The US Supreme Court has temporarily suspended a ruling allowing a transgender student use the bathroom of his choice in a Virginia high school.
The student, Gavin Grimm, was born female but identifies as male. His school initially permitted him to use the male bathrooms in school but, following complaints from parents, the school board adopted a policy that students must use private bathrooms or bathrooms that correspond with their biological gender.
The case in question, Gloucester County School Board v G. G., centred on whether gender identity is covered by Title IX, the law which prohibits discrimination on grounds of sex. The Court of Appeal in the Fourth Circuit found in favour of Mr Grimm, holding that he should be entitled to use the boys’ bathroom. The school board subsequently appeal to the Supreme Court, which will heard after the summer recess. In addition, they applied for an immediate stay to block the existing order. The Supreme Court voted 5:3 to block the order of the lower court until the substantive case is heard.
This is amid much discussion on what is proving to be a hugely divisive issue. Many US states, including most recently North Carolina, have introduced laws requiring people to use the bathroom that corresponds with the gender listed on their birth cert. A directive from the Obama administration threatening schools with the loss of federal money for discrimination based on gender identity has also been challenged in court by more than 20 states. Such laws have been criticised as being discriminatory, with certain companies refusing to do business in such states.
Further news has come from the United Kingdom, where the UK Supreme Court has referred a question to the Court of Justice of the European Union on whether a person who has changed gender must also be unmarried in order to qualify for a state retirement pension.
The applicant in question did not apply for a gender recognition certificate as she wished to remain married to her wife. The applicant was refused the state pension on the basis that she was a man and could not be treated as a woman for the purpose of determining her pensionable age.
When the UK Gender Recognition Act was passed, “a valid marriage could subsist in law only between a man and a woman”. Under the provisions of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, which came into full force in December 2014, a full gender-recognition certificate can be obtained without a marriage having to be annulled, provided the applicant’s spouse consents. Those provisions, however, are not retrospective.
Click here to read the judgment in MB v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.