faces backlash

Amnesty International UK has hastily withdrawn its report A growing threat: the anti-rights movement in the UK – which smeared gender-critical charities, grassroots volunteer networks, evidence-based medicine associations and victim-support groups as “anti-rights” – saying that it is under review.

Published on 8th July 2026, and removed just days later on 10th July, the Growing threat report is a new low for a once-great organisation founded on the rigorous gathering of evidence and the defence of free expression.

A sister report Like a snowball: the growth and impact of the gender critical movement in the UK, published in May 2026, remains live online and bemoans the normalisation of “all manifestations of GC belief, including misgendering and talking about trans people with reference to their ‘biological sex’ and trans women as ‘biological males’.”

Amnesty’s public expressions of animosity and unevidenced slurs towards those with gender-critical views not only harm the reputation of gender-critical groups but also create a hostile environment for its own gender-critical staff, and set the organisation in opposition to its own charitable objects.

Amnesty made a submission in the 2025 case of For Women Scotland v Scottish Ministers: its proposed interpretation of the Equality Act was rejected by the Supreme Court, which judged that it would undermine the protection of rights, making the legal protections against sex discrimination, sexual-orientation discrimination and gender-reassignment discrimination “incoherent” and “unworkable”.

Rather than admit that its approach took a wrong turn, Amnesty has doubled down.

The Growing threat and Like a snowball reports present gender-critical views as “transphobia” and groups such as the Gay Men’s Network and Beira’s Place rape crisis centre as shady, nefarious and driven by misogyny and homophobia.

Stephanie Davies-Arai of Transgender Trend received a British Empire Medal for services to children for her work exposing the harms of unevidenced gender medicine. For Women Scotland won the Scottish Herald’s Public Campaign of the Year and the Emma Humphreys Memorial Prize given by the Centre for Women’s Justice. LGB Alliance, Sex Matters and FiLia are registered charities, recognised as pursuing goals in the public interest.

Following Mermaids’ failed attempt to have LGB Alliance struck off the charity register, the Charity Commission explicitly warned:

“Demonising and undermining those who think differently is not acceptable behaviour from any charity on our register.”

The affected organisations are not letting the matter drop with a quiet deletion. Amnesty’s postbag is full of letters and its board members are facing calls to:

• provide the specific evidential basis relied upon for these classifications, or admit that none exists

• withdraw both reports in their entirety

• issue a public apologies to the individual groups smeared, as well as to its own gender-critical staff and supporters

• commit to comprehensive training for staff and trustees on UK equality and discrimination law.

It is time for Amnesty’s leadership to look honestly at legal reality, respect the pluralism of human rights advocacy, and engage in constructive dialogue rather than defamation.

What the letters said

Children of Transitioners and Trans Widows’ Voices said:

“The inclusion of small, grassroots victim-support organisations such as ours within a report describing an ‘anti-rights movement’ risks serious reputational harm, may deter vulnerable women and children from seeking support, and creates the impression that the experiences and human rights of the people we support have been discounted.”

For Women Scotland said:

“On page 2 of your report, however, you claim that the ruling has contributed to a “significant decline in protections for LGBT+ rights” with no reference to the fact that the Judges considered lesbian, gay and bisexual rights as well as the rights of those covered by gender reassignment and concluded that a certificated sex interpretation would be hugely damaging to these groups.”

Gay Men’s Network said:

“We consider that your report is a deeply silly and malicious piece of low politics designed to ‘evidence launder’ a list of undesirable gay and lesbian organisations and actors such that it can be quoted by those who seek, (like you) to control gay and lesbian free speech and open discourse.”

LGB Alliance said:

“Having lost the argument at the UK Supreme Court, Amnesty has now taken the extraordinary step of branding LGB Alliance (along with For Women Scotland and numerous other organisations) part of an ‘anti-rights’ movement. It somehow neglected to add the Supreme Court.”

Sex Matters said:

“Allowing individual staff, campaigning teams or activists to use Amnesty’s name to launch campaigns that are not based on a solid understanding of human rights and the Equality Act is a reckless approach to governance and reputational, regulatory and legal risk, and a diversion from your mission.”

JK Rowling said:

“Beira’s Place hasn’t sent anything. Yet.”

Read all the letters

• Beira’s Place statement

• CAN-SG

• Children of Transitioners and Trans Widows’ Voices

• For Women Scotland

• Gay Men’s Network

• Genspect

• Keep Prisons Single Sex

• Labour Women’s Declaration

• LGB Alliance

• Liberal Voice for Women

• Murray Blackburn Mackenzie

• ScotPAG

• SEEN in Health

• SEEN in Journalism

• SEEN in Publishing

• Sex Matters

• Third Sector SEEN

• Thoughtful Therapists

• Transgender Trend

• Women’s Rights Network

The government has published the final version of the statutory safeguarding guidance for schools in England, Keeping children safe in education (KCSIE), which will come into force in September 2026. There were very few changes from the version published for consultation in February.

It includes sections on single-sex spaces (paragraphs 105–116) and single-sex sports (paragraphs 95–98), as well as a long section on “children questioning their gender” (paragraphs 252–282).

In December 2023, under the previous government, the Department for Education published draft guidance on “gender questioning” children, to which we gave a score of 76 percent based on our published scoring framework.

We said it should:

1. support schools in line with the law

2. provide coherent, consistent guidance across the education system

3. direct schools to collect sex-based data

4. uphold the Admissions Code

5. uphold single-sex spaces

6. uphold single-sex sports

7. avoid undermining safeguarding

8. rule out full social transition in school

9. uphold freedom of belief and speech

10. support clear sex-based rules and consideration for gender non-conforming children.

We have applied the same scoring framework to the new guidance and it comes in at 79 percent, with the improvement largely due to it being brought into the statutory safeguarding framework and having been made shorter and clearer.

There are, however, still some concerning aspects. Although the guidance is in line with the Equality Act in making clear that separate-sex facilities are not negotiable – no child may be permitted to use spaces designated for the opposite sex, no matter how that child identifies – it tries to reconcile this firm principle with the idea of “social transition” at school.

It defines this as facilitating “the child presenting as the opposite biological sex”, despite ruling out steps such as using opposite-sex facilities or being recorded as being the opposite sex. But by raising the possibility of “social transition” in school, it opens the door to negotiation and pressure, even though any school that works through the guidance accurately will inevitably conclude that the only fair and safe way to set policies that differentiate between girls and boys is to be clear who the girls are and who the boys are.

Helpfully, KCSIE says that schools should not initiate social transition, which should stop activist teachers promoting it. But it still leaves schools having to negotiate with activist parents who want their child to “socially transition” at school, and who may be highly motivated.

1. Support schools in line with the law

7/10 – The guidance has been put on a statutory footing and ties into existing sex-based laws and regulations, including the Equality Act and regulations concerning school premises. It says that school governing bodies and proprietors:

“must have regard to this guidance, ensuring policies, procedures and training in their schools or colleges are effective and comply with the law at all times.”

By putting the advice about use of single-sex facilities within KCSIE, the government has placed compliance within the remit of school inspections. The result will help clamp down on activist teachers promoting transition.

The new gender-related material within KCSIE is shorter and clearer than the previous draft guidance, but it suggests that children may in rare instances be able to undertake “social transition” in school, which it defines as facilitating “the child presenting as the opposite biological sex”.

2. Provide coherent, consistent guidance across the education system

7/10 –The guidance is clear that schools cannot allow children of any age to use opposite-sex toilets and changing facilities, or (in most situations) to play sports designated for the opposite sex. It applies to all schools, both state and independent, and will be covered by the inspection regime.

It also makes clear where the Equality Act and regulations concerning school premises apply differently to 16–19 academies that are outside the “further education” sector. It says that these colleges may be covered by part 3 or 5 of the Equality Act 2010 and still need to comply with the law.

The guidance will form part of the inspection of safeguarding, where leaders are expected to “take an effective, whole-school approach”. However, while in practice it rules out many aspects of “social transition”, it still suggests that children may (rarely) transition at school, including what it calls “full social transition” at primary school. It does not explain how this can be consistent with the rest of the guidance.

3. Direct schools to collect sex-based data

10/10 – The guidance is clear that no child can change their sex at school, and under the section on “correct information” it states that:

“schools and colleges are legally required to record a child’s biological sex accurately wherever it is recorded.”

4. Uphold the school admissions code

7/10 – The guidance does not mention admission to single-sex schools (the previous version made clear that schools are not required to admit a girl “as a boy” to a boys’ school or a boy “as a girl” to a girls’ school). It should be obvious that it is not possible to safeguard a girl in a boys’ school or a boy in a girls’ school while pretending that child is the opposite sex.

The guidance does address the question of children already “in stealth” at school. It says:

“Schools and colleges should be particularly conscious of the vulnerabilities of children who have fully socially transitioned from an early age and may be living in stealth (that is, school or college friends/staff may be unaware of their biological sex). The Cass Review emphasised that these children are likely to approach puberty in a fearful and anxious state. Schools and colleges should involve the designated safeguarding lead in these cases.”

The idea that a child can be admitted to school “in stealth” as the opposite sex is not consistent with the legal requirement that all children’s sex must be correctly recorded wherever sex is recorded (such as in the admissions register and school information system).

5. Uphold single-sex spaces

10/10 – The guidance has a clear, dedicated section on the law on school premises in relation to toilets, changing rooms and residential accommodation, which it ties into the safeguarding inspection framework:

“In line with the responsibilities of schools and colleges to adhere to the highest standards of safeguarding for the children and young people in their care, alongside obligations under the School Premises (England) Regulations 2012 and the Education (Independent School Standards) Regulations 2014, schools must not allow pupils into toilets, changing rooms, or boarding or residential accommodation designated for the opposite sex, with no exceptions. Colleges to which part 6 of the Equality Act 2010 applies should follow the same principles.”

6. Uphold single-sex sports

7/10 – The guidance correctly says:

“Where schools have implemented single-sex sports as being necessary for safety reasons, there should be no exceptions and pupils must not be allowed to participate in sports designated for the opposite sex. Colleges should follow the same principles.”

