A new law that was recently passed in Scotland will force all-girls schools across the United Kingdom to admit males who self-identify as transgender, a report has claimed.
A report drawn up by the Policy Exchange think-tank has claimed that the new Scottish legislation allowing over-16s to self-ID as a different gender without any medical assessment will force all-girls schools across the entire United Kingdom to start letting in biological males who identify as trans.
It comes as the British government considers blocking the legislation from being officially signed off by the King under rules set out within the Scotland Act 1998, which outlines some of Scotland’s devolved powers.
According to the report published on Thursday, the new rules — which will allow people in Scotland to gain legal recognition as an alternate gender without the need for medical investigation — will have major ramifications across the wider United Kingdom, making it far more difficult for certain women-only spaces such as all-girls schools to be maintained legally.
“[It will c]hange the operation of the law in relation to single-sex services, making it potentially more difficult for women-only spaces to exclude biological males,” the document warns, explaining that gender and sex under Britain’s equality legislation are often largely treated as interchangeable.
As a result, it appears that males who gain a gender recognition certificate in Scotland describing them as being a girl or a woman may not be able to be legally excluded from all-girls schools anywhere in the United Kingdom.
“[B]iological males possessing a Scottish Gender Recognition Certificate, regardless of where they are in the UK, will be legally female and will benefit from inclusion within that category for the purposes of the Equality Act,” the report explains.
“The law as it stands provides that 16-18-year-old biological males who hold a Gender Recognition Certificate cannot be excluded from single-sex girls schools,” it continues.
“There is no exception for gender reassignment discrimination in relation to schools.”
“This Bill will confer on certain biological males a legal right of admission to girls’ schools, a right which otherwise does not exist,” the document goes on to claim.
The document goes on to argue that the British government would be “justified” in seeking a so-called section 35 order, which would block the transgenderism bill passed in the Scottish Parliament from becoming law.
Such an order can be passed in Westminster should they have reasonable grounds to believe that a law passed in Scotland poses a danger to UK-wide governance.
According to The Telegraph, there appears to be a growing appetite within the Conservative (Tory) Party government to issue such an order, much to the chagrin of Scotland’s progressive administration, as well as the many LGBT lobby groups dotted throughout the kingdom.
The newspaper reports that the British government’s Secretary of State for Scotland, Alister Jack, has received legal advice that the trans law could be challenged using a section 35 order.
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