After months of leaks and confusion, we may finally be on the verge of discovering what the U.K. Tories are planning to do about former Prime Minister Theresa May’s long-awaited transgender reforms.
Initially, the U.K. minister for women and equalities Liz Truss indicated that they would be putting forward a ban on sex-change surgeries for minors as well as instituting protections for single-sex spaces. But last month, the Daily Mailreported that Boris Johnson’s live-in fiancée Carrie Symonds, more than twenty years his junior, was the influence behind Johnson’s “cold feet” on the matter, according to Tory MPs. Downing Street strongly denied the allegations.
Now, The Sunday Times is reporting that Theresa May’s plans to allow transgender people to simply identify however they wish will be officially abandoned this week—while at the same time, the government will make it far cheaper to legally change your gender. (Currently, it costs £140.) The Times could not confirm whether the anticipated protections for single-sex spaces will still be going ahead, although Equalities Minister Liz Truss, who faced major backlash as she worked on reforms to the Gender Recognition Act, promised that there would be no “rollback” of “transgender rights.”
