Trans row could have been avoided with a bit of common sense

Some will say that is a simplistic summary in the wake of yesterday's Supreme Court ruling, but to the average person in the street that is what it essentially boils down to.

The UK's highest court has ruled that as far as the Equality Act 2010 is concerned, the definition of a woman will be restricted to biological females. 

Of course even this ruling is cloaked in the type of ambiguity that the legal profession specialises in. But effectively it rules that women should now be able to use female-only changing rooms, confident that biological men will not be present. It means that female athletes should be able to compete on a level playing field with other women, without their rivals having the unfair advantage of having been through male puberty. It should once and for all end the scandal of convicted male sex offenders being housed in female prisons because they identify themselves as women.

The sad thing about this case is that it has taken seven years, and no doubt many tens of thousands of pounds in legal fees, to come to a conclusion which most people would see as basic common sense. It has created a problem which a decade or so ago did not even exist, and could have been avoided with a bit of flexibility and pragmatism from all concerned.

This newspaper is not unsympathetic to people with a genuine gender dysphoria, and believes that most right-thinking people will be tolerant and understanding in these matters. But the number of people who this affectes is vanishingly small, and any issues could surely have been accommodated with a bit of give and take from all concerned. Instead, the battle lines were drawn, the rhetoric became ugly, and a nasty and needless culture war ensued.

We welcome what is surely a sensible ruling, and hope this means the wounds caused by this legal battle can finally heal. But it should never have come to this.