Trans rights are under threat, help us protect them.
The Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has recently released a new Code of Practice, which advises services, public functions and associations on how to adhere to the Equality Act (2010); the law that protects people from discrimination in the workplace and in wider society.
The updated code essentially advises that businesses and service providers should treat trans people as their sex assigned at birth. However, the guidance is neither clear nor consistent, and, particularly in the case of trans men, advises that they should not be able to access the single-sex spaces of their gender and be cautious about accessing those for their sex assigned at birth, thus essentially excluding them from all single-sex spaces (including toilets, changing rooms, sports clubs, etc), except in the case that a third (gender-neutral) option is available.
This is an alarming ruling that delegitimises trans identities and plays into the hateful narrative in which trans people, particularly trans women, are pitted against cis women and painted as a threat to cis women’s safety. Its impacts will be extremely harmful to trans and cis people. Trans organisations have pointed out that many trans people would rather avoid public spaces altogether rather than be forced to use the services of their sex assigned at birth, therefore meaning they will be excluded from many aspects of public life.
We are wholeheartedly against this new guidance, so have created this guidance to help trans-rights activists resist it.
