Newnham college will continue to welcome transgender women

Newnham, one of the 31 colleges at the University of Cambridge, is one of only two all-women colleges in the whole of Oxbridge. 

The new Cambridge University Society of Women (CUSW) has drawn attention to the fact that Newnham accepts trans-women as of 2017, making the college not an ‘all-female college’ according to Maeve Halligan, a co-founder of the society.

Halligan and other campaigners have pledged to report Newnham to the Charity Commission and the Equality and Human Rights Commission over the possible breach of law following the recent Supreme Court ruling that the definition of a woman in the Equality Act was biological women, meaning trans people were not able to use the spaces of the gender they identify as. Trans women, for example, are no longer able to use a female changing room.   

Maya Forstater, Chief Executive of charity Sex Matters, when asked for comment, claimed Newnham was seeking loopholes in the law, and that they should ‘urgently reconsider its policy to bring it back into line with the law’ and confirmed that Newnham would be reported. Equality lawyer Audrey Ludwig, a member of the group Legal Feminist, said the college’s decision was ‘at serious risk of being determined as unlawful’.

Newnham College remains confident that they have a strong legal case regardless of the Supreme Court ruling, with the principal Alison Rose writing in a letter to students that the admissions policy of the college is ‘cleared by the college lawyers’. When asked for comment, Newnham sent their rationale that under Schedule 12 of the Equality Act 2010 Newnham as a single-sex higher education institution can exceptionally admit ‘students of the opposite sex’. 

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Newnham’s governing board has stated that ‘Newnham wishes to continue its longstanding approach of being inclusive of trans women students’’ and that ‘“Newnham has decided to continue exceptionally to accept applications from the small number of students who identify as trans women and hold ID (passport, driving licence or gender recognition certificate) in the female gender.’ 

Newnham states that the above policy ‘does not prejudice its fundamental character as a single-sex higher education institution for women’, also highlighting how it has never been a single-sex space as it employs male employees and has men stay overnight.

This decision will certainly have wide reaching implications, not only on Newnham, but also on Murray Edwards, who operate on a similar policy.

Featured Image Credit: Newnham College 

The University of Cambridge, Audrey Ludwig and the Cambridge University Society of Women were approached for comment.