Today the UK Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that the terms woman and sex in the Equalities Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex. 

The issue was whether trans women who have a gender recognition certificate, are women in the eyes of the law and therefore are entitled to women’s legal protections. 

For legal purposes under this ruling transwomen are not women. The terms women and sex in UK law must be interpreted as referring to biological sex.

Contrary to recent claims by Wellington Pride supporters, LAVA members have been defending our right, enshrined in the Human Rights Act 1993, to exclude men from our groups and spaces. This article is by Tighe, a LAVA founder and member, who protested with us at the Ministry for Women and Michael Fowler Centre in March 2021.

Read this excellent account by Garwhoungle at The Ministry Has Fallen on Substack, of the situation the LAVA lesbians found themselves in when their stall to display a lesbian herstory map at Pride was cancelled - because they exercised their freedom of political opinion, freedom of association and freedom of expression.

On 8 August, LAVA claimant Marg Curnow was interviewed by Paul Brennan for his Breakfast show on Reality Check Radio. Listen to them to discuss our case in the Human Rights Review Tribunal at the link in this article.

Marg Curnow, a plaintiff in our Human Rights Review Tribunal case has had a letter to the editor of The Post published, responding to this opinion piece in The Post on June 19 2024. We reproduce Marg’s letter below.

Lesbian Action for Visibility in Aotearoa (LAVA) has made a discrimination complaint to the Human Rights Review Tribunal (HRRT) against the Board of Wellington Pride Incorporated.