A unambiguous decision by the supreme court helps MPs, MSPs and others dodge difficult questions
For all the negative stereotypes, many politicians are thoughtful, diligent and caring. But they are also human, and it is their more self-serving instincts that may have caused some to breathe a sigh of relief at the supreme court ruling on gender recognition.
After a challenge by the gender-critical group For Women Scotland – which started out as a dispute over Scottish government legislation about female representation on public boards – judges ruled that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act refer to biological women and biological sex.
The verdict will be heavily contested, and could bring serious and perhaps unforeseen repercussions for transgender women. But such an unexpectedly definitive view allows leaders in Scotland and Westminster to (and there is no gentle way of putting this) dodge responsibility over one of the most contentious and toxic debates of our age.
The Scottish government’s response was particularly eloquent. While stressing that no one should see the ruling as cause to triumph, it otherwise talked blandly about “engaging with the UK government to understand the full implication of this ruling”.
There is logic to this. The Equality Act and the Gender Recognition Act, the legislative focus of the deliberations, are both UK-wide and thus not something the Holyrood administration can decide unilaterally.
But beneath this reassuring constitutional hum lurks the sound of quiet footsteps, as the SNP’s first minister, John Swinney, shuffles his party away from an era when Nicola Sturgeon’s government was very proudly at the vanguard of transgender rights.
