The British Transport Police (BTP) are being sued by women’s rights campaigners over new guidance that allows trans officers to strip-search women.
The guidance, which was authorised in September, states that regardless of whether transgender staff possess a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC) or not, the BTP recognises their trans status and will use the preferred pronouns.
However, it specifies that staff can only search people of the same sex as “either their birth certificate or GRC”.
This means biologically male police can intimately search women as long as they have a GRC.
The British Transport Police (BTP) are being sued by women’s rights campaigners
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Campaigners wrote to Chief Constable Lucy D’Orsi last month calling for the guidance to be axed on the basis that it breaches human rights.
Maya Forstater, the chief executive of gender-critical campaign group Sex Matters, called the guidance “state-sponsored sex discrimination and sexual abuse”.
However, the force has refused to remove the guidance, and a lengthy legal battle will soon commence.
Foraster has now said: “Sex Matters is seeking urgent permission for a judicial review to halt British Transport Police’s heinous practice of allowing male officers with a Gender Recognition Certificate to strip-search female detainees.
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Maya Forstater, the chief executive of gender-critical campaign group Sex Matters, called the guidance ‘state-sponsored sex discrimination and sexual abuse’
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“This policy means every woman who travels on trains around the UK is at risk of being subjected to undignified and humiliating treatment, which is a breach of her human rights.
“We are bringing this case to ensure that no woman in the UK has to suffer this degrading treatment, and to protect female officers from being forced to search male suspects who decide to declare themselves ‘women’.”
In BTP jurisdiction, officers can search people of the same sex as “either their birth certificate or GRC”.
Those 18 and over who have lived in their acquired gender for more than two years can purchase a GRC for £5.
Male police can intimately search women as long as they have a GRC
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Cathy Larkman, a retired police superintendent and national policing lead for the Women’s Rights Network, said: “It will now either be established that British Transport Police has overreached themselves and permitted women’s human rights to be breached in the most heinous and undignified way, or that the law supports this outright intrusion on women’s bodies.”
A spokesman for the British Transport Police said: “British Transport Police can confirm that a civil claim has been received and a judicial review is underway. We cannot comment further at this time due to pending legal proceedings.”
In January, similar guidance by the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) in January was withdrawn after public outcry, with the Conservative government raising concerns about women’s safety.
Due to this, the NPCC said it was conducting a thorough review of its guidance on searches conducted by transgender officers.
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