But it also says:

“Where there are no safety concerns and a child makes a request relating to how they participate, schools and colleges will need to consider the request in light of the advice on ‘considering requests for support with social transition’. This means that the school or college would need to take into account all the relevant factors, including whether supporting social transition is overall in the best interests of the child, as well as considering the impact on other children and the aim of creating safe and fair environments for children to participate in PE.”

We don’t think there is any basis for this. Whether for fairness, safety or the encouragement of girls in sport, single-sex sports should be single sex. Gender non-conforming children should not be discriminated against or harassed in participating in sport with their own sex.

While there is a general principle that decisions about children should be made with the child’s best interests paramount, this part of the guidance appears to consider making complex clinical decisions in the context of deciding which PE team a child can play on.

The guidance does recognise (at paragraph 275) that both fairness and safety are legitimate aims for separate-sex sports.

7. Avoid undermining safeguarding

8/10 – Putting the guidance into the statutory safeguarding framework is a big step forward. However, including the possibility of “social transition” and the concept of “gender” is inconsistent with the parts of the guidance that are clear about sex. It will provide opportunities for organisations to continue to undermine safeguarding by encouraging children and their families to think that children may be able to “present as the opposite sex” during their school career.

The guidance also misses the opportunity to underline that gender identity should not undermine sex-based rules and behaviour codes in other parts of the guidance, such as harmful sexual behaviour – harassment, coercion or sex by deception – by trans-identifying pupils, and those children’s vulnerability to online harms and radicalisation. Any child disclosing that they are considering adopting or have adopted a cross-sex identity is disclosing a safeguarding risk.

It does not mention other safeguarding risks such as children breast-binding and taking off-label banned drugs or “DIY” cross-sex hormones.

8. Rule out full social transition in school

7/10 – The guidance rules out large parts of what is commonly included under that label, such as recording a child as the opposite sex, allowing them to use opposite-sex facilities and letting them participate in most sports with children of the opposite sex.

But it uses the term “social transition” 31 times, and leaves the door open for other, undefined, aspects of social transition to be negotiated. This presumably means pronouns and uniform, although they are not covered in any detail.

Paragraph 275 explains that schools and colleges should consider how their policies affect children with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, both when developing policies and when considering requests to be exempted from following them. When a rule or policy places a gender-questioning child (and other gender-questioning children) at a disadvantage compared with those who are not gender-questioning, the school or college should consider:

(1) Does the policy have a legitimate aim, for example, safeguarding or fairness in sport?

(2) Is the policy a proportionate means of achieving that legitimate aim? This will involve considering:

• whether there is another way of achieving the same aim. Might a policy be adopted or an exception made that still achieves that aim?

• the impact of the rule, or of making (or not making) an exception on the child themselves and anyone else affected. The school or college should balance the impact of agreeing to the child’s request against the impact of refusing their request, taking into account all the relevant factors. This will include taking into account the school or college’s judgment about whether supporting social transition is in the child’s best interests and the best interests of other children.

In practice, if schools refer to children by words used for the other sex or allow them to wear the opposite sex’s uniform it will be difficult to maintain clear expectations and rules.

9. Uphold freedom of belief and speech

7/10 – The guidance says:

“The school or college should also make sure that children and their families are aware that while the school or college will appropriately sanction any cases of bullying or harassment, and take a strong stand against bullying, the school or college must also be conscious of the rights of pupils and staff in relation to their religion or belief. However, schools and colleges supporting social transition might consider discussing options with pupils and staff such as using names instead of pronouns.”

This is the only mention of pronouns in the guidance.

10. Support clear sex-based rules and consideration for gender non-conforming children

9/10 – The guidance says that:

“schools and colleges should consider adopting policies across school and college life that maintain flexibility and avoid rigid rules based on gender stereotypes.”

Avoiding gender stereotypes is a good principle. But encouraging “flexibility” while suggesting that children may be able to undertake social transition creates ambiguity and room to negotiate.

Total 79%

Related content

Guidance released on “gender-questioning” children (February 2026)

What guidance from the Department for Education needs to say (January 2023)

Sex Matters is bringing a judicial review against the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) for its unlawful guidance on sex by deception.

The guidance concerns the rare cases of sexual assault involving deception as to sex. We say the guidance is unlawful because it conflates the concept of subjective gender identity with objective sex and is confusing and incoherent.

The CPS asserts that “questions of deception and consent may involve more complex issues where the suspect is trans or non-binary”. This is wrong in law and could lead to both over-prosecution and under-prosecution, as well as encouraging young people to believe that their asserted gender identity overrides their sex in relation to other people’s sexual consent and sexual orientation.

That the CPS is defending its guidance is perhaps not surprising when you realise how deeply embedded in CPS policies and guidance is the idea of keeping trans people’s sex a secret and forcing others to pretend they have changed sex.

Twenty years ago the police and CPS were still willing to recognise the role of sexual fetish in cross-dressing and transgenderism. As guidance from the Association of Chief Police Officers said in 2005:

“Not every male or female that dresses as the opposite gender (transvestite) do so because they wish to permanently be defined in the opposite gender (e.g. transgender). Some do it as a fetish or for sexual gratification, some are simply driven by an unexplained urge to dress as a woman and are considered to be transvestites, but will have no desire to change their gender.”

The criminal justice system then embarked on a long process of forgetting, offence-taking, confusing itself with ever-changing terminology and ignoring the law.

An institution loses its way

In 2007 the CPS published its Policy for Prosecuting Cases of Homophobic and Transphobic Hate Crime. It defined “transphobic” as:

“A fear of or a dislike directed towards trans people, or a fear of or dislike directed towards their perceived lifestyle, culture or characteristics, whether or not any specific trans person has that lifestyle or characteristic. The dislike does not have to be so severe as hatred. It is enough that people do something or abstain from doing something because they do not like trans people.”

It defined a transphobic incident as:

“Any incident which is perceived to be transphobic by the victim or by any other person.”

The CPS did not consider that women might rationally fear men who overstep boundaries, or that people might be free to “do something or abstain from doing something” because of a person’s sex, not because of a generalised dislike of trans people.

In 2013 the McNally case established that deception as to sex could vitiate sexual consent. But the CPS was too busy taking directions from trans organisations to be clear about the law.

In 2014 it published the CPS Transgender Equality Management Guidance which drew on advice from the civil service trans and intersex network “a:gender”, and the lobbying groups GIRES, Press for Change and Mermaids.

This document wrongly said:

“Under this legislation [the Data Protection Act 1998], data relating to an individual’s gender reassignment (which includes a change of gender status and name) is classed as ‘sensitive information’, and therefore attracts a higher degree of protection than usual, especially when a Gender Recognition Certificate is held (see Gender Recognition Act below).”

This is the same mistake the EHRC has made in its new draft code for service providers this year.

In its Guidance on Prosecuting Cases of Homophobic and Transphobic Crime (which included guidance on cases with transgender suspects), the CPS said:

“Whether the trans person is a victim, witness or defendant, the CPS’ policy is that the person will be addressed in terms that reflect his or her present gender status. So, a trans woman, although having a birth certificate that shows her to have been born a male, should be addressed and charged and/or indicted, if appropriate, as a woman.”

In July 2019 the CPS published a Trans Equality Statement, the aim of which it said was to “sustain the confidence of communities”. It boasted that:

“The CPS has worked for a number of years with a wide range of Trans organisations nationally and locally.”

and stated that:

“Prosecutors should address Trans victims, witnesses and defendants according to their affirmed gender and name, using that gender and related pronouns in all documentation and in the courtroom.”

The Trans Equality Statement says that “misgendering” is a potential basis for a transphobic hate crime. And the prosecution guidance on homophobic, biphobic and transphobic hate crime says that the police and CPS “have agreed to treat unauthorised breaches under s22 Gender Recognition Act 2004 as potential hate crimes if the alleged victim or any other person perceives them as such”. That means that simply referring to a trans person’s sex is viewed as a potential “hate crime” by the CPS and police.

In 2020 the CPS produced an education pack for secondary schools, which promoted the idea that “wearing anti-LGBT+ badges or symbols” and “showing or distributing anti-LGBT+ leaflets, comics or other propaganda” could be hate crime. The pack had been developed with Stonewall and Gendered Intelligence.

One of the teaching exercises featured a video scenario where an adult male wearing women’s clothing goes into the women’s toilets. Two young women at the sinks whisper their discomfort: “What’s he doing in here? This is the Ladies.”

The class discussion guidance says:

“Ask the students what happened in the clip. Thinking about how the girl in the clip was treated, can the class understand why she might have felt hesitant about going into the toilets?” [By “girl”, it means the adult man.]

The worksheet for school children asks:

“Can you say why the person went into the ladies’ toilets and not the mens’ toilets? How did the women behave towards her? How did that make her feel?”

The guidance was only withdrawn after a 14-year-old girl brought a legal claim.

In 2021 the CPS published guidance for prosecutors on same-sex sexual violence and sexual violence involving a trans complainant or suspect/defendant, in which it said that the idea that “trans women” are men who want to deceive straight men into having sex “is part of a wider transphobic myth that trans women are ‘dangerous’”.

It also says:

“It is not uncommon for men who identify as heterosexual who engage in sexual activity with a trans woman to feel disgusted with themselves, and they may then react with violence towards the trans woman or to accuse her of rape. Gay men who have sex with trans men can also become violent and aggressive, and sexual violence can occur as a result.”

In 2022, when the CPS appointed Sophie Cook as its “speak out champion”, concerns were raised that he had a history of derogatory statements towards gender-critical women.

In 2022 the CPS updated its legal guidance on domestic abuse. It gave “withholding money for transitioning” and “refusing to use their preferred name or pronoun” as examples of domestic abuse against transgender individuals.

In 2024 these two statements were dropped in an update of the guidance, after the think-tank Policy Exchange pointed out that they do not constitute criminal offences. Instead the guidance now says that it might be a crime to refuse to use a family member’s preferred name “with the intention of causing emotional or psychological distress, particularly where the victim has obtained a recognised Gender Recognition Certificate”.

Of course a gender-recognition certificate does not direct how family members think and talk about a person.

