LAST WEEK I BROKE the news on this site that the Scottish Parliament had erased gender as a classification category on its website after initially categorising Iris Duane, a biological man self-identifying as a woman, as female and inventing a third category – non-binary – for Q Manivannan.

Since then, it has caused quite a stushie on social media, with feminist groups alongside Conservative and Labour MSPs writing to the new Presiding Officer Kenny Gibson demanding women MSPs be counted.

Susan Dalgety pointed out that in failing to publish data on sex the Parliament was likely to be in breach of the Public Sector Equality Duty, which requires organisations to publish information demonstrating their compliance with equality legislation, including data on sex.

Another problem is looming. Holyrood’s standing orders now require gender balance on committees, which becomes impossible to comply with if the relevant data is withheld – and committee membership is due to be confirmed in the coming days.

Meanwhile, the parliamentary authorities are sitting on their hands. They have not restored gender as a search category, claiming it was “a legacy system” they have “taken steps to remove”. They said they are “reconsidering” their systems and processes as part of an Inclusive Parliament review, looking at “what personal information on members we need to publish and in what format”, and at “the creation and presentation of new MSP/candidate diversity data”.

Of course, it isn’t just at Holyrood where gender fantasy – the idea that men who self-identify as women become for all intents and purposes women – and the law are colliding. It really is incredible that last year’s Supreme Court judgement won by For Women Scotland – that under the Equality Act sex means biological sex, not gender – has still not been fully accepted and implemented. Opponents had pinned their hopes on Bridget Phillipson somehow diluting this ruling in the EHRC guidance, which, after considerable and unjustifiable delay, she finally issued last week. It turns out that single-sex spaces are exactly that, and by definition, exclude the opposite sex. Cue howls of outrage from “transwomen” and their supporters that men pretending to be women are now excluded from women’s toilets, changing rooms, female prisons etc.

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