Recommendation 18

Section 22 of the Gender Recognition Act is important. It ensures the privacy of transgender people by making it a criminal offence for a person who has acquired information about a person’s GRC, in an official capacity, to disclose it without the transgender person’s consent (except in limited circumstances). No prosecution has been brought under this section so far. We are concerned to hear about the fears many working in an official capacity have in relation to this provision, and we are not convinced that in all cases those handling GRC’s should be subject to criminalisation where mistakes could be made. We recommend that the Government amends section 22 of the Gender Recognition Act to ensure that only cases where there is evidence that the disclosure was deliberate and knowing, are covered. (Paragraph 141) The Equality Act 2010 and its interaction with the Gender Recognition Act 2004