Transgender people do not have the right to be recognized as women by law and to share the protections afforded to those born biologically female. The British Supreme Court ruled today, upholding the appeal of a feminist group , For Women Scotland, against the local government of Scotland: promoter of a legislation aimed at guaranteeing the recognition of the definition of women also to trans people who have requested and obtained a so-called “Gender Recognition Certificate” (GRC).

The ruling, signed by five judges of the Supreme Court, the highest judicial body in the Kingdom, applies to England and Wales, as well as Scotland.

The long-awaited verdict came after two lengthy hearings in November during which the parties presented their respective arguments, supported by organisations aligned in one direction or the other. "According to the unanimous decision of this court," read the rapporteur judge, Deputy Speaker Lord Patrick Hodge, "the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 (the reference law on equality in force on the island, ed.) refer to the biological woman and biological sex." A provision, Lord Hodge continued, that should not be read as "the triumph" of one party to the detriment of the other: British law, he stressed, ensures full protection of transgender people from any discrimination, without the need to extend the definition of woman to them and force the Equality Act.

Outside the courtroom, several feminist activists cheered and chanted slogans in the shadow of the statue of Millicent Fawcett, a historic figure in the suffragette movement. Among those present were several prominent figures and co-founders in 2018 of the group For Women Scotland, such as Joanna Cherry, a jurist and former Scottish MP for the SNP who dissociated herself from the independentist-progressive party in power in Edinburgh over this controversial issue.

The campaign to protect biological sex was supported among others by JK Rowling , writer and literary mother of Harry Potter, who has long been active in the controversy against the so-called "gender ideology" and in defense of the "biological difference" of women. Alongside the Scottish government and the "Gender Recognition Certificate" was Amnesty International UK among others.