Despite the documented instances of crimes with transgender perpetrators (including a disproportionate number of sexual offences), the experiences of “trans widows” and children of transitioners, which can include domestic abuse, and the fact that transgender perpetrators of homicide outnumber transgender victims, the CPS does not have any guidance that recognises clearly that “trans women” are men and “trans men” are women, and that transgender individuals may be perpetrators of crime.

There is increasing attention on non-contact deviant sexual behaviour as a risk factor for offending. But when recast as an expression of gender identity it may be overlooked or even celebrated, and those concerned by it cast as “transphobic”.

In 2022 Lionel Idan, CPS Hate Crimes Lead, told Pink News about gaining a sympathetic understanding of the behaviour of a man stealing women’s underwear:

“I remember one of my early experiences, it must have been 2006, I met with the chair of my local transgender advocacy group. She really made me think about the way we do things in a different light. She said, ‘Lionel, back when I was younger, I couldn’t walk into a shop and buy women’s lingerie. And so I used to have to steal items off of clotheslines’ … I said, ‘Of course, I’d have prosecuted you.’ And she said, ‘There you go. Now, you know the context. I had to steal, not because I’m a thief, but because I couldn’t buy what I needed for my identity.’ ... That was one of the moments where I realised, in the job I do, that to better understand lived experience is absolutely crucial.”

The frightening experience of a woman whose underwear was stolen off the line did not seem to trouble Idan.

Sex by deception

Individuals who lie about their sex online or in person in order to encourage another into a sexual act are disregarding consent, whether their victims are male or female, gay, straight or bisexual.

That the CPS can’t or won’t see this from the victim’s point of view is the result of 20 years of training itself to forget what it once knew about sexual fetish and deviant behaviour, to view “gender identity” as equivalent to sex, and to view gender-critical (that is, truthful) speech as a hateful act.

Dr Emma Hilton (chair), Maya Forstater (chief executive) and board members Anya Palmer, Professor Michael Biggs, Simon Knapp and Rebecca Bull at the National Council for Voluntary Organisations offices

Last week Sex Matters’ board (who are my collective bosses and have fiduciary duty for the charity and responsibility for making sure it stays on mission) met to talk governance. As for every charity, it is the board’s role to approve strategy in line with our charitable purposes, scrutinise and agree the budget, think about risk, ensure there are policies and systems in place to manage it, and support the team and me to deliver our strategy.

As a young organisation in an extremely challenging environment, we have had to do a lot of learning about the nuts and bolts of being an organisation while also working at top speed. The expression “building the plane as we are flying it” is one we often use.

The board thanked Charlotte Cadden, who has been elected as a Conservative Councillor in Bolton and will therefore be stepping down. Charlotte has been a huge asset to Sex Matters, bringing to the board her calm, curious and pragmatic style, and frontline experience from her role as a police officer for 30 years in Greater Manchester Police.

The trustees agreed on Dr Emma Hilton as permanent chair. Emma has been on Sex Matters’ board since the organisation was founded. She is an expert on biology and sports and is frequently consulted for her expertise. Since December 2025 she has been interim chair, and she is principled, open, careful and collaborative in that role. It has been a pleasure working with her over the past six months and I look forward to continuing to work with her.

The board also welcomed Simon Knapp, our new treasurer.

In the coming weeks Sex Matters will be seeking new applicants to join the board of trustees. The board would particularly like to hear from you if you have experience as a charity trustee or chief executive, or as a non-executive director on the board of a mission-driven business or social enterprise (read Sex Matters’ annual report and look out for a separate email with details of how to apply).

This weekend I am looking forward to speaking at the Women’s Rights Network national conference in London. I am on a panel with Professor Jo Phoenix, Akua Reindorf KC and Susan Smith of For Women Scotland. Our session is on Women and the law: Is the social contract between women and the state broken? Unfortunately Naomi Cunningham, who was supposed to be on the same panel, can’t make it as she is tied up with the ongoing Tempest v DEFRA tribunal concerning the gender-critical SEEN civil-service network.

Among the other speakers are Julie Bindel, Rosie Duffield, Tracy Edwards MBE, Maeve Halligan, Dr Emma Hilton, Cathy Larkman and Connie Shaw. Down the road will be the CAN-SG conference Rethinking youth gender medicine, which runs on to Monday. Among the expert speakers are Professor Alice Sullivan, Zhenya Abbruzzese, Dr David Bell, Sex Matters board member Professor Michael Biggs, Stephanie Davies-Arai of Transgender Trend, Dr Anna Hutchinson and Dr Stella O’Malley of Genspect.

Helen Joyce will be at the CAN-SG conference both days; Fiona McAnena is splitting her time between the two events. We are looking forward to seeing so many brilliant friends, and making new ones. Do come up and say hello if you’re attending.

Sex Matters is one of a band of organisations in the UK and internationally that have bootstrapped themselves into existence in order to combat the harm and injustice caused by gender ideology. We have gone about it in different ways, with different strategies, focusing on different aspects: medicine, children, LGB people, free speech, feminism, the law, the civil service, sport and more.

Sex Matters is a single-issue, non-partisan human-rights charity. We campaign for clarity about sex in law and policy in the UK. We do this because sex matters for fairness and safety for women, for children to grow up secure in their bodies and for institutions to work for us all. We think it is important for people to be able to talk about the two sexes so they can argue about what the social contract should be (that’s what being “worthy of respect in a democratic society” is about). My job is to lead in shaping our strategy and building a team that can deliver it. Thank you for your support: we couldn’t do without it.

Conversion Practices Bill targets parents

Draft bill threatens families, free speech and religious rights

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce speaks to Dennis Kavanagh, director at the Gay Men’s Network and non-practising barrister, about the legal minefield that is the draft Conversion Practices Bill.

Dennis examines the low threshold for criminality in Clause 1 of the bill, which states that “any conduct” can be a conversion practice and risks putting parenting on trial and breaching human rights.

Helen and Dennis speak about the potential for transactivists to use the bill to suppress discussion of trans ideology and the harms of gender-affirming care.

Victory in the US Supreme Court

Those fighting to protect sport for women and girls in the USA won a major victory on 30th June when the Supreme Court declared, in a robust and thorough judgment, that state laws restricting female sport to those born female are lawful. The verdict on this point was unanimous: 9–0. A separate legal argument on whether transgender identity should be nominated for special consideration (by being granted “equal protection” status under the constitution) was rejected 6–3.

Sex Matters provided input – “amicus curiae” briefs are the US equivalent of intervening in the case.

Find out more

• Our written explainer on the cases

• Podcast – Helen and Fiona discuss the case when it was heard in January

• Sex Matters on the significance of the interpretation of sex in the Equality Act

• Dr Emma Hilton, Sex Matters chair, on sex testing in sport.

Media coverage

Helen joined Julia Hartley-Brewer on Talk TV to discuss the news.

Debunking fantastical claims about conversion therapy

The government launched its draft conversion-therapy bill saying it has found evidence that 75,000–93,000 people each year experience abusive conversion practices each year in England and Wales.

It suggests this can be stopped at minimal cost (45 minutes of familiarisation for each police officer, social worker and other public-sector worker who needs to know about the new law), and that the ban would prevent tens of thousands of cases of clinical depression.

Every piece of this reasoning (which starts with taking seriously a Stonewall survey that found there are some 25,000 gay exorcisms each year) is fantastical.

In 2022 the Government Equalities Office established a national conversion-therapy helpline which ran for three years at a cost of £360,000. It has released no details of how many (or few) calls it received. A report published by LGBT charity Galop, which operated the service, appears to suggest that no more than a handful of callers reported conversion practices each year.

Find out more

• Read our blog post on the £360,000 helpline that didn’t ring

• Read our report examining the lack of evidence

• Watch Baroness Cash, shadow minister for equalities, raise our analysis in the House of Lords.

Media coverage

The Telegraph (Daniel Martin) quoted analysis by Sex Matters showing that most of the cases presented by LGBT charity Galop to back its claim that a law against conversion practices is needed concerned actions that are either already criminal or else concern private and family life, such as a parent refusing to use a child’s “preferred pronouns”.

In other news

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has told army chiefs to assess whether trans-identifying soldiers can use opposite-sex facilities on a “case-by-case basis” while a new policy is being developed following the Supreme Court ruling. The Sunday Telegraph (Sabrina Miller) quoted Maya as saying that the MoD is exposing female service personnel to an officially endorsed policy of harassment and discrimination by allowing male soldiers into women’s showers.

West London NHS Trust has told patients that they can use single-sex facilities based on their “legal gender”, meaning that hospitals will still allow men to use female-only wards and toilets more than a year after the Supreme Court ruling. The Telegraph (Michael Searles) quoted Fiona as saying that the term “legal gender” has no basis in law or medicine.

Two much-anticipated reports into NHS maternity failings by Baroness Amos and Donna Ockenden came under criticism this week by referring to “birthing people” rather than “women”. The Daily Mail (Shaun Wooller) and Daily Express (Hanna Geissler) quoted Fiona as saying that shoehorning “birthing people” into both reports, presumably so as not to offend the trans lobby, shows shameful disregard for the mothers and babies let down by NHS trusts across the UK.

A GCSE revision guide by Pearson instructs Spanish language students using phrases about how they “follow/admire” someone who “fights/fought for transgender rights”. The Telegraph (Albert Tait) quoted Helen as saying that this example reveals how extensive and subtle the indoctrination of children in schools is.

Queen Camilla’s meeting with JK Rowling was criticised by transactivists. Maya was interviewed by Nana Akua on GB News and Helen was interviewed by Mark Dolan on Talk TV.

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This week, the High Court will hear Sex Matters’ challenge to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) guidance on deception and consent in sexual offence cases.

At the heart of the case is a straightforward question: can the CPS lawfully tell prosecutors that a person’s “gender identity” may be legally relevant when deciding whether deception invalidates consent to sex? Sex Matters says the answer is No.

The case will be heard on 8th and 9th July 2026 at the Royal Courts of Justice. We are represented by Sarah Vine KC and Chris Knight KC.

How we got here

This hearing is the culmination of more than four years of engagement with the CPS about whether its guidance is an accurate statement of the criminal law.

