Trans officers within British Transport Police can no longer conduct intimate searches of women following a Supreme Court ruling, GB News can reveal.
Guidance to staff seen by this broadcaster said that, as an interim position, any "same sex searches are to be undertaken in accordance with the biological sex of the detainee."
Deputy Chief Constable Alistair Sutherland told BTP officers that the force would provide "further clarity" once it "had a chance to digest the judgment" handed down at the Supreme Court yesterday, which ruled that trans women are not legally women.
Judges in Britain's most senior court ruled unanimously that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 referred to sex not gender.
Trans officers within British Transport Police can no longer conduct intimate searches of women following a Supreme Court ruling, GB News can reveal
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In reaction, the staff note from DCC Sutherland told colleagues that if they had been "affected by this in any way" then they can find "support on the Wellbeing Hub."
The update comes amid a legal battle between gender critical campaigners and the force over its previous guidance that allowed transgender officers to strip-search women.
The policy, first revealed by The Telegraph, had allowed male staff that identify as women to conduct intimate searches of women as long as they had a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC).
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BTP had maintained that this policy was permitted under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, but the Sex Matters campaign group said the policy was unlawful and a breach of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects against "torture, humiliating and degrading treatment."
Last year, the force faced a legal letter from Sex Matters on the policy, as it broke with the majority of other forces in allowing trans officers to conduct searches of women.
But BTP defended its stance, arguing that it was false to claim that it “exposes women to a particular risk of behaviour.”
Maya Forstater, CEO of human rights charity Sex Matters, said: "This change of position by British Transport Police is welcome and shows that yesterday's Supreme Court judgment is going to have a huge impact.
"Organisations like BTP were, in effect, operating self-ID policies because they were afraid of gender recognition certificates. As a default they decided to accommodate the wishes of any trans person and to completely ignore the rights of others.
Judges in Britain's most senior court ruled unanimously that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 referred to sex not gender
PA
"Female officers we interviewed told us about the pressure they were under to carry out searches on men who claim to be women, and how humiliating and degrading that is for them. This policy should never have been adopted, and it should not have taken a Supreme Court judgment for the chief constable to recognise that female officers have human rights too."
It said at the time: “As has been outlined previously, Parliament has imposed stringent safeguards in respect of the ability of an individual to obtain a GRC.
"It is not enough simply that a man identifies themselves as a female to obtain one.”
BTP has been contacted for comment.
