Sex means biological sex. A woman is a biological female. We now have these definitions on the authority of the UK Supreme Court, which this morning handed down one of the most consequential judgments since its foundation. It’s hard to know just how far-reaching the decision, couched in the dry language of statutes, will turn out to be. But there is no doubt that it’s a landmark moment for half the population.

In effect, the court has ruled that sex means exactly what most of us thought it did: before a wholesale onslaught on language and women’s rights by those promoting gender ideology. It’s now clear that “trans women” are not legally women in terms of the 2010 Equality Act, even if they have a gender recognition certificate (GRC).

It’s a long overdue triumph for common sense, thanks to the work of For Women Scotland, a campaigning organisation that took on the Scottish government and courts. Crucially, the judgment confirms the primacy of biological sex over what the Supreme Court called “certificated sex”.

It all began when Scottish ministers argued, bizarrely, that legislation intended to ensure equal representation of the sexes on boards could be satisfied by appointing an equal number of biological men and trans-identified males, as long as the latter held a GRC.

The idea that someone born male could change his legal gender for all purposes, giving him access to women’s refuges and single-sex gatherings, was always absurd. But it was enthusiastically promoted by trans activists, who insisted that men with a GRC had to be treated as women in every circumstance. It posed a significant threat to lesbians, who were repeatedly told that they had to accept “male lesbians” in their organisations and spaces or face legal challenges.

For Women Scotland’s challenge ground its way through the Scottish courts and ended up in the Supreme Court last November, which had to consider what might appear to be a technicality: the interaction between the Equality Act and the 2004 Gender Recognition Act. Opponents of the GRA argue that it should more accurately be regarded as a piece of legislation that allows individuals to conceal their biological sex.

This morning’s decision hinged on the fact that the Equality Act provides group-based protections against discrimination, and the definition of those groups need to be clear. The judges found that extending protections intended for women to individuals with “certificated” sex would cut across definitions of “man” and “woman” in the Act in an “incoherent” way.

That’s stating the obvious, to say the least. But it’s important to remember that the judgment could have gone the other way. We’ve heard so much propaganda in recent years about “trans women” being oppressed and vulnerable, that reporting of this incredibly important case has too often been framed as an attack on “trans rights”.

It was always about the rights of women, who have been subjected to outrageous demands by trans-identified males and their indoctrinated supporters in mainstream political parties. Perhaps today’s resounding victory will make some of them think again, instead of parroting lines given to them by Stonewall and other captured organisations.

Today is the day that everything — and nothing — changed. Women are still adult human females, but we now have the protection of the UK’s highest court when we say that biological sex matters.

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Joan Smith is a novelist and columnist. She was previously Chair of the Mayor of London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Board, and is on the advisory group for Sex Matters. Her book Unfortunately, She Was A Nymphomaniac: A New History of Rome’s Imperial Women was published in November 2024.

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