West London NHS Trust Allows Biological Males With Gender Recognition Certificates Into Female Wards Under Temporary Policy

West London NHS Trust permits biological males who hold gender recognition certificates to access female-only wards and toilets. The trust directs patients that single-sex facilities may be used according to their legal gender, including those possessing a GRC. The Supreme Court ruled that sex under the Equality Act 2010 means biological sex.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission confirmed that the ruling establishes a person's legal sex as that recorded at birth and that obtaining a GRC does not alter one's legal sex for Equality Act purposes. The trust provides NHS services across Ealing, Hounslow, and Hammersmith and Fulham. It operates women-only units at St Bernard's Hospital.

The trust revised its transgender policy in April and stated the current version is temporary while it awaits national NHS guidance. A trust spokesman said the policy reflects the Supreme Court ruling and was developed with legal advice to balance rights while maintaining safe care.

An NHS spokesman said the Equality and Human Rights Commission's statutory guidance has been laid in Parliament and the service is reviewing it to publish draft guidance shortly.

Claire Coutinho, the shadow equalities minister, stated that biological males must not be allowed into single-sex female spaces and called on the Health Secretary to demand immediate withdrawal of the policy and to publish national guidance that is more than twelve months overdue.

Fiona McAnena, director of campaigns at Sex Matters, stated that the term legal gender has no basis in law or medicine and that it is extraordinary for NHS bosses at West London to write rules using that terminology. She added that patients or staff could have grounds to mount a legal challenge.