Women Only Homeless Shelter To Take In Biological Males Who Identify As Female

A women-only homeless shelter in London are to allow biological males who identify as female into its single-sex facility.

The move, operated by Glass Door, has sparked outrage from critics who argue that it will jeopardise women’s safety.

Conservative MP Miriam Cates said: “It appears that Glass Door is yet another well-meaning organisation that does not understand the Equality Act.

“Men who identify as women should not be denied access to services on the basis of their trans status but that doesn’t give them the legal right to be treated as if they were female.

The Telegraph reports: For the first time this winter, Glass Door will provide a women-only shelter in recognition of the “growing numbers of homeless women” in London, it said.

The charity held its annual Sleep Out fundraiser in Duke of York Square in Chelsea on Friday and it hoped to raise £175,000 to finance its winter shelters.

But it has now emerged the shelter would be open to transgender women.

When asked by The Telegraph if trans women would be admitted, a Glass Door spokesman said: “In line with our Gender, Equality and Diversity policy any guest who identifies as a woman will be treated in line with their gender identity and will be eligible for a space in our women-only shelter dependent on availability.”

Women’s campaigners have lambasted the “cruel” decision and demanded it be reversed.

Helen Joyce, director of advocacy at Sex Matters, said: “A women’s shelter that accommodates men who identify as women ceases to be a women’s shelter.

“For many years, the importance of keeping men out of women’s shelters has been such that any person who enters – including plumbers and electricians – must be female.”

‘It’s an absolute disgrace’ 

She added: “Gaslighting vulnerable women in this way is among the cruellest examples of how organisations are prioritising the feelings of men over the fundamental safety and wellbeing of women.

“Glass Door needs to scrap this policy and reassess why the shelter was set up in the first place.”

It comes as the Government is set to tighten legislation protecting women-only spaces. In April it emerged that it had asked the equalities watchdog for advice on changing the wording of the Equality Act to specify that it protects “biological sex” rather than “sex”. 

The Equality and Human Rights Commission recommended that such a change would “bring legal clarity” in eight areas, including sports and single-sex areas.

And on Wednesday at the Tory conference, Rishi Sunak pledged to stop individuals being “bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be”. 

The Prime Minister insisted it was “common sense” to say that “a man is a man and a woman is a woman”.

Kellie-Jay Keen, founder of Standing For Women, called Glass Door’s decision harmful, adding that the shelter had chosen “the validation of men over the safety of women”.

She said: “The women’s sector has been parasitically invaded by this pernicious, woman-hating cult, and so it comes as no surprise to me that yet another service, supposed to be looking after the most vulnerable women, has turned their back on them.

“The blood, sweat and tears of women, in decades gone by, who created the spaces has been thrown back in their faces. It’s an absolute disgrace. One could argue that they have no choice or that they are too imbecilic to understand the exceptions and exclusions provided by the Equality Act, but that’s just not good enough. Either this women’s shelter stands by vulnerable women and provides a space in which they may escape and recover or it allows men in.

“This will with absolute certainty cause untold harm to women, and they will just self-exclude from this service. I feel nothing but contempt for women who betray women with the greatest needs.”