Pyrophore: United Kingdom

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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — usually just the United Kingdom (UK) — is a sovereign state in Northwestern Europe.

How UK government works

The UK comprises four constituent countries — England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, in descending order of population. The UK itself is organised as a unitary state; Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have devolved governments. This means that rather than, for example, a constitution, the existence and authority of each constituent country government (“national government”) is drawn from particular laws made by the British central government (“the British Government” or “HM Government”). This is as opposed to the federal model used in, for example, the United States and Australia. Those countries’ territorial divisions (called “states” and/or “territories” by both) have a subordinate relationship with their national governments, but in theory that relationship is based on an agreement between the states and the federation which, among other things, limits the federation’s power over the states. In the UK, on the other hand, the terms of the relationship between the UK Government and the national governments can be changed unilaterally by the UK Government.

As those relationships currently stand, legislation made by national parliaments can also be vetoed by a relevant UK elected official, namely the UK Secretary of State for that country. This is as opposed to federal systems, where when a subordinate state passes a law which conflicts with federal legislation, even where federal legislation is constitutionally afforded supremacy, the federation must seek redress through the courts. The country Secretaries’ veto power is theoretically similar to the veto power nominally enjoyed by the British monarch over British legislation, or by the governors-general of Commonwealth realms over legislation passed in those countries. However, those officeholders are theoretically nonpartisan, are prohibited by convention or law from using their powers for political purposes, and almost never use them anyway. British Secretaries of State for constituent countries, however, are partisan elected politicians and have displayed a willingness to use their veto power to enforce their party’s agenda in constituent countries against the will of their national governments — trans affairs have been a particular focus.

All of this means that the national governments are functionally semi-autonomous arms of the UK Government. Under general Pyrophore editorial policy this would normally mean that their actions would be listed on this page, to avoid fragmenting useful knowledge. However, the constituent country governments are usually informally understood as organs of their respective countries, and listing all relevant events in constituent countries on this page would create clutter. Thus, as a rule, relevant events in constituent countries will be listed on the page of the relevant country.

The legislative legacy of empire

The United Kingdom and its various predecessor states have historically built and maintained colonial empires across the globe. Some territories colonised by the British continue to be governed by the UK. However, many other colonised territories have become independent of the UK government to varying extents; some are fully independent (e.g., the United States) while others maintain some sort of connection with the UK government or domestic institutions like the monarchy (e.g., Australia).

In some former British jurisdictions, British domestic law continues to have some degree of effect or influence. This broadly includes British statutes which were passed and took effect in the relevant colonial state before it attained legislative independence, and were subsequently grandfathered into its independent body of laws (but may since have been amended in both jurisdictions and thus diverged from one another). More generally, courts of former British colonies occasionally cite or defer to decisions of British courts. For instance, the British legal concept of a young person’s capacity to consent to medical treatment, Gillick competence, is also used and known by that name in Australia, even though Gillick was a British case and subsequent case law in the two jurisdictions has differed somewhat. Where disambiguation is necessary, clarifying language is used (e.g., “Australian Gillick competence”).

Timeline

1985, October 17. The Lords of Appeal in Ordinary issue their ruling in Gillick v West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority. In doing so, they establish the concept of Gillick competence.

1988, May 24. The Local Government Act 1988 takes effect. The bill contains a section, s 28, which amends the Local Government Act 1986 to add a new section, s 2A. The relevant part of s 2A reads as follows:

2A — Prohibition on promiting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material

A local authority shall not—

(a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality;

(b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.

Because the new s 2A was inserted by the 1988 Act s 28, the provision becomes known in UK political parlance as “Section 28”.

2000, April 1. The Scotland Act 1998, establishing the Scottish national government, finishes its multi-stage commencement process, rendering the Scottish government fully operational.

2000, July 24. The Ethical Standards in Public Life (Scotland) Act 2000¹ takes effect. s 34 repeals s 2A of the Local Government Act 1986 (“Section 28”) within Scotland.²

2003, September 18. The Local Government Act 2003 takes effect. s 127(2) (Schedule 8) repeals Section 28 in England and Wales.

2005, April 4. The Gender Recognition Act 2004 takes effect. It provides a mechanism for certain trans adults to change their legal sex.

2010, October 1. The Equality Act 2010 takes effect. It provides new discrimination protections for a number of marginalised groups, including, at the time of enactment, trans people.

2020, September. NHS England commissions the Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People. Hilary Cass, the former president of the Royal College for Paediatrics and Child Health, is appointed to lead the review. In accordance with customary nomenclature used in Commonwealth countries for inquiries of this kind, the review is thus known as the Cass Review.

2020, December 1. HM High Court of Justice in England gives judgment in R (Bell) v Tavistock.

2021, September 17. HM Court of Appeal in England gives judgment in Bell v Tavistock, on appeal from the High Court of Justice.

2022, March. The Cass Review releases its Interim Report.

2023, January 17. Alister Jack MP, then the UK Secretary of State for Scotland, makes an order under the Scotland Act 1998 s 35 with regard to the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill 2022, passed by the Scottish Parliament in December 2022. The s 35 order blocks the Bill from receiving the Royal Assent and becoming law.

The Gender Recognition Reform Bill veto is the first time royal assent has been withheld from a bill for political reasons since 11 March 1708, when, on the advice of her ministers, Anne Stuart, then Queen of Great Britain, vetoed the British Parliament’s Scottish Militia Bill 1708.

2024, April 10. The Cass Review releases its Final Report (alternatively “the Cass Report“).

2025, April 30. The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom gives judgment in For Women Scotland v The Scottish Ministers. It holds that for the purpose of statutory interpretation with regard to the Equality Act 2010, the terms “man”, “woman” and “sex” refer to “biological sex”. It does not give a non-circular definition for this term.

The press and NGO response suggests most people in positions of power in civil society interpret it with the most transphobic meaning possible, i.e., “sex assigned at birth”. The ruling catalyses a cascade of further institutional bans targeting trans people.

Footnotes

This Act was enacted by the Scottish Parliament. This is indicated by the presence of “(Scotland)” in the name of the Bill. ↩︎
While the Scottish national government, as a devolved government, does not have the sovereignty that, e.g., a state of a federation would typically have, the Scotland Act does make a delineation of powers between the UK Government and the Scottish government. In those policy areas considered “devolved matters,” the Scottish government has the power to repeal UK legislation within Scotland. Local government and education are both devolved matters. ↩︎