Sex Matters Podcast

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce is joined by social scientist Matilda Gosling, who was commissioned by Sex Matters to write Criminalising conversations , a new report on the government’s proposed Conversion Practices Bill and how it would affect parents, therapists and gender-distressed young people. The report is the first of its kind to document the serious problems with the planned new law...

Why does it matter whether we collect data on sex? In this episode of the Sex Matters podcast, Helen Joyce talks to sociologist Professor Alice Sullivan of University College London about her forthcoming book Sex, Lies and Statistics , due out in November. Alice explains why sex has always been an essential statistical variable, and how conflating it with “gender identity” conceals differences in...

This week, Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena explain the key role charities have played in allowing misunderstandings of the Equality Act 2010 to undermine safeguarding in schools. They look at recent NSPCC guidance on changing rooms, which could allow male teachers to supervise female pupils while they get changed, counter to essential safeguarding principles. They discuss the charity sector’s opp...

In this week’s episode, Fiona McAnena is joined by Tanya de Grunwald, host of the This isn’t Working podcast and founder of the This is Working network, to discuss how employers should navigate the sex and gender debate. Widespread misunderstanding of the law over the past decade has resulted in workplace policies that now urgently need to be put right. Fiona and Tanya explore why some employers a...

As the autumn term begins, Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena discuss statutory safeguarding guidance, as well as draft technical guidance on equality law for schools from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).Disappointingly, the EHRC’s guidance is riddled with serious legal errors. Unless it is significantly revised, it will mislead schools about their legal duties and what they must do...

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce speaks to psychotherapist Stella O’Malley, founder and director of Genspect, about how the government’s plans to criminalise so-called “conversion practices” would harm families and therapists. Good therapy requires open, trusting conversations, Stella points out. But the planned law risks making discussions about trans identification taboo, and driving therapis...

In this week’s podcast, Fiona, Maya and Helen discuss the cancellation of a panel organised by Women’s Rights Network Northern Ireland at the Féile an Phobail arts festival in Belfast. They discuss how the event was successfully relocated, drawing greater public attention, and what the controversy reveals about the challenges facing gender-critical women. They also examine media coverage of sex an...

The EHRC code of practice finally comes into force on 5th August. In this week’s podcast, Helen Joyce and Maya Forstater discuss what it will mean for single-sex services, charities and associations. They make some predictions for the coming autumn, when organisations will no longer be able to claim they’re “waiting for guidance”, new school safeguarding policy will come into force and legal battl...

In this week’s episode, Maya and Helen discuss the updated version of Keeping children safe in education (KCSIE), which places guidance for schools on dealing with trans issues within the statutory safeguarding framework. The most important change is the addition of three clear safeguarding principles that constrain how schools can respond to requests for “social transition”. Send our model policy...

A major row has erupted after Amnesty International UK published — and then quickly withdrew — a report labeling more than 100 organisations as “anti-rights”, including women’s rights groups, charities, support services, and campaigning organisations. Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena talk about the parlous state of democratic debate on human rights, when organisations are branded as threats simply...

In this week’s episode, Fiona McAnena is joined by Kim Jones, co-founder of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports , to discuss the landmark US Supreme Court ruling which reaffirmed that Title IX protections are based on biological sex. In January, the Supreme Court heard two cases that required it to adjudicate on what “sex” means in US anti-discrimination law. Idaho and West Virginia were def...

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce speaks to Dennis Kavanagh, director at the Gay Men’s Network and non-practising barrister, about the legal minefield that is the draft Conversion Practices Bill. Dennis examines the low threshold for criminality in Clause 1 of the bill, which states that “any conduct” can be a conversion practice and risks putting parenting on trial and breaching human rights. H...

In this week’s episode, Helen Joyce and Fiona McAnena discuss the current climate of free speech and gender ideology within British universities. Helen reflects on her recent talk to students at Durham Union – you can read her account of the event on her Substack . Read our recent report, Getting back on track , which explains how the legislative framework can enable and protect sport at a univers...

In this week’s podcast we talk to Cathy Larkman, retired superintendent and policing lead at Women’s Rights Network, about our judicial review against the National Police Chiefs’ Council over its abusive strip-searching policy. Under PACE – the main law governing police conduct – strip-searches must be carried out by an officer of the same sex. But the NPCC says that doesn’t apply to trans detaine...

In this week’s episode, Fiona McAnena talks to Dr Louise Irvine, co-chair of the Clinical Advisory Network on Sex and Gender (CAN-SG), about Rethinking Youth Gender Medicine , on Sunday 5th and Monday 6th July in London. The conference will feature world experts discussing the social and clinical care of gender-distressed children and young people. Whether you’re a clinician, educator, parent, res...

In this week’s episode, Maya Forstater and Fiona McAnena talk about our new report, Getting back on track: Using the Equality Act to enable and protect sport for women and girls – why we’ve produced it, and what’s in it. We show how UK law provides for separate sport for women and girls in several different ways, for fairness, safety and opportunity, from grassroots participation to elite competit...

In this week’s episode, Helen and Maya talk through what is colloquially known as a “small claim” for belief discrimination against a service provider. Examples of such discrimination include being refused service in a pub, barred from a gym or forced to leave an event because you are known or suspected to hold gender-critical beliefs (or to be associated with someone who does). Sex Matters has pu...

This week, Maya, Helen and Fiona give their initial take on the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s long-awaited update to the Code of practice for services, public functions and associations , which has been published by the Minister for Women and Equalities and laid before Parliament. Read the code of practice. Read our first analysis of the code . This is a public episode. If you would like...

In this week’s episode, Maya and Helen discuss the recent legal judgments that highlight the importance of strong protections for free speech and academic freedom to people who hold gender-critical views. As Maya wrote last week in Times Higher Education , at the heart of the High Court judgment in the judicial review brought by the University of Sussex is an Equality Act-shaped hole. The Office f...

In this week’s episode, Maya and Helen discuss our latest report, Sex-based rights in the City , which uncovered the widespread failure of the financial sector to comply with the Supreme Court ruling. Not one of 15 financial institutions contacted replied clearly stating that it provided single-sex toilets, as required by workplace regulations, and restricted access to people of that (biological)...

In this week’s episode, Fiona talks to Emma Moore, who manages our help desk. They discuss common themes, the advice provided to those seeking support, and the resources available on our website. Explore Sex Matters’ resources . This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.sex-matters-news.org

In this week’s episode, Maya and Helen discuss the new national digital ID (BritCard), which the government has committed to creating by the end of this parliament. But the government does not plan to include sex on the BritCard, saying that this “is not necessary for the intended purpose of the digital ID”. Maya and Helen explore why failing to include sex as a voluntary field on the BritCard is...

In this week’s episode, filmed in London, Maya, Fiona and Helen discuss the week’s events marking the anniversary of the For Women Scotland judgment at the Supreme Court. During the year since the Supreme Court judgment confirmed that “sex” in the Equality Act means biology, not self-ID or paperwork, there has been some progress but also significant institutional resistance. Shortly after the ruli...

In this week’s episode, Maya and Helen talk about our latest publication, One year later , which tells the stories of individual women harmed by the failure to implement the Supreme Court ruling handed down on 16th April 2025. A year after the landmark judgment, we are still hearing distressing stories of ordinary people being treated terribly simply because they want single-sex spaces, because th...

In this week’s episode, Fiona McAnena and Emma Hilton discuss the International Olympic Committee’s new policy on protecting the female category , released on 26th March. They talk about what’s in the policy, what it means for sport more broadly and how it’s been received. Emma is Sex Matters’ interim chair and the co-author of the most-cited paper on sex differences and the impact of testosterone...