In May 2021 the CPS published guidance called “Deception as to Gender” as a section in its Rape and Sexual Offences Prosecution Guidance (under Chapter 10: consent). It sought to explain how prosecutors should apply section 74 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 in cases where someone alleges that their consent to sexual activity was obtained through deception about a partner’s sex.

The CPS had been a member of the Stonewall Champions scheme and it updated the guidance following a “preconsultation with interested groups” that included the Government Equalities Office, LGBT charity Galop, Mermaids, Gendered Intelligence, LGBT Consortium, LGBT Foundation, Scottish Trans Alliance and Stonewall, along with organisations concerned with violence against women.

The updated draft guidance it published in 2022 confused biological sex and gender identity and presented them as parallel concepts. The section entitled “Evidential considerations” advised that a suspect’s trans identity, if genuine, should be treated as evidence that a deception as to sex was not deliberate, and that trans suspects had no duty to disclose “gender history” (by which it meant their sex).

Sex Matters and the Gay Men’s Network both raised concerns, arguing that the guidance did not accurately reflect the law.

In December 2024, the CPS published a revised version, which was now called “Deception as to Sex”. Although some wording had changed, the central problem remained: prosecutors were repeatedly directed to consider “sex and/or gender identity” as though the two concepts were legally interchangeable. The guidance suggested that the suspect’s rights to privacy protected by Article 8 ECHR, the Equality Act 2010 or the Gender Recognition Act 2004 might trump the right of the complainant to understand what she or he is consenting to in an act of a sexual nature.

In February 2025, Sex Matters sent a formal pre-action letter explaining why we believed this guidance was unlawful.

The CPS asked for additional time to respond. Over the following months, we exchanged extensive correspondence. It accepted that some amendments were needed and proposed a number of changes to the guidance. But it refused to abandon its core position that “gender identity” could be relevant to the legal test for consent.

Following the Supreme Court’s judgment the CPS amended the guidance again, inserting the word “biological” before “sex” at numerous points. This didn’t help; while sex is by definition biological, adding that word in this way tends to suggest there is another relevant kind of sex that isn’t biological (or that “biological sex” and “gender identity” are two parallel characteristics). The most recent version of the guidance was updated in June 2026.

What does the law say?

The Sexual Offences Act 2003 sets out the offences requiring the prosecution to prove absence of consent. They are rape, assault by penetration, sexual assault and causing a person to engage in sexual activity. In relation to these offences, a person (A) is guilty of an offence if she or he acts intentionally, and (B) does not consent to the act, and (A) does not reasonably believe that B consents.

English law recognises that some forms of deception can invalidate consent to sexual activity. But not every lie between sexual partners is a criminal offence.

The Court of Appeal has made clear that the deception must be “so closely connected to the performance of the sexual act” that it is capable of negating consent. That is the legal test established in R v Lawrence [2020]. Cases involving deception about fertility, HIV status or other wider circumstances have generally failed that test. Cases involving deception about the nature of the sexual act itself, such as secretly removing a condom or pretending a sexual act is a medical procedure, may satisfy it.

The key precedent on deception related to sex is R v McNally, in which the Court of Appeal held that deception about whether a person is male or female could invalidate consent. (Sarah Vine KC discussed the legal concepts with Michael Foran on his podcast in 2024).

Sex Matters argues that the CPS guidance is unlawful as it treats gender identity as though it were equivalent to sex. We say that a person’s gender identity (whether they identify as a transwoman, transman, masc, femme, non-binary, gender fluid or anything else) is not part of the performance of the sexual act and therefore cannot satisfy the Lawrence test. As the Supreme Court recognised in For Women Scotland:

“People are not sexually oriented towards those in possession of a certificate.”

The CPS disagrees and says that the matter should be left to a jury in an appropriate case.

The hearing on 8th and 9th July 2026 will therefore focus on a fundamental point of principle: is gender identity legally relevant to deception under section 74 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003?

Why the guidance matters

Crown Prosecutors are expected to follow CPS guidance when making charging decisions. Police officers, defence lawyers and victim-support organisations also rely on it. Guidance issued by the Crown Prosecution Service should explain what the law is, not what groups such as Stonewall, Galop and Gendered Intelligence would like it to be.

Muddled guidance could have real and damaging consequences: genuine offences may not be prosecuted or people may face prosecution on the basis of an incorrect understanding of the law.

The guidance is also likely to influence sex education and guidance produced by other organisations for young people, and for those who identify as transgender. Young people who are experimenting with sexual relationships for the first time and who may believe that “you are who you say you are” are particularly at risk of misunderstanding the importance of sex to the validity of consent, and of becoming either victims or perpetrators.

Our case includes a witness statement from Dennis Kavanagh of the Gay Men’s Network, who says that deception as to sex is a growing issue for male homosexual victims:

“The practice of trans identifying females concealing their sex, colloquially known as ‘stealthing’, is a known issue in homosexual male spaces.“

He points at the guidance issued by ClincQ, Cruising: a trans guy’s guide to the gay sex scene, which encourages this – “Some guys [trans-identifying women] might not tell their sex partners.”

Kavanagh points out in his witness statement that deception as to sex has been identified by some trans-supporting lobby groups and charities as a target for reform with the ultimate aim of removing the right of the victim to obtain information about the sex of their potential partner prior to sexual contact. For example, Stonewall’s publication A vision for change: Acceptance without exception for trans people included as a goal:

“Judicial clarity of ‘sex by deception’ cases to define the legal position on what constitutes sex by deception based on gender, and to ensure trans people’s privacy is protected.”

The CPS itself, as the principal authority responsible for prosecutions, should be unequivocal, precise and clear as to the centrality of biological sex to sexual orientation and therefore to consent to sexual activity, just as the law itself is clear on this point.

Sex Matters is asking the court to quash the guidance, or to remove those parts of it that misstate the law.

Related content

Sex Matters responds to CPS consultation

Legal Feminist: Ciara Watkin: Where did the deception start?

Where sex matters: Relationships

Dennis examines the low threshold for criminality in Clause 1 of the bill, which states that “any conduct” can be a conversion practice and risks putting parenting on trial and breaching human rights.

Helen and Dennis speak about the potential for transactivists to use the bill to suppress discussion of trans ideology and the harms of gender-affirming care.

Read our analysis of the bill.

Read our response to Galop’s report.

Why is the government claiming to have evidence that 90,000 people a year suffer conversion therapy when almost no cases were ever reported to its national helpline?

When the government unveiled its draft bill to criminalise so-called “conversion practices” on 25th June, ministers and officials said they had evidence of a serious problem.

For proof, equalities minister Olivia Bailey pointed to a newly published report by LGBT charity Galop. It was described as containing “hundreds of case studies” demonstrating widespread abuse taking place across Britain today. The Cabinet Office claimed to have evidence of tens of thousands of people being victimised. But dig into the numbers and the picture changes dramatically.

Read Conversion therapy: still not illegal – or still not happening?

Following the evidence

Galop’s report Still not illegal: Evidence of modern-day conversion practices from Galop’s frontline services analyses case notes the charity collected between 2022 and 2025. It is presented as “some of the strongest evidence yet” that conversion practices are widespread.

Researchers examined records from around 13,500 Galop clients over three years. From those they identified:

• 371 potential cases of conversion practice

• 195 cases with sufficient detail for analysis

• just 132 recent cases

• only 29 cases that came through any of Galop’s helplines.

Only 51 clients approached Galop seeking help specifically because of alleged conversion practices. Most were already receiving support for issues such as domestic abuse, “honour”-based abuse, forced marriage, sexual violence, homelessness or asylum issues. That hardly suggests an epidemic requiring the creation of new criminal offences.

Meanwhile the Cabinet Office is citing a debunked Stonewall survey that claims tens of thousands of people are undergoing exorcism every year.

The Ban Conversion Therapy coalition of campaigning organisations has more members than the number of “case studies” of conversion therapy reported by Galop in Still not illegal.

The £360,000 helpline

The government presents the Galop report as if the charity is an independent observer. It fails to mention that Galop was paid £360,000 over three years to operate the government’s National Conversion Therapy Helpline.

When the service was commissioned, officials expected as many as 10,000–15,000 callers every year. Instead, the evidence presented in the report strongly suggests that only a handful of conversion-therapy reports were ever received.

Taxpayers deserve to know whether this spending represented value for money before ministers commit even more public funding.

What was reported to the helpline?

The cases in Galop’s report vary widely and are extremely short on detail. A few involve genuinely horrific crimes:

• rape

• sexual assault

• physical violence

• forced marriage

• kidnapping

• coercive control

• false imprisonment.

These are appalling, but they are already criminal offences. No new ban is required for them to be prosecuted.

Many other examples are far less serious, including interfamilial tension that is no doubt distressing but should not be criminalised. Some involve parents of the individuals in the case studies:

• insisting homosexuality is “just a phase”

• refusing to use preferred names or pronouns

• encouraging a child to marry

• praying for them

• taking them to church or a mosque

• arguing about sexuality or gender identity.

Others involve family estrangement, emotional pressure or religious disagreement. These situations may be painful, and in some circumstances may be abusive. But that does not mean entirely new criminal offences should be created.

There is not a single example of the historical practices involving electric shocks or aversion techniques that most people understand by “conversion therapy”.

A solution looking for a problem

Galop joined the Ban Conversion Therapy coalition before the Government Equalities Office (GEO) opened bidding to run the national helpline with criteria that, in effect, required applicants to be already operating a similar service. It ended up being the sole bidder for a contract that seemed tailor-made for it. And now ministers are using research it produced, alongside research from Stonewall, to seek to justify both new criminal legislation and continued funding for the helpline that didn’t ring.

That creates at the least the appearance of circularity. Campaigners claim a serious problem exists. The GEO funds an organisation linked to that campaign to investigate it. The organisation writes a report supporting the campaign objectives. The government cites that report as independent evidence for new legislation and further funding.

This is not robust evidence-based policymaking.

Victims of domestic abuse, “honour”-based violence, forced marriage, assault and sexual violence deserve protection. But those protections already exist in law.

