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Consultation launched on expediting transgender recognition

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Angela Constance

Plans have been unveiled to make it simpler for transgender people to be legally recognised in their acquired gender.

Equality Secretary Angela Constance has launched a consultation on proposals which would bring Scotland into line with international best practice including:

  • Replacing requirements to provide medical evidence and to live in an acquired gender for two years when seeking legal gender recognition, with a self-declaration system

  • Reducing the age at which recognition can be obtained to 16, and considering options for under-16s

  • Options for the legal recognition of non-binary people – people who do not identify as male or female

    • Ms Constance said: “Scotland rightly has a reputation as one of the most progressive countries in relation to LGBTI legal and human rights equality in Europe – but we need to do more to progress equality for trans people.“Both our Fairer Scotland Action Plan and this year’s Programme for Government commit to renewing the 2004 Gender Recognition Act. This Act was once considered ahead of its time but it now needs updated so we can ensure we are creating a fairer Scotland for those who are transgender and non-binary.

    “By holding a full and wide ranging consultation we can make sure that our law is fit for purpose and in line with international best practice. This is a vital conversation and one which will ensure transgender and non-binary people in Scotland are treated with dignity, fairness and respect.”

    James Morton, Scottish Trans Alliance manager, said: “The current process to change the gender on a trans person’s birth certificate is a humiliating, offensive and expensive red-tape nightmare which requires them to submit intrusive psychiatric evidence to a faceless tribunal panel years after they transitioned.”It makes sense for birth certificates to be brought into line with the self-declaration process already used to change all other identity documents when trans people start living in their gender identity.

    “Being able to change the gender on their birth certificate to match their other identity documents ensures that their pensions, insurance policies, civil partnerships and marriages are all administered correctly.”

    Dr Stuart Waiton, a lecturer in criminology at Abertay University, said the proposals were “state-sponsored child abuse”.

    He said: “In a liberal society, it is up to individuals to make decisions about their lives for themselves but this does not mean that we should be cheering on this culture of narcissism.“Eighteen-year-olds can do what they like with their bodies. But for a government to suggest that 12-year-olds, immature young people, who don’t have the ‘right’ to go to bed when they want, let alone anything else, can have gender reassignment should be seen as a form of state-sponsored child abuse.”

    Simon Calvert of the Christian Institute, added: “Politicians must stop and ask themselves if jumping on this bandwagon is really helping children. The more trans politics grips our culture, the more young people are being rushed into damaging hormone therapy and mutilating surgery by people motivated more by political posturing than the best interests of children.”

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