It comes as the Labour MP Charlotte Nichols was earlier this week accused of “abandoning women’s rights” by the former Olympian Sharron Davies, after attacking those questioning whether transgender swimmer Lia Thomas should be allowed to compete in women’s sports.  

While Mr Johnson had stayed out of the trans debate, his ministers have been more vocal. Sajid Javid, the Health Secretary, criticised Sir Keir’s comments, insisting that “only women have a cervix”. The Foreign Secretary Liz Truss – also the women and equalities minister – has called for Whitehall to cut ties with the LGBT charity Stonewall.

Division on Stonewall

Downing Street faced its own rift over Ms Truss’s call to stop taxpayers funding contentious Stonewall diversity training. A former aide to Mr Johnson claimed a “very small group of advisers” were allowing Government policy on trans rights to be “controlled” by Stonewall. Mr Johnson’s wife Carrie spoke at a fringe Tory conference event organised by Stonewall last year in which she said she was an LGBT+ “ally” and “committed to equality and acceptance for everyone, whoever you are and whomever you love”.

While last month Ms Truss told the equalities regulator in a letter that the Government “has no interest” in stopping trans people from using single-sex facilities, some Tory MPs have criticised the party’s stance on the trans issue, and three of the Government’s LGBT advisers quit their posts last year.

Nikki da Costa, who stood down as Number 10’s director of legislative affairs last August, said “the PM is not receiving the range of opinions on the debate around gender identity that he should”, claiming female No 10 staff who defend sex-based rights “have to fight pretty hard to be in the room”.

Earlier this year the Government rejected Theresa May’s proposed reforms to the embattled Gender Recognition Act to allow people to legally change their gender without a medical diagnosis. 

Ministers are also consulting on new legislation to ban conversion therapy, which has come under fire from campaigners who argue it risks inhibiting clinicians who question someone’s decision to identify as trans. Some 5,500 children are now on the waiting list at the controversial Tavistock gender clinic, up more than a fifth since Covid lockdowns.