Views that a person’s sex cannot be changed is a protected philosophical belief

A woman who lost her job after expressing views that sex cannot be changed and transgender women are “not women” has won an appeal against an employment tribunal.

In Forstater v CGD Europe and ors, the EAT has held that ‘gender-critical’ beliefs, including a belief that sex is immutable and should not be conflated with gender identity, are protected under the Equality Act 2010. The employment tribunal had erred in finding that such beliefs were ‘not worthy of respect in a democratic society’. A philosophical belief is only excluded from protection if its expression would be akin to Nazism or totalitarianism and thereby liable to be excluded from the protection of rights under the European Convention of Human Rights. The claimant’s gender-critical beliefs, which were widely shared and did not seek to destroy the rights of trans persons, clearly did not fall into that category

Link to case.