Judge: Census gender question ‘lawful’
A JUDGE has thrown out a legal bid to stop Scottish Government plans allowing people to self-identify their gender in this year’s census.
Lord Sandison ruled that a proposal to let Scots self-identify in response to a question asking them their sex – even if they do not have a gender recognition certificate – is lawful.
The campaign group Fair Play For Women had gone to the Court of Session to challenge guidance issued by the National Records of Scotland that people would be allowed to choose a different gender to the one on their birth certificate. But in his ruling, Lord Sandison said a selection on the census which was provided in ‘good faith and on reasonable grounds’ would not be a false answer.
Last night, Fair Play For Women said it was ‘disappointed by the judgment and will be requesting an urgent appeal’.
The group said on Twitter: ‘The guidance proposed for the sex question will jeopardise the collection of accurate data on sex in the Scottish census and erodes the harmonisation of data collected via censuses across the UK.’ Transgender rights activists welcomed Lord Sandison’s judgment, in which he stated there is ‘no general rule or principle of law that a question as to a person’s sex may only properly be answered by reference to the sex stated on that person’s birth certificate or GRC [gender recognition certificate]’.
Fair Play For Women brought the action after it was announced the sex question in the census would contain guidance saying: ‘If you are transgender you can be different from what is on your birth certificate. You do not need a gender recognition certificate.’
At a hearing earlier this month, the group’s advocate, Roddy Dunlop, QC, argued that the only lawful responses on the census were for people to answer based either on their birth certificate or their gender recognition certificate.
Mr Dunlop said a judge in an English court recently stopped a similar proposal being adopted for the census south of the Border. But Lord Sandison said the 1920 Census Act in Scotland contained distinctions from the English equivalent which allowed Scottish ministers to permit people to self-identify when answering the sex question. Scotland’s census will take place on March 20.