Advice please: changing rooms at work

[plmnk]

Hello wise women,

I need your advice. I work in the performing arts department of a school and recently we had a performance at an outside venue that included both students and staff. There were two changing rooms provided for staff, marked "Male" and "Female". One member of staff, who is male but wears feminine-coded clothes and makeup (and requests she/her pronouns) was granted use of the female changing room (an open-plan space with an adjoining lockable single-room bathroom). I didn't use the room to change because I didn't feel comfortable knowing that a male member of staff could come in at any moment.

I would like assurance from my workplace that I and my female colleagues are not put in this position again. There are also shower and changing rooms at the school and I am no longer convinced that they are actually single-sex. Any advice on how best to raise this? Writing directly to HR/line manager/other? Any advice on how to word an initial email would be gratefully received.

Thank you 🙏

I would refer your employer to the recent change in the Equality Act that legislates employers can be held responsible for sexual harassment. IANAL but the simplest way to remove the risk of sexual harassment is to keep changing rooms as single sex spaces.

Which toilets/changing rooms does your colleague use at the school?

Slightly off piste, but when I did am-dram festivals quite often there was one communal changing room - with male and female toilets adjacent - and I was not worried about changing into and out of costume. But no-one there was pretending to be the opposite sex, and anyone could go and change in the single-sex toilets if they chose. Showers were also single-sex. Not sure I would like it if the general space had included showers, and getting down to less than slips etc. which now often seems to be the case in such spaces.

I'm not sure but the toilets are mostly single lockable rooms — there's a variety of unisex, male and female ones. Work changing rooms: I don't think my colleague uses them.