A transgender man today had his appeal to be named ‘father’ on his child’s birth certificate rejected by Supreme Court Justices because it was not an ‘arguable point of law’.
Journalist Freddy McConnell, 34, wanted to be registered as ‘father’ or ‘parent’ and said forcing him to be recorded as mother breached his human right to respect for private and family life.
He has already lost two rounds of a legal battle. A judge ruled against him in 2019 after a High Court hearing and three Court of Appeal judges dismissed an appeal earlier this year.
He then made an application to the Supreme Court.
But a Supreme Court spokeswoman said on Monday that justices had rejected his application and decided not to consider the case.
The Supreme Court spokeswoman said justices had refused to give permission because the case did not raise an ‘arguable point of law’ which ‘ought to be considered’.
Mr McConnell is a single parent who was born a woman but now lives as a man following surgery.
Ten days after he legally became a man, he accessed sperm from a donor and because he had decided to keep his womb, was in the position of being a pregnant man.
Mr McConnell, a multimedia journalist who works for the Guardian, was biologically able to get pregnant in 2017, and when he gave birth in 2018, was legally a man when his child was born.
He wanted to be registered as father or parent but a registrar told him that the law required people who give birth to be registered as mothers.
Mr McConnell took legal action against the General Register Office, which administers the registration of births and deaths in England and Wales.
He then mounted an appeal after a judge ruled against him in September 2019, following a High Court trial in London.
The transgender community will be looking at this case as a measure in how the law understands their needs and fundamental rights; a cherry-picking policy simply cannot be endorsed going forward, and the courts should recognise this when they hear the case.