The question is not whether abuse should be punished. It is whether creating a new category of crime called “conversion practices” adds anything useful for victims or prosecutors, or simply creates a distraction from using existing safeguarding powers and domestic-abuse legislation to tackle real crimes with worryingly low conviction rates.

The impact assessment for the proposed new law contains a calculation based on a Stonewall survey that came up with a widely debunked estimate of 10% of LGBT people having undergone exorcism to change their gender identity or sexual orientation. Based on this survey, the government estimates that around 80,000 people undergo conversion practices in the UK each year.

Parliament should now ask some simple questions:

• How many genuine cases of conversion therapy did the £360,000 helpline receive?

• How many resulted in police investigations?

• Which harms are not already covered by existing criminal law?

• Why does the government believe a new offence is necessary?

• Why is the government relying on a widely criticised Stonewall opinion survey as its main source of evidence?

Some fantastical estimates from Stonewall plus a few brief accounts of family conflict and religious disagreement along with a handful of more serious incidents that already fall under existing laws from Galop hardly constitute the strong case for new criminal legislation that ministers suggest. Evidence should drive policy, not the other way around.

Read more about conversion therapy.

Protestors outside the Scottish Parliament 11th April 2026. Photo: Nicole Jones

For Women Scotland has won another important victory against the Scottish Government, forcing it to finally remove all trans-identifying men from the women’s prison estate.

The Scottish Prison Service policy had been that trans-identifying male prisoners who had not committed violent, harassing or threatening crimes against women did not generally pose “an unacceptable risk of harm to those housed in the women’s estates” [paragraph 11 of the judgment]. Trans-identifying men who had been convicted of a violent crime against women in the past could be placed in a women’s prison based on an individual risk assessment.

The Scottish Government had refused to change this policy even after the Supreme Court made clear that “sex”, “woman” and “man” mean, and were always intended to refer to, biological sex, and that single-sex services are based on sex.

John Swinney, the First Minister, claimed that when it came to housing trans-identifying prisoners, it was a complicated legal issue. All of the arguments the Scottish Ministers put forward were rejected by the Court of Session in the judgment handed down on 19th June 2026.

The judge, Lady Ross, said:

“In all the circumstances, the Prisons Guidance is unlawful.” [paragraph 184]

Although many trans-identifying men had previously been removed from the women’s estate in Scotland, some remained at the time of the judgment. They are now being moved out of female prisons and Prison Service guidance regarding transgender prisoners must be changed.

Legal arguments

For Women Scotland argued that the ministers have a statutory obligation under rule 126 of the Prisons and Young Offenders Institutions (Scotland) Rules 2011, which requires that separate accommodation is provided for male and female prisoners. Women-only prison accommodation is intended for the protection of women prisoners as a group. That, they claimed, is “a bright line rule” that should not be crossed and does not need to be renegotiated every time it is used.

The Scottish minister’s main concern, as summed up by Lady Ross, was:

“to resist the argument that the only lawful policy would be the exclusion of all trans prisoners from prisons of the opposite biological sex.” [paragraph 37]

The ministers argued that:

• the petition was not relevant because the issues should be heard on a case-by-case basis, not decided on a policy level, and the Equality Act 2010 allows individuals to bring claims

• trans prisoners have rights under Articles 2, 3, 8 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights (concerning the right to life, freedom from torture and degrading treatment, autonomy and private life and non-discrimination)

• the Supreme Court decision in April 2025 was a starting point when deciding on where trans-identifying prisoners should be accommodated, but not the final word as it had not considered the legal intersection with the convention.

The ruling

Although the judgment sets precedent only in Scotland, it will be persuasive in other jurisdictions, and it was based on reasoning that applies to other types of single-sex and separate-sex services, not just prisons.

Policies must be lawful

There is no need or expectation that individual women harmed by the policy would have to bring legal cases in order to test whether it is lawful. Service providers and public bodies must take account of all their legal obligations when devising the policy.

“… the structure of the EA 2010 and the fact that it allows for individuals to bring claims do not provide a complete answer to this petition in the way contended for by the respondents. In general terms, service-providers and those who exercise public functions must make sure that the ways in which they carry out those responsibilities are lawful. They must be prepared to meet individual claims but they will only be able to do that in a considered and consistent way if, at the stage of devising policy, they take account of all of their obligations, including those under section 29 of and Schedules 3 and 22 to the EA 2010. If they adopt a policy which, when implemented in individual cases, will result in a breach of their statutory obligations, then that policy may be challenged as being unlawful.” [paragraph 58]

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) tried to argue that its policy of housing trans-identifying men in women’s prisons was “pragmatic” and similar to a mother taking her young son into a female toilet or changing room. The judge disagreed. She said that when a woman takes her young son into the ladies’ toilets with her, the boy’s “presence derives from that of his mother” and a baby boy being born in a women’s prison does not stop the prison from being for women only.

Separate-sex prisons are allowed

The Equality Act does not require separate-sex prisons, but it allows them.

But there is a legitimate basis for not allowing trans-identifying men in women’s prisons, namely protecting women’s dignity, safety and privacy, and the prison context is important.

“Sex segregation in prisons is not mandated in terms by the EA 2010, but it is lawful. Sex segregation is protected by the provisions of the EA 2010 which are, as expressed by the Supreme Court, “directed at maintaining the availability of separate or single spaces or services for women (or men) as a group”. That can be accepted without the need to examine the circumstances of an individual prisoner in the context of a delictual [i.e civil] claim. For separate spaces to be maintained in a way that is foreseeable and consistent, there require to be rules, whether statutory, as in this case, or otherwise, which are capable of general application. The exemptions or carve-outs, whether in terms of Schedule 3 or Schedule 22, can only sensibly be operated on a group basis. A separate sex space is lawful if either of those exemptions applies. Following FWS 2, lawful sex segregation in prisons means that trans prisoners are excluded from prisons for the opposite biological sex. [paragraph 82]

This recognition that separate-sex spaces rely on rules that are foreseeable and consistent is a clear justification for providing straightforward separate-sex services.

Sex discrimination against women

For Women Scotland argued that placing male prisoners in the female estate would itself result in sex discrimination and would at least be perceived as having the effect of violating the dignity of women prisoners or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for them, and that that would be harassment. The SPS argued that in both cases, evidence of individual harm would be needed.

The judge disagreed, saying that while harassment might need evidence in relation to sex discrimination, there is no need to refer to the circumstances of an underlying claim in order to bring a challenge to the policy.

She agreed that there is a basis to conclude that the accommodation of male prisoners in the female estate would result in female prisoners receiving less favourable treatment because of their sex.

“There are disadvantages associated with the sharing of accommodation by female and male prisoners; were it otherwise, there would be no need for sex segregation.” [paragraph 89]

Bright-line rules are legitimate

The law recognises the necessity for clear rules which are not subject to a case-by-case analysis in their application.

“The imposition of a bright line rule may have adverse consequences for individuals but there is a strong line of authority which makes clear that, as explained by the European Court of Human Rights in Animal Defenders at paragraph 106: ‘a state can, consistently with the Convention, adopt general measures which apply to pre-defined situations regardless of the individual facts of each case even if this might result in individual hard cases’.” [paragraph 135]

Balancing human rights

All prisoners, including trans-identifying prisoners, have rights under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Article 8 states that everyone has the right to respect for their private life. However, regardless how much a trans-identifying man believes he is a woman, he does not have the right to be placed in the women’s prison estate.

“… there is no case to support an argument that Article 8 entails a right for a trans woman to live in the same place as and in the company of women. It is precisely because of the impact of mixed sex accommodation provision on the privacy and dignity of the would-be fellow prisoners that the restriction in rule 126 exists and that immediately shows that, even if Article 8 rights are engaged, the interference is justified under Article 8(2). Sex segregation is necessary for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights or freedoms of other prisoners.” [paragraph 125]

This is because Article 8 rights are qualified and sex segregation in prisons is justified.

Under Articles 2 and 3, the SPS is obliged to protect life and not to subject prisoners to inhuman or degrading treatment. But this does not mean that it is obliged to accommodate a trans-identifying prisoner in a prison for the opposite sex. The rights of all prisoners must be considered and balanced.

Both the Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) and the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) intervened and argued against the petition. They drew attention to both the need to protect the convention rights of women prisoners and the need to balance those rights in the event of a conflict. However, they were primarily focused on ensuring that, when it came to the placement of trans-identifying prisoners, there was not a “without exception” policy. They argued that this could breach the rights of trans-identifying prisoners. The SHRC’s solution was to “have a human rights framework within which to make individual assessments”. [paragraph 47]

Women’s human rights are protected

That both the SHRC and the EHRC, alongside the Scottish Government, failed to stand up for women’s human rights until a grassroots organisation brought the case is shameful.

Related content

Housing men in women’s prisons is cruel and unlawful

Where sex matters: Crime

Lobby day on 10th March to protest about the puberty-blocker trial. Photo: Belinda Jiao

Following For Women Scotland’s latest legal win, this week the Scottish Government finally accepted that forcing female prisoners to share accommodation with transgender males was unlawful and indefensible, and Scottish women’s prisons are once more women-only.

But meanwhile the government in Westminster has published a “conversion practices” bill for England and Wales that threatens parents with jail if they don’t affirm a child who declares a transgender identity. We also heard this week that the puberty-blocker trial is moving again (subject to legal challenge).

The previous week we had met Olivia Bailey, the minister who is leading on this topic, and told her both in person and in writing afterwards that the proposed law would harm those it sets out to protect. She said that there would be safeguards to protect exploratory therapy. But the bill only conceives of exploration based on the idea that some people are “born in the wrong body”, and that the way to resolve that is to try to live as the opposite sex, perhaps with extreme medical intervention, and certainly without consideration that other people have rights.

Like many of you, I am deeply disappointed that Baroness Cass is supporting the puberty-blocker trial. It’s hard to overstate the importance and influence of the review she led, which laid bare the scandal of the lack of evidence underpinning “gender-affirmative” treatment. But the report had limitations, most seriously – as we said at the time – its failure to tackle the school-to-clinic pipeline and its endorsement of the idea of a puberty-blocker trial.

We met Baroness Cass twice when she was undertaking her review, and we said to her what we said to Olivia Bailey last week, and will keep saying: transitioning children is not consistent with safeguarding or preparing them for a healthy adult life in a world which recognises that sex is real and immutable.

