Transgender across the UK

Transgender ideology has quickly become an important, and divisive, topic for people in the UK. Over the course of recent years, it has become a battleground in the media, among academics, in the workplace, in sports, and in the law courts.

The amount of attention given to transgender issues is far greater than the number of people who actually identify as a different gender to their birth sex. According to the 2021 census, 262,000 people in England and Wales over the age of 16 answered ‘No’ to the question ‘Is the gender you identify with the same as your sex registered at birth?’ This would give a figure of around 0.5% of the population identifying as transgender. However, since the census issues have emerged with the question that was asked, and how people might have responded, meaning the true number of people identifying as transgender might be lower than this. The Office of National Statistics say that the numbers give “an indication of the size of the population and is broadly consistent with other sources but caution is needed”.

The normalisation of transgender ideas is seen in organisations like Stonewall, which had formerly focused on lesbian and gay rights, shifting their attention to transgender rights. Stonewall have sent representatives to ‘educate’ organisations, which, in their desire to have a reputation for being inclusive, swallow up the ideology they are taught. Debate is often suppressed and people are silenced through claims of ‘transphobia’ or being a ‘TERF’ (trans-exclusionary radical feminist). Scare-statistics – which aren’t accurate – about driving transgender people towards suicide if their identities are not affirmed are used, along with slogans like ‘Trans women are women’ and ‘Trans rights are human rights’ in the absence of discussion. Politicians are often asked ‘What is a woman’, and many are reluctant to answer, for fear of offending either side in the debate.

Concerns have been raised about how transgender ideology has affected what is taught to children. Transgender activist group Mermaids, for example, have sent breast binders to children without informing their parents. Gender ideology is routinely taught in classrooms as fact, and advice issued to schools has suggested they should not tell parents if their child wants to change their gender (although more recent advice has stepped back somewhat from this). There have even been claims that parents can be referred to social services for not affirming their child’s choices.

Transgender issues have become a touchstone for freedom of speech in the UK. Many people who have spoken out in favour of the biological definition of sex, and against transgender ideology, have been met with fierce opposition. They have been branded as ‘transphobic’ and had speaking engagements cancelled.

Both author JK Rowling and comedian Graham Linehan have been vocal opponents of transgender ideas. This has led to fans calling for a boycott of Rowling’s books, and strong opposition to those actors due to star in upcoming adaptations of her work. Graham Linehan has been investigated by the police for comments he made on social media, leading to his high-profile arrest at Heathrow Airport for which the Metropolitan Police later apologised.

Less high-profile names have also faced resistance to their views, especially within universities. Dr Michael Foran is a fellow at Keble College in Oxford. He was forced to cancel a series of lectures on the themes of his book ‘Sex, Gender, Identity, and the Law’ after abuse from transgender activists. The first two lectures were disrupted by protestors, calling him a “bigot” who “masks his transphobia behind a thin veneer of academia”. They then called on those in attendance to “join me in walking out and refusing to platform this bigot.” Kathleen Stock was Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex, who left her job after student protests over her questioning of gender identity as more important than biological sex. Students then protested over her speaking at the Oxford Union because her views were seen as transphobic.

Maya Forstater worked as a researcher for the Center for Global Development (CGD). In 2019 she posted on social media criticising the government’s plans to allow transgender people to declare their own gender. (Called ‘self-ID’, these plans were later dropped). As a result of her posts, she lost her job, and she then took CGD to an employment tribunal. A High Court judge ruled in her favour, saying that gender-critical views did fall under the protection of the Equalities Act, as they “did not seek to destroy the rights of trans persons”. This landmark case showed that people are free to hold views that others may deem as controversial or questionable.

The Gender Recognition Act 2004 enables people to apply for a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC). This changes the person’s gender for most legal purposes. A GRC instructs the Registrar of Births to issue a new birth certificate with the applicant’s acquired gender if certain requirements are met, such as a medical diagnosis and proof that the individual has lived as their acquired gender for at least two years. A GRC does not change the legal status of a person’s gender for some purposes, such as peerages, succession, parental status, and certain gender-specific offences. The Act also allows for further exemptions to be added in the future.

In 2022, the Scottish Parliament passed the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill. This would have changed the process needed to obtain at GRC in Scotland, removing the requirement to have a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria. It would have also cut the time required to live in a preferred gender from two years to just three months (six months for those under 18), and lowered the age limit for applying for a GRC to 16. In an unprecedented move, the UK government used devolution powers (called section 35 powers) to block the legislation. They argued that the Scottish law would create two different, parallel schemes for interpreting gender and could impact the safety of women and girls. Although the Scottish Government launched a judicial review of the order, it was ruled lawful in 2023 and the government abandoned its plans to introduce the legislation.

In their 2024 manifesto, the Labour government pledged to introduce a ban on ‘conversion practices’, which would include attempts to question, or change, a person’s sexuality or gender identity. This was subsequently introduced in the 2026 King’s Speech as a “commitment to bring forward a trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices” adding that the legislation would “ensure that the criminal law offers protection from these practices, while also preserving the freedom for people”. Currently no specific Bill has been introduced to Parliament.

In Northern Ireland, a private member’s Bill was brought by Éoin Tennyson to introduce a conversion practices ban. The Conversion Practices (Criminalisation) Bill had several days of heated debate at its Second Stage reading, and was passed by 46 votes to 29. This is the first step towards a conversion practice ban becoming law and the Bill now passes on to the Committee Stage for a detailed, clause-by-clause scrutiny, before further consideration and a final vote.

