For Women Scotland case: Landmark 'definition of a woman' Supreme Court ruling due

A landmark ruling on the definition of a woman in law will be delivered this morning by the Supreme Court.

The row centres on whether trans women can be regarded as female for the purposes of the 2010 Equality Act.

The Supreme Court gender case explained

It is the latest legal challenge by the campaign group For Women Scotland (FWS) against the Scottish Government.

The UK Supreme Court in Parliament Square, central London | PA

The ruling, which follows a two-day hearing in November last year, could have wide-ranging implications across Scotland, England and Wales.

The issue under scrutiny is whether a person with a full gender recognition certificate which recognises their gender as female can be considered a woman for the purposes of the Equality Act.

The legal battle dates back to the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018, which sets legal targets for increasing the proportion of women on public boards.

In 2022, FWS successfully challenged the original Act over its inclusion of trans women in its definition of women.

The Scottish Government then dropped the definition from the Act and issued revised statutory guidance – essentially, advice on how to comply with the law.

This stated that under the 2018 Act, the definition of a woman was the same as that set out in the Equality Act, and also that a person with a gender recognition certificate recognising their gender as female had the sex of a woman.

FWS challenged this revised guidance on the grounds that sex under the Equality Act referred to its biological meaning. The campaign group said the Government was overstepping its powers by effectively redefining the meaning of “woman”.

Its challenge was twice rejected by the Court of Session, which did grant FWS permission to appeal to the UK Supreme Court. It will deliver its verdict this morning.

The court’s president, Lord Reed, will read a summary of the decision around 9.45am.

FWS was represented by Aidan O’Neill KC during last year’s two-day hearing. He told the court the “common sense” meaning of the words man and woman should be reflected.

During his evidence session, he also said sex is “an immutable biological state”.

Ruth Crawford KC, representing the Scottish Government, argued the Gender Recognition Act 2004 means obtaining a gender recognition certificate amounts to a change of sex “for all purposes”.

She also said “a person who has become the sex of their acquired gender is entitled to the protections of that sex”.