JK Rowling has accused Keir Starmer of publicly misrepresenting equalities law, in what she says is “yet another indication that the Labour party can no longer be counted on to defend women’s rights”. The Harry Potter author was responding to comments the Labour leader gave to the Times when asked to define a woman. Starmer, formerly the director of public prosecutions, the most senior prosecutor in England and Wales, said: “A woman is a female adult, and in addition to that trans women are women, and that is not just my view, that is actually the law. It has been the law through the combined effects of the 2004 [Gender Recognition] Act and the 2010 [Equality] Act.” He called for reforms to the Gender Recognition Act, under which people diagnosed with gender dysphoria who have lived in their acquired gender for at least two years can apply to be legally recognised. “The process that people have to go through does need to be looked at,” he told the Times. “If you talk to anybody who’s been through the process, there’s a real issue about respect and dignity.” On Saturday Rowling said in a tweet: “I don’t think our politicians have the slightest idea how much anger is building among women from all walks of life at the attempts to threaten and intimidate them out of speaking publicly about their own rights, their own bodies and their own lives. “Among the thousands of letters and emails I’ve received are disillusioned members of Labour, the Greens, the Lib Dems and the SNP. Women are scared, outraged and angry at the deaf ear turned to their well-founded concerns. But women are organising. “Now @Keir_Starmer publicly misrepresents equalities law, in yet another indication that the Labour party can no longer be counted on to defend women’s rights. But I repeat: women are organising across party lines, and their resolve and their anger are growing.” Rowling said “innumerable gay people” had written to her saying they felt “under attack”. She said: “Like women, they – especially lesbians – are under attack for not wishing to be redefined and for refusing to use ideological language they find offensive.” Under the 2004 Gender Recognition Act in England and Wales, a transgender person is legally recognised as their acquired gender only after they have received a gender recognition certificate (GRC). But the Equality Act 2010 provides protection for trans people who have not yet transitioned or obtained a GRC.
Section 7 of the act gives protection to anyone with the protected characteristic of “gender reassignment”, defined as anyone who “is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person’s sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex.” The Equality Act also allows providers of separate or single-sex services to provide a different service to, or exclude, someone who has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment, including those with or without a GRC, provided that the service providers can prove it is “a proportionate means of achieving legitimate aim”. In the Times interview, Starmer called for a “more considered, respectful, tolerant debate about these issues,” adding: “I don’t think it furthers the interests of anybody to continue the debate in the way that it’s been going on now for some time.”