ODFOx, Wadhwa may be experienced, may even be a good person (although I am dubious about that), but they have no right or business to apply for a job which is reserved under schedule 9 of the Equality Act as this one was.
Wadhwa has admitted not having a GRC on a Pink News podcast and has claimed that no one asked about trans status so Wadhwa didn't tell.
In evidence to the Women's and Equality committee, Wadhwa claimed the GOR was discriminatory.
Of course, it is discriminatory and that is the entire point. It is legal discrimination to ensure that jobs which require intimate care or counselling can be reserved to one sex. Wadhwa and RCS have no right to decide the law does not apply to them. Or worse, to cite it when it suits and ignore when convenient.
What they have now done is indirectly discriminate against other male people and they may run into legal issues for falsely claiming to survivors that their jobs are reserved under EA.
Rape Crisis can, of course, decide not to use the exception, but they cannot use this Schrödinger's version of the GOR. You, and they, may assert that MW has no malign intent, but that is irrelevant, it opens the door and the consequences may not be to their liking. Sadly, though, it is vulnerable women who will suffer.
archive.ph/UErrk