Thank you for replying Crispy and I appreciate your points.
Yes, it is right that a GRC is not necessary to enter a toilet or a changing room. It is not even illegal for a man to do. The illegality is in any action taken. It is in of itself not a passport into such spaces, as such.
However, it acts as a measure of trust and a marker of recognition that you are not just sneaking in but have made an effort to comply with the concerns of women over the privacy of such spaces.
Just saying we don't need one anyway gives no indication of concern and, as trans people asking support of women, we should be aware of their feelings and so making an effort counts.
However, what a GRC is can be a recognition of change of legal status. If you have one, you are protected. There are exceptions - rightly so - such as refuge spaces - but a GRC will be interpreted broadly in any dispute as a protection of that person's gender/sex in many circumstances. It is much a memo to yourself to say - I have legitimacy, but I also have limits to respect.
You may argue this is almost of no value in practical terms. And given how few of those who say they are trans but have decided getting one is currently too much hassle or intrusive or expensive to bother have attained one then that seems true.
Outside of those of us 5000 or so who clearly did not.
So this begs the question why change the law to access one then if right now it is too hard to bother? You either want one because it matters or you don't want one.
Wanting one only when it is basically handed over free for just asking will not create any sense of trust or mutual respect.
The real value in my eyes of a GRC is a token of mutual trust and understanding between the holders of one those people we ask to accept us amongst them.
They are rather less likely to do so if you are not prepared to make any effort to get one and will only bother applying if it is easy.
If, as you argue, access to spaces are not contingent on having one, then why do so many want one anyhow?
You answer this I think by explaining you need a GRC to access a new birth certificate.You do. But a birth certificate is a statement of medical reality at birth. It cannot, self evidently, be a gender certificate as no doctor can know the gender identity of a baby if that differs from sex.
So a birth certificate expresses a literal position at birth. Which, incidentally, is why - even if you are one of the tiny number of people in the UK to have had theirs changed - would know as I do that the one showing your position at birth is NOT removed from record.
The altered one is a copy for purposes of convenient use and a degree of protection of amended sex status in day to day circumstances.
It only exists because sex is legally altered by a GRC. So the GRC gatekeeps the issuance of these and has meant only a small number have ever happened.
Partly, as I understand because a birth certificate is to a degree a medical document and altering it has always needed medical approval. That is how it happens via the GRC. The medical safeguards built into the act provide a degree of justification for such a change of a key document.
I suspect most people would have no argument with documentation that allows anyone self declaring to live unhindered by bureaucracy or oppression and to be able to operate day to day with paperwork that makes that possible - passport, driving licence etc.
But that they will (and in my view rightly) feel that a medical document about birth should not be replaced without any input at all from doctors that there is a legitimate basis for that alteration.
There is bound to be more argument over whether any trans people should be allowed to get a new birth certificate. Indeed I was stunned that it was possible for me.
I never asked for it or expected it. However, I took it on the basis that I had to supply two sets of medical evidence on both testing and diagnosis of gender dysphoria and on significant medical intervention to amend my body.
Even that will likely not be considered valid grounds to many people. My brother, who I love dearly, and has been a huge rock over the past 50 years in my life and been 100% behind me always, is adamant he thinks that I should not have been allowed to have got this altered.
I would not call him a bigot in a million years for that opinion. This is a valid viewpoint that I totally understand.
It is bound to get even more tricky with cases of no surgical intervention at all. There are a few even today - but again all are still filtered through medical assessment and evidence to give some degree of legitimacy to this alteration.
To go past that to remove any medical basis for changing a birth record and just saying that it was wrong is in some ways just another step on the same route I can see. And might even be acceptable to society if there was a proper debate not a demand.
My view is and I think so will that of a lot of people be that any change to this document ought not to happen without some input from doctors.
I think it is a totally reasonable thing to ask of someone wishing to alter a document of such moment about their physical reality to not see it as intrusive to explain why it was incorrect and be assessed just in case there are reasons not conducive with doing that.
There will be some cases where, in the interests of both the well being of that person and, more importantly, the concerns of wider society, issuing a changed certificate might be wrong.
It needs proper reasons to do so in my view. Not just a request.
in essence I am perfectly fine with self expression of gender and making it cheaper, easier and even assessment free to get basic acknowledgement that a person has declared they intend to live in a different gender role. And that in day to day life be regarded as such.
But when it comes to any situation where legal status is important - as in treatment by the law, recognition under crime statistics, access to sex segregated spaces, participation in sports, or other things where your body and its physical make up are in any way relevant to the way this would impact on the rest of society, then in those circumstances self declaration alone is not enough.
The safeguards in the GRA are there for good reason and help protect some of the above things.
Otherwise if it becomes a free for all to just say you are what you are, then GRCs and birth certificates become meaningless as they essentially are like a piece of paper you can write on a card and hold up saying - 'I am now a woman.'
Legal documents require sensible filters before they are drawn up.
Society deserves to get a little more confidence and security in exchange for considering the fundamental change of status in any single person. Let alone hundreds of thousands.
Trust is a two way street where both parties are willing to give and take to reach an accommodation.
If it becomes a declaration, then, whilst most people will use this wisely and do so for sincere motives, there are bound to be openings for hucksters, charlatans and others with nefarious purposes.
And without question unforeseen consequences will emerge from such a law that will only appear after such a drastic free for all is created.
Then we will all see them when it is too late.