For 15 years the NHS has subjected children to ideologically driven, evidence-free treatment based on the belief that others can be forced to accept them as the opposite sex. This was a promise doctors had no business making.

It is completely unethical to damage the health of more children in pursuit of this fantasy, or to expose parents, teachers and others to threats of investigation and even jail for resisting it.

Neither the puberty-blocker trial nor the conversion-therapy bill makes any sense. They are solutions looking for a problem. What they are trying to solve is the conundrum that adult transsexualism requires others to engage in extreme societal accommodation. The Supreme Court has already said No to that.

The puberty-blocker trial is going to court, and the conversion-therapy bill is going to Parliament (for pre-legislative scrutiny). We will be working in both arenas to attack the indefensible.

Find out more

Baroness Cass is wrong about the puberty-blocker trial

Draft conversion-practices bill threatens parents with jail time

Media coverage

In The Telegraph (Daniel Martin) and GB News (Alice Tomlinson), Maya was quoted as saying that this is a dangerous proposal which will harm the people it purports to protect, and that it is reckless for the government to push on with this when it’s well known that many young people who adopt a transgender identity as children or teenagers grow up to be gay instead.

Sex, gender and free speech on campus

Trans ideology in British universities

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce and Fiona McAnena discuss the current climate of free speech and gender ideology within British universities.

Helen reflects on her recent talk to students at Durham Union – you can read her account of the event on her Substack.

Read our recent report, Getting back on track, which explains how the legislative framework can enable and protect sport at a university level.

In other news

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is moving ahead with the widely condemned puberty-blocker trial following an unsuccessful legal challenge. It was covered in the Daily Mail (Shaun Wooller), The Times (Eleanor Hayward), The Sun (Sam Blanchard) and The Telegraph (Laura Donnelly). Helen was quoted as saying that gender ideology has broken yet another institution, as the MHRA’s mission is supposedly to “put patients first” in everything it does, yet it is signing off on a trial that does the opposite.

Later in the week, Baroness Cass backed the puberty-blocker trial in an interview with BBC News in which she said the trial will help “reduce harm”. The Telegraph (Michael Searles) quoted Maya as saying that it was grossly irresponsible of Cass to put children at grave risk by making misleading and unevidenced remarks in support of a trial of puberty blockers.

Work with Sex Matters!

Sex Matters is seeking a proactive and detail-focused administrative assistant to join our team on an initial one-year contract, with the possibility of extension. This role is remote and full-time, but we are open to considering applicants looking to work four or five days.

We’re looking for an individual with strong organisational skills, excellent attention to detail and experience in an administrative, operations or support role. You’ll be comfortable working with digital systems, databases and spreadsheets, handling confidential information appropriately and communicating professionally with supporters, colleagues and external contacts.

Closing date: 30th June 2026

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Sex Matters survives on your support.
Without it, we simply wouldn’t exist.

Sex Matters can deliver essential research and analysis, help shape the debate, and empower people with clear, published guidance on their rights – but only with your support. Please contribute what you can to keep us going.

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Helen reflects on her recent talk to students at Durham Union – you can read her account of the event on her Substack.

Read our recent report, Getting back on track, which explains how the legislative framework can enable and protect sport at a university level.

The government has published a draft bill to ban “conversion practices”.

While there are improvements on previous drafts of this law, it remains an attempt to shift “Stonewall Law” – now slowly being driven out of workplaces and services – into homes and classrooms.

It puts parents, therapists, teachers and partners at risk of being subjected to investigation if they do not affirm that someone is “male” or “female “ (or both, or neither) based on their personal declaration rather than their biology.

Although it offers an exception for medical professionals as long as they do not “act in a way that falls far below the standards reasonably expected of a person in their position”, others are at risk of being subjected to investigation if they do not support a person’s transition.

It also hands the power of private prosecution to organisations like the Good Law Project and Nancy Kelley’s Trans Solidarity Alliance.

What does the bill do?

The bill defines “conversion practice” as any conduct with the intention of causing the individual to have or not have (or to believe that they have or do not have) a particular sexual orientation or transgender identity. The question of whether conduct amounts to an abuse is a question of fact “to be determined by reference to all the circumstances of the case”.

The government’s argument is that “abuse should never be legal”, but in practice this bill hands off the detail for determining what is or isn’t abuse to the courts.

We fear that this open-ended and subjective definition will lead to parents, teachers, therapists, youth workers, pastoral leaders and others being investigated by the police and possibly submitted to the Crown Prosecution Service for assessment and prosecution, and also being vulnerable to private prosecution.

The offence of carrying out an abusive conversion practice on an individual is defined in terms of causing “serious harm” to the individual’s physical or mental health, or “serious alarm or distress to the individual which has a substantial adverse effect on their usual day-to-day activities”. This could potentially mean a wife telling her husband to stop wearing her clothes, parents telling a child they will not pay for puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones, or a school insisting on referring to all children accurately as girls or boys, in line with its safeguarding responsibilities.

Making Equality Act compliance a criminal offence?

The crime may be tried as a summary offence at a magistrates’ court, which can hand down a 12-month prison sentence, or by the Crown Court, leading to imprisonment of up to five years. Corporate bodies such as companies can also be tried for “failing to take all reasonable steps to prevent the commission of the offence”.

This is likely to have a significant chilling effect on individuals expressing gender-critical beliefs and applying sex-based rules at work.

A brief history: from historic abuses to strategic campaigning

Historically, what the public understands as conversion therapy refers to abhorrent, systemic attempts in the 1950s and 1960s to “cure” homosexual individuals using barbaric aversion techniques such as electric shocks or nausea-inducing drugs. These historic practices have long since died out – and are completely illegal under existing UK criminal laws.

When we reviewed 10 years of annual reports from major LGBT organisations up to 2019 we found that “conversion therapy” was barely mentioned as an active concern: it was widely seen as a historical relic. The sudden pivot occurred around 2020 following the loss of the debate over gender self-identification via the Gender Recognition Act. Lobby groups strategically co-opted the universal moral outrage against historic gay conversion methods and lifted the terminology wholesale to apply it to an entirely different phenomenon: “gender identity”.

The evidence vacuum: pulling apart the numbers

Proponents of the ban routinely lean on three heavily compromised data sources to assert that there is an ongoing “epidemic” requiring a new criminal law. When subjected to scrutiny, the evidence is not there:

• 2017 National LGBT survey: this self-selected online survey is frequently cited because 2% of respondents claimed to have undergone conversion therapy. However, the survey bundled spiritual counselling and ordinary conversations into the same definition as serious criminal abuses like corrective rape. Crucially, the survey showed that reporting was higher among older age groups, confirming that traditional conversion efforts are a historic, rather than contemporary, UK issue.

• 2023 Galop report: This was based on a survey claiming that 43% of trans-identifying people had faced conversion practices. Yet the qualitative data in fact shows that 56% of those accounts described ordinary interpersonal family friction or peer disagreements (such as a friend telling a teenager they are transitioning “for attention”). While emotionally distressing, family arguments should not be the business of the criminal justice system.

• 2025 Stonewall/Opinium poll: This push poll claimed that 30% of trans-identifying people in the UK had been subjected to an exorcism in the past five years. It also featured a bizarre generational skew whereby the youngest respondents reported drastically higher rates of physical violence than the older generations who actually lived through the persecution of the 20th century. It represents a narrative capture that broadens the definition of “harm” so widely that it pathologises everyday parental guidance and clinical scepticism.

Today’s announcement came with another report from Galop which analysed the case notes of 195 detailed cases of GALOP clients. Most of these relate to family relationships which they identify as “emotional and psychological abuse” such as:

“Dad makes frequent comments that ‘[Client] is not trans’ and that he is a woman. […] [Client] disclosed his parents want to take him to counselling to ‘convince him he is a female’.“

Like the previous Galop study, it includes a small number of crimes such as sexual assault alongside a much larger number of family disagreements. There is nothing in the study about what proportion of these cases were judged to be crimes by Galop, and what the outcomes were if they were reported to the police.

What happens next?

Ministers have opted for the slow track: the draft bill will be sent for pre-legislative scrutiny by a joint committee. This gives parliamentarians, clinicians, parents and teachers a vital window to influence what happens next.

Briefing on the draft bill

More on conversion therapy

On Wednesday 10th June, it was five years since I won my employment appeal tribunal, with a judgment that gender-critical beliefs are “worthy of respect in a democratic society”. It was also five years since we launched the Sex Matters memo to update people who helped our fledgling organisation get off the ground. Thank you to everyone who has supported us.

I marked the anniversary with an interview (and cake!) with Mr Menno. We talked about why a belief-discrimination case was the right test case to bring, the change it created, how Sex Matters started and how the Gender Wars might end. So much has happened during those five years, in part because of the legal precedent but much more because of the public and political actions enabled by the growing freedom to speak. But at the top of institutions, wilful inertia remains the rule.

Menno and I talked about the phone call in which the boss of the Center for Global Development, Masood Ahmed, told me I had lost my job. “We recognise sex-slash-gender,” he told me. “That’s not the law,” I replied. “In the UK, sex is a protected characteristic.” Losing my job simply for stating a personal characteristic that is supposed to attract legal protection was bewildering at first – and then maddening.

It’s now beyond doubt that sex means sex in the Equality Act. But it remains bewildering and maddening that leaders of powerful institutions have failed even to acknowledge that their legal misunderstandings were a serious mistake. More than that, many are still trying to find ways around the law, meaning that we are still having to keep saying: “That’s not the law.”

The latest victory was the excellent news that For Women Scotland has won its challenge against the Scottish Government’s cruel policy of placing trans-identifying male prisoners alongside female prisoners in women’s jails. The court said this policy was never lawful, and that the Scottish Government could not simply keep going in the hope that individual prisoners won’t bring discrimination claims.

To quote from the ruling: “service-providers and those who exercise public functions must make sure that the ways in which they carry out those responsibilities are lawful.” This applies whether you’re a private company like Marks & Spencer, which claims to have single-sex changing rooms but in reality doesn’t, or whether you’re a public body or indeed a national government.

