After months of heated debates, which divided the left and the feminist movement, the Spanish parliament definitively approved, on Thursday February 16, the “law of real and effective equality for trans people”. The text was adopted by 191 votes for (the Socialist Party, the radical left of Podemos and the Basque and Catalan nationalist parties), 60 against (Vox, far right) and 91 abstentions (the Popular Party, moderate right).
It enshrines the right to “gender self-determination”, that is to say the possibility of changing the sex appearing on identity papers without any other action than a public declaration of non-conformity with the sex assigned to the birth. “This law allows everyone to be who they are, without shame, without fear and without discrimination”, welcomed the Minister for Equality, Irene Montero, a member of Podemos, who has defended this text against all odds for almost three years so that it arrives safely.
The law aims to fight against the discrimination of which transgender people are victims and to “depathologize” transidentity, according to the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO), which withdrew it in 2019 from the list of mental disorders. The text reinforces the sanctions in the event of discrimination against trans people, whether in access to housing or employment. It prohibits conversion therapy aimed at changing their gender identity. And it allows trans men who have retained their “gestation capacity” to have access to assisted reproduction techniques from the national health system.
Simplified change
The sex indicated in the civil register will be the one that will be taken into account, both for athletes, when participating in competitions, and for delinquents and criminals, when being imprisoned in prison. A scenario which caused one of the controversies at the origin of the resignation of Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon, as the People’s Party reminded the podium.
Fourteen of Spain’s seventeen autonomous regions already had “trans laws”, some since 2014, allowing anyone to change the name and sex appearing on their health card, without a medical report or any supporting document, and for all children to change their first name and freely define their gender identity at school. Only Asturias and Castile and Leon had not legislated on this issue. Elsewhere, these laws have often been approved thanks to the abstention of the People’s Party, sometimes even unanimously. Without ever having raised controversy.
You have 45.97% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.