Debates about conversion practices have highlighted the potential for criminalising parents who want to check if their child is making an informed decision before changing gender. In Australia, where similar laws have been passed, prayers which mention the need to repent are seen as inappropriate according to government guidance. This has created fear in Christian communities and homes, and concern that such a ban would effectively criminalise teaching an traditional Christian position on gender and sexuality.

In April 2025 the UK’s Supreme Court made a landmark decision that for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010 the term ‘sex’ refers to biological sex and not a chosen gender identity. The ruling came as a result of a challenge to Scottish law which included transgender women in female quotas on public boards. However, the Court’s decision has implications in other areas and the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) was tasked with revising its guidelines on how to apply the equalities law.

The EHRC submitted its draft guidance to the government in September 2025, but it was not published until May 2026 and came into force in August. The guidance applies the Supreme Court decision to organisations and businesses that are open to the public.

The EHRC Code of Practice specifies that use of same-sex facilities, such as toilets and changing rooms, should only be used by people of that biological sex. This means that a trans woman – someone who is biologically male but who identifies as female – could not use a female bathroom.

The guidance goes on to say that if trans people are not offered a third, gender-neutral space, then this could be viewed as discriminatory. It recommends that gender-neutral changing rooms should offer self-contained, lockable spaces with floor-to-ceiling walls. The EHRC also said that organisations could allow trans people to use disabled facilities, or if they only had two toilets, one male and one female, they could be converted to unisex facilities.

Before the Code of Practice was issued there were a number of high profile tribunals where NHS employees claimed harassment for having to share changing facilities with trans colleagues.

The NHS closed the UK’s only dedicated “gender identity clinic”, the Tavistock Centre, following the Cass Review, an independent review into gender identity services commissioned by NHS England. The Centre faced a series of safeguarding failures, including fast-tracking children onto harmful drugs, and the Cass Review found that it was not “safe” or “viable.”

The Cass Review into gender identity services also found that transgender treatment for children was based on “remarkably weak” evidence. Dr Hilary Cass, who produced the report said that medical staff had “no guidance, no evidence, no training” and criticised the lack of evidence that puberty blocking medication, used to pause puberty in children, was safe to use.

As a result of the Cass Review, NHS England announced that puberty blockers would no longer be prescribed for children expressing gender dysphoria. Instead it called for a clinical trial into the medication, which was also recommended by Cass’ report.

A new trial into the effectiveness of puberty blocking drugs was announced in November 2025, despite concerns about the ethics of using experimental drugs on children under the age of 13. Campaigners brought legal action against the government to try and stop the trial, which was paused because of the legal proceedings. However, the High Court rejected the challenge in July 2026, opening the way for the clinical trial to begin. The study, which is being conducted by Kings College London, started recruiting 220 participants aged 11 to 16 in August 2026.

There has been a lot of controversy about the role of transgender athletes in sports. In April 2025 the Ultimate Pool Women’s Pro Series final in Wigan was contested by two transgender players (biological males identifying as female). Questions about the fairness of biological men competing against biological women have led to some sports organisations making decisions to ban transgender men and women from competing outside of their biological sex.

The International Olympic Committee has said that biological males, and those with differences in sexual development, will not be able to compete in women’s sport categories from the Los Angeles Summer Olympic Games in 2028. Athletes will be required to take a ‘once in a lifetime’ test to determine if they are female. The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) have introduced a similar scheme for their tour, which includes Wimbledon.

The Green Party have proposed plans that will allow athletes to compete in the category “they feel most comfortable in”, giving biological men a legal right to compete in women’s sports. They say that the current rules barring transgender players from competing in their chosen gender are rooted in “historical colonial and Eurocentric attitudes” and “transmisogyny”. Their policy will be debated at their party conference in October 2026.

Each of the main parties in Westminster made mention of gender identity and transgender rights in their manifestos for the 2024 General Election. Labour said that they would support the implementation of single-sex spaces under equality law, and protect transgender people by making hate crime an aggregated offence. They also pledged to deliver a trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices, and to modernise the gender recognition law while retaining the need for a gender dysphoria diagnosis.

The Conservatives pledged a guarantee that “the contested concept of gender identity” would not be taught to children, and that they would protect young people questioning their gender from “ideologically-driven care”. They state that their position is that “biological sex is a reality”, a position that the majority of people in the UK recognise. They promised to permanently stop puberty blocking medication and amend the NHS constitution to give every patient the right to single-sex accommodation and care.

Reform UK state their belief that ”transgender indoctrination is causing irreversible harm to children” and promise to ban transgender ideology in primary and secondary schools with “no gender questioning, social transitioning or pronoun swapping“. They would mandate that all public toilets and changing areas must provide single-sex facilities, and they would change the Online Safety Bill to ensure that social media companies pushing “baseless transgender ideology” would have no role in regulating free speech.

The Liberal Democrats promise to defend the rights of all gender identities, including trans and non-binary people, and to ban conversion practices. The Green Party pledges to campaign for the right of self-identification, ending the spousal veto, and introducing an X gender marker on passports for non-binary and intersex people.

Transgender issues have become a common subject in the news, and in politics, over recent years. It has rapidly become the touchstone for whether a person’s views are acceptable or not. As such, Christians may feel unable to speak about the Bible’s position on gender, and affirm the goodness of being male or female. CARE is committed to speaking the truth about gender with grace and kindness, and to ensuring that all Christians are able to do the same across the UK.