But even as we were celebrating this win, we also heard that the MHRA is pushing ahead for a dangerous, unnecessary medical trial of puberty blockers for gender-confused children. James Esses, Keira Bell and the Bayswater Group of parents will be seeking an emergency injunction.

On 16th June Sex Matters was back in court for our own judicial review, which is against the National Police Chiefs’ Council and British Transport Police. Like For Women Scotland in the Scottish prisons case, we were arguing against a public authority that seeks to operate outside the law. Our case is against official guidance for police forces that they can sidestep the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE), the law that governs how they detain suspects and collect evidence. PACE is absolutely clear that strip-searching must be carried out by an officer of the same sex as the detainee. And yet the NPCC and BTP claim that in certain circumstances that essential legal safeguard can be ignored.

Left to right: Helen Joyce, Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena outside the Royal Courts of Justice on 16th June 2026 (Picture: Belinda Jiao)

It is an essential characteristic of democracies that they do not operate shadow regimes outside what the law specifies. The power to search individuals and collect evidence that might be used to deprive them of their liberty is among the state’s most coercive, and should be especially carefully controlled. As the judge said in the case of campaigner Harry Miller, who successfully fought against the recording of a non-crime hate incident against his name because of some rather banal tweets: “In this country we have never had a Cheka, a Gestapo or a Stasi. We have never lived in an Orwellian society.”

The policy we are challenging was put in place after the Supreme Court judgment in For Women Scotland. It tries to find a way around the law by saying opposite-sex searches can be carried out “consensually”. We were in court with Cathy Larkman, who is a retired police superintendent and the policing lead for the Women’s Rights Network, and with Rachel Fletcher, the chair of the Police SEEN network of serving officers who have bravely spoken up.

Cathy Larkman of WRN (left) and Rachel Fletcher of Police SEEN

Cathy and I had provided witness statements. Cathy’s drew on her more than 30 years of experience as a police officer. Mine included material from interviews with serving officers. Some were women who told us how humiliating it would be for them to search male detainees – including men who have committed violent and sexual crimes against women. Some were men who told us how wrong it would be for them to strip-search confused teenage girls on the basis that they “identify” as boys.

It is bewildering and maddening that we are still having to bring cases like this against public bodies, fighting policies and guidance produced by public servants and allowed to stand by ministers, all of them too cowardly to do their job of following the law and protecting our democracy, but still willing to draw their salaries from it. But as long as they continue to flout the law, we will keep going.

Thank you to everyone who supported me in my case and all these other important cases. Thank you too to everyone who has supported Sex Matters in our work, and who has found a way to use their voice. You changed everything!

Find out more

Maya’s employment appeal tribunal

Media coverage

Our judicial review against NPCC and BTP was covered in the news by Police Oracle, Policing Insight and Danny Halpin for PA Media, whose story was published by regional news outlets across the UK including Nation Cymru. Counsel for Sex Matters, Tim Owen KC, was quoted as saying that the law governing police searching expressly stated that all searches beyond outer clothing must be carried out by someone of the same sex as the detainee, and a shadow “consensual” searching regime was simply unlawful.

Donate to our legal challenge

Abusive strip-searching rules: our legal challenge

Why we’ve taken police chiefs to court, with guest Cathy Larkman

In this week’s podcast Helen Joyce talks to Cathy Larkman, policing lead at Women’s Rights Network, about our judicial review against the National Police Chiefs’ Council over its abusive strip-searching policy.

Cathy, who served as a police officer for more than 30 years, finishing her career as a superintendent, speaks from experience about how female police officers will come under pressure to search male detainees, including rapists, cross-dressing fetishists and men who simply enjoy threatening and humiliating women.

Read about our case.

Read State sanctioned sexual assault, Cathy’s report for the Women’s Rights Network.

Can you spare two minutes to email your MP?

Nearly 150 MPs have signed Labour MP Stella Creasy’s motion calling for Parliament to reject the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s draft code of practice. But they seem not to understand that the code doesn’t make law; it just explains how to follow the law.

More than 1,200 Sex Matters supporters have already written to their MPs. Could you spare a couple of minutes to do this? Use our simple online tool to challenge them if they signed or offer your support if they didn’t.

Take action now!

In other news

The Association of Green Councillors has issued guidance to the Green Party’s councillors which wrongly states that trans-identifying men do not have to be excluded from single-sex spaces, as reported by The Telegraph (Genevieve Holl-Allen). Fiona was quoted as saying that Green Party councillors who act on this disinformation could put their local authority at risk of legal action, and will also be letting down all those who want single-sex spaces and services.

Outrage over Lush’s decision to launch a Pride Month window display featuring a cartoon tiger with mastectomy scars was covered by The Telegraph (Gabriella Swerling). Helen said that the campaign was deeply disturbing and offensive, and that the grim fact that thousands of girls and young women have had healthy breasts cut off in an effort to look like men is a tragedy.

If you’d like this memo in your inbox every Friday at teatime, join our mailing list now.

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Sex Matters survives on your support.
Without it, we simply wouldn’t exist.

Sex Matters can deliver essential research and analysis, help shape the debate, and empower people with clear, published guidance on their rights – but only with your support. Please contribute what you can to keep us going.

Donate

Under PACE – the main law governing police conduct – strip-searches must be carried out by an officer of the same sex. But the NPCC says that doesn’t apply to trans detainees. We say that PACE is the only lawful basis for police searching, and that clear rules protect both officers and detainees.

Cathy speaks from experience about how female police officers will come under pressure to search male detainees, including rapists, cross-dressing fetishists and men who simply enjoy threatening and humiliating women.

Read about our case and support our crowdfund.

Read State sanctioned sexual assault, Cathy’s report for the Women’s Rights Network.

Helen Joyce and Dr Emma Hilton, chair of Sex Matters, with former police officer Cathy Larkman

Like everyone who opposes trans ideology, I would imagine, I sometimes still boggle at its depraved consequences. Among these have been policies saying that if a male police officer identifies as a woman, or has a piece of paper from the government saying he is a woman, then he is a suitable person to carry out a strip-search on a female detainee. That was the policy of nearly every police force in the UK until the Supreme Court judgment of April 2025, despite it being obvious to anyone with an ounce of common sense and compassion that a woman’s already traumatic experience of being strip-searched would be made a thousand times worse if the person doing it was a man. How he identifies is irrelevant.

We have all repeated the facts a thousand times by now. Nearly all sexual criminals are men. Nearly all their victims are women. “Trans women” – men who say they are women – aren’t magically less prone to such crimes than other men; indeed prison figures suggest that they may be more prone. Some are motivated to cross-dress by a fetish; policies that treat them as women are sexually exciting for them. And of course allowing trans-identifying male officers to strip-search women would enable serious human-rights abuses against vulnerable women. That proponents of doing so claimed to be motivated by human rights was sickening.

In late 2024 Sex Matters started a legal challenge against British Transport Police over an opposite-sex searching policy, which was settled after the Supreme Court judgment led to it being withdrawn. And yet so determined are the gender ideologues to enable opposite-sex strip-searching that they have tried again, this time with guidance written by the National Police Chiefs’ Council, a talking shop that produces model policies for police forces. This says that a detainee who declares a trans identity can “request” to be searched by someone of the opposite sex. If such a person can be found, the cross-sex search can proceed on the basis of “consent”.

Perhaps this guidance seems less awful than saying trans-identifying men can search women (that is a low bar). But it is still an outrage. Valid consent cannot possibly be obtained from someone who is under arrest. The NPCC’s claim that officers who refuse to carry out opposite-sex searches will experience no detriment to their careers is wilfully naive.

You don’t have to be overly cynical to see that the opportunity to expose themselves in front of female officers will be seized upon by many male detainees, whether because they find exposing themselves arousing, because they like humiliating and frightening women or because they dislike the police and want to cause as much trouble as they can.

We think the killer legal argument is that the guidance is in direct contravention of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE), which sets out in great detail how police searching must be carried out. PACE leaves no wiggle room for opposite-sex searching – none at all.

And so Sex Matters has taken a new challenge against this NPCC guidance. I will be attending the hearing in the High Court on Tuesday 16th June, together with my colleagues Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena, retired officer Cathy Larkman of Women’s Rights Network and a representative of the Police SEEN network.

We have set up a crowdfunder and published our court papers, which include witness statements from Cathy and Maya. Cathy’s is filled with insights from her more than 30 years as a serving officer; Maya’s includes dozens of quotes from serving police officers explaining why opposite-sex searching is so harmful and dangerous.

I carried out some of the research cited in Maya’s statement, in particular the interviews of those officers. Like most people, I have never been arrested or spent any time in a custody suite; hearing about this particularly fraught part of their job increased my respect and admiration for them and made me even more enraged that police leaders are so determined to push through this dangerous and disgusting policy.

I urge you to read what they had to say – and, if you agree that cross-sex strip-searching must not be allowed under any circumstances, please consider supporting our legal case.

Helen Joyce

Donate now

Find out more:

• The story of the case so far

• Our legal submissions

• Trans-identifying males who have committed sex crimes

• Our crowdfunder

Media coverage:

Both The Telegraph (Daniel Martin) and the Daily Mail (Sam Merriman) covered our judicial review of the NPCC guidance. They quoted current and retired police officers who told us that female officers will feel under immense pressure to carry out searches on male detainees despite not wanting to, and their fear that a man directed to manipulate his private parts by a female officer could experience this as arousing.

Child gender medicine: CAN-SG conference

In this week’s episode of the Sex Matters podcast, Fiona McAnena talks to Dr Louise Irvine, co-chair of the Clinical Advisory Network on Sex and Gender (CAN-SG), about Rethinking Youth Gender Medicine, on Sunday 5th and Monday 6th July in London. The conference will feature world experts discussing the social and clinical care of gender-distressed children and young people. Whether you’re a clinician, educator, parent, researcher, or simply concerned about child safeguarding and ideology distorting medical practice, this is a conversation you won’t want to miss.

CAN-SG has offered Sex Matters’ supporters an exclusive discount: use the code SM25 for 25 percent off all ticket prices. Further discounts are available for people on low incomes, and students can attend the full two days for just £20.

