A hospital told the police that a patient could not have been raped because her alleged attacker was trans, the House of Lords has heard. 

The attack took place a year ago and the woman reported it but when officers contacted the hospital, which has not been named, they were told “that there was no male in the hospital, therefore the rape could not have happened”. 

Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne, who raised the issue during a debate on single-sex wards, continued: “They forgot that there was CCTV, nurses and observers. 

“None the less, it has taken nearly a year for the hospital to agree that there was a male on the ward and, yes, this rape happened. 

“During that year she has almost come to the edge of a nervous breakdown, because being disbelieved about being raped in hospital has been such an appalling shock. The hospital, with all its CCTV, has had to admit that the rape happened and that it was committed by a man.” 

Investigated by the police 

The legal definition of rape means that it can only be carried out by a physically intact man. 

The case is currently being investigated by the police. 

Lady Nicholson said that the case had arisen as a direct result of the NHS policy – known as Annex B – which allows patients to be placed on single-sex wards according to the gender with which they identify at the time. 

“The result of Annex B is that hospital trusts inform ward sisters and nurses that if there is a male, as a trans person, in a female ward, and a female patient or anyone complains, they must be told that it is not true – there is no male there,” she told the upper chamber. 

“I think it is completely wrong that the National Health Service should be instructing or allowing staff to mislead patients -to tell a straightforward lie. It is not acceptable.” 

She called for the policy to be withdrawn arguing that it “gives priority to trans people over women” and therefore threatens the “dignity, privacy and safety” of female patients. 

Lady Nicholson said that the policy undermines the provision of single-sex wards which were voted on by Parliament and “undermines” protections for women that “took at least 50 years to come through”. 

The former MP said that by adding the self-identification clause in the policy on eliminating mixed-sex accommodation: “Parliament has been ignored and bypassed and surreptitiously something far-reaching has been brought in that affects all families, all faiths, all identities and all levels of society. In place of sex-based rights, we are giving priority rights to one special section of society.” 

She said that she had not seen such “filleting of legislation anywhere before in Britain” and it was “cheating the public”. 

The policy is being reviewed by the NHS but as this newspaper revealed, one of those carrying out that review is a “trans advocate”. 

‘Strengthening of trans rights’

Before the consultation on the issue closed, Dr Michael Brady promised campaigners that the “commitment from the team leading on the review is supporting the maintenance/strengthening of trans rights in the update”.

A coalition of women’s rights groups including doctors and nurses have written to the Health Secretary complaining that they were not consulted. Baroness Fox of Buckley said that the review is “not satisfactory” as it has “no public terms of reference” and is being “carried out in secret”. 

She said that the fact that Dr Brady is the NHS “LGBT adviser might make him rather the opposite of impartial”. 

Referring to The Telegraph article, she added: “I want the Government to take this seriously and recognise that when somebody says that there are no plans to reduce the existing rights of transgender people, what women hear – if I can translate it – is that women-only wards are not guaranteed at all. 

“I want the Government to be honest with us about what they believe they are arguing for. I also want them to take us away from having to discover these things in newspapers and, instead, assure us that a new review will be set up that is independent and fully resourced.” 

Lady Nicholson’s proposals were opposed by Lord Etherton QC, who argued that the current policy was “entirely appropriate and consistent with the anti-discrimination law in the Equality Act”.