Our challenge to City’s unlawful ponds policy

The City of London committees involved with the ponds on Hampstead Heath have voted to continue with a “trans inclusive” approach which allows men who say they are women to use the women-only pool, showers and changing rooms. Our legal hearing is scheduled for November.

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Media coverage:

Author Amanda Craig wroet in The Telegraph about an encounter with a naked man at the Ladies’ Pond several years ago that led to her visiting the facility much less frequently. Maya discussed the story with Nana Akua on GB News, while Victoria Smith wrote for UnHerd that the City of London Corporation’s decision to retain a trans-inclusive policy rather than following the law on single-sex spaces was an insult to women.

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EHRC code: write to your MP

More than 120 MPs have signed Labour MP Stella Creasy’s motion calling for Parliament to reject the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s draft code of practice. But they seem not to understand that the code doesn’t make law; it just explains how to follow the law.

Nearly a thousand Sex Matters supporters have already written to their MPs. Could you spare a couple of minutes to do this? Use our simple online tool to challenge them if they signed or offer your support if they didn’t.

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Media coverage:

Among those who have signed the motion are two Labour MPs from Hertfordshire, Josh Dean and Chris Hinchliff. Bishop’s Stortford Independent (Sinead Corr) quoted Helen as saying that either the signatories really don’t understand the difference between law and statutory guidance, or they are knowingly indulging in pointless virtue signalling, and that neither possibility is impressive.

In other news

An investigation by NHS Sussex into the rogue WellBN GP practice in Brighton and Hove has resulted in the clinic being ordered to end prescriptions of cross-sex hormones for 78 children. The Telegraph (Michael Searles) quoted Fiona as saying that doctors hellbent on promoting transgender ideology have done untold harm to vulnerable young people,

EHRC chair Mary-Ann Stephenson revealed at a Women and Equalities Committee meeting on Tuesday 9th June that the equalities watchdog needed to relocate after its old office was targeted by transactivists. The Telegraph (Dominic Penna and Daniel Martin) quoted Fiona as saying that it’s disappointing that committee MPs who insist on undermining women’s right to single-sex spaces had nothing to say about vandalism or threats by transactivists.

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On Tuesday 16th June Sex Matters will be in the High Court for a judicial-review hearing. Our claim is against the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and the chief constable of British Transport Police (BTP), and concerns guidance both have issued regarding strip-searches performed on trans-identifying detainees. The secretary of state for the Home Office is named as an interested party.

Our argument is that both NPCC’s and BTP’s guidance is unlawful because it permits a detainee to be strip-searched by an officer of the opposite sex on the basis that both the detainee and officer “consent” to this. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE), the primary legislation setting out police powers in England and Wales, specifies that any search that goes beyond the removal of outerwear must be carried out by someone of the same sex.

The story so far

In late 2024 Sex Matters brought its first judicial review against BTP. That case related to guidance permitting officers with gender-recognition certificates (GRCs) to search detainees of the opposite (biological) sex, on the basis that a GRC changed a person’s sex for the purposes of PACE. That action was stayed (paused) by the High Court pending the decision of the Supreme Court in For Women Scotland v The Scottish Ministers (FWS) – although FWS concerned whether a GRC changed a person’s sex specifically for the purposes of the Equality Act specifically, it was expected that the reasoning in the judgment might shed light on whether it should or shouldn’t be understood as changing a person’s sex in PACE. After the judgment was handed down BTP withdrew its guidance. Our claim was therefore withdrawn by consent and BTP was ordered to make a contribution to our costs.

BTP then issued new guidance, as did the NPCC, which is an umbrella body that produces guidance and model policies for all police forces. These guidance documents still allowed for opposite-sex searching, albeit with different parameters. This time GRCs played no part in decision-making; instead trans-identifying detainees could request that they be searched by someone of the opposite sex. If such an officer could be found who was willing to carry out the search, it would proceed on the basis that both parties consented to it. If no officer could be found the detainee would be kept under continuous watch or be searched per PACE by someone of the same sex. We applied to take a fresh legal challenge, and in January of this year we were granted permission.

“Searching will be completed in line with biological sex however there will be times where a consensual search is agreed, and both the officer and the detainee give consent to the search.”

NPCC Interim guidance – Searching by transgender officers and employees of the police and the searching of transgender detainees

“… a detained person may consent to be searched outside the statutory requirement that the sex of the person searching is of the same biological sex as the person being searched, i.e. where the detained person indicates a preference to be searched by an officer of a biological sex in contradiction of the requirements of statutory powers. The person must be capable of giving consent and consent should not be sought if the person is deemed unfit through drink or drugs or does not have the relevant mental capacity to decide this.”

BTP interim guidance – Transgender and Non-Binary Search Guidance

We think that both documents breach Section 54 (Searches of detained persons) of PACE.

PACE aims to balance police forces’ need to investigate and prevent crime with citizens’ rights and freedoms. Section 54 of PACE gives police the legal power to search someone who is arrested. That power is usually exercised during detention at a police station, but in some circumstances searches take place elsewhere.

Sub-section (9) of PACE states that:

“The constable carrying out a search shall be of the same sex as the person searched”.

We argue that this is unequivocal and provides the only basis for lawful searching. We disagree that there is any power at common law for a police officer to search a detainee by consent.

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Why this case matters

Searches under PACE are lawful if they fall within the permitted parameters; consent is not at issue. This protects officers as well as detainees. We think permitting opposite-sex searches outside PACE puts officers (of both sexes) in legal jeopardy if they search someone who later claims their consent was not valid.

We also think opposite-sex searching harms women, both those conducting such searches and those subjected to them. Under this guidance, male police officers are able to carry out strip-searches of women with a trans identity. That such women must “consent” is not a meaningful safeguard: we do not accept that consent can meaningfully be given by a person who is detained. Women in contact with the police are on average extremely vulnerable. A high proportion have been in care, suffer from mental-health or addiction problems, or have experienced domestic or sexual abuse or trauma.

The growing cohort of trans-identifying girls and young women are also known to suffer disproportionately from mental-health issues. If one is detained she may request to be searched by a man because that is “gender affirming”, only to find the search traumatising and later come to view what happened as a violation. That she has “consented” does not remove the risk of serious harms, as is clear from the recent shocking case of a mentally ill trans-identifying woman who was held in a male psychiatric ward because that aligned with her “gender identity”, only to be raped within an hour.

In a witness statement provided in support of our claim, Maya Forstater, Sex Matters’ chief executive, writes:

“Taken together, the extreme vulnerability of female detainees, the recognised greater trauma done to women by being strip searched and the existence of this new cohort of young trans-identifying women mean it is necessary to consider the impact of the revised policies on female detainees who identify as trans. The officers we spoke to expressed fears that such women might request to be searched by male officers because they feel that to do otherwise would be to invalidate their trans identities.”

The guidance hands male detainees who have an erotic interest in cross-dressing, or who get a sexual thrill from exposing themselves in front of women or simply enjoy humiliating and intimidating women, an easy way to do so inside the custody suite. In her witness statement, Maya quotes serving police officers who explain how the possibility of being searched by a female officer will inevitably be exploited by some male detainees.

“The officers we interviewed emphasised that some members of the public are routinely deeply sexist and unpleasant towards female officers and staff members. The female officers said that it is extremely common for men to make sexualised remarks and insults, to suggest that they must be lesbians, to make rape threats, to pretend to believe that a female officer is a stripper performing in police uniform, to say they would like to be handcuffed or frisked by the officer, to say that she ‘needs a good shag’ or to make lewd suggestions that she is having sex with her male colleagues. This happens more to younger (and therefore on average less experienced) female officers.

“They emphasised that especially when it comes to searching, detention or custody situations, the people they interact with are not typical of their demographic among the general public. One said: ‘they’re far more likely to be violent against our officers, [seek to] humiliate our officers. They dislike police and they will do anything they can to harm us.’ All said that they expected that a policy that gave any man requiring a strip search the opportunity to ask for it to be performed by a female officer would be rapidly and widely misused for criminal and sexual purposes.”

The burden of opposite-sex searching will fall disproportionately on female officers because of the demographics of both police forces and those detained by police. Female officers are in a minority in all police forces, and men make up the great majority of detainees in general, and almost all of those detained for violent or sexual crimes.

The NPCC’s guidance states that female officers will not have to search trans-identifying men if they do not want to, and that if they refuse they will suffer no career detriment. But as Catherine Larkman, a retired senior police officer and the national policing lead for the Women’s Rights Network, explains in another witness statement, such safeguards are completely insufficient.

“A detainee requiring [a strip search] cannot be housed in a cell safely, without the search first taking place and any items that they may use to harm themselves or others, or any evidential items, being located and removed. The teams that carry out these searches are often not large. A female officer or staff member who feels uncomfortable at searching a male detainee, would be unlikely to refuse to carry out a search. She would likely hide her discomfort and unease and carry out the search, in order to avoid inconvenience to her colleagues, or being seen as a troublemaker. She may also be very conscious that, if she refused, another female colleague would then be asked to carry out the search instead of her.

“The disciplined nature of the police service and the prevailing culture within, is also a factor in an unlikely refusal to search. Policing is a public service role, and officers and staff are subject to a discipline code and standards of professional behaviour, including a requirement to treat others fairly and without discrimination. Officers and staff are conscious of the necessity not to breach these standards. They are also conscious of the demands on their own colleagues and the pressure to work effectively as part of a team. Standing out as the weak link on a team where risk and discomfort are to be expected, is not desirable. A refusal to carry out a search in an environment, where time, efficiency and safety are of the essence would be felt adversely.”

The question for the court

At the heart of this hearing is a simple question: are consensual opposite-sex strip-searches in breach of the same-sex statutory duty imposed by s.54(9) of PACE or is there an additional common-law power to search by consent?

If the court agrees with Sex Matters that opposite-sex strip-searches cannot be permitted by consent, then we request that the court declare that the guidance is unlawful. Our aim in bringing the case is to require that NPCC, BTP and by extension all police forces in Britain ensure their searching guidance complies with PACE.

Witness statement of Maya Forstater

Witness statement of Catherine Larkman

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