Scepticism towards transgender rights has grown across the board since 2022
Recent years have seen an increasing backlash against transgender rights. In the US, some of Donald Trump’s first acts upon resuming the presidency have been to sign executive orders declaring there to be only two sexes, restricting gender care services for young transgender people, barring transgender people from military service, and banning transgender women from women’s sports.
Here in the UK, the 2024 general election saw the Conservatives pledge to change the Equality Act to rewrite the definition of sex and allow organisations to bar transgender women from single-sex spaces, and that the concept of gender identity would not be taught to children. The increasingly popular Reform UK has criticised transgender “indoctrination” and promised to “ban transgender ideology in primary and secondary schools”.
Now a new YouGov study, the fourth in a series reaching back to 2018, shows an increased scepticism towards transgender rights across the board – and particularly in the two and a half years since our previous wave of this study.
Notable in this most recent study – conducted in mid-December – is the growing resistance on transgender rights among those groups that are typically more permissive on the issue, like women and young people.
In fact, the only question on which women now take the permissive view on transgender rights is saying that people should be able to change their gender socially, although at 55% this still represents an eight point drop since the 2022 survey.
When it comes to whether or not people should be able to change their gender legally, there has been a crossover among women. While in 2022 women supported allowing people to change their gender legally by 44% to 32%, these figures have since shifted to 37% who continue to be in favour but 42% now opposed.
While 18-24 year olds remain the most permissive group when it comes to trans rights, there has likewise been an increase in scepticism.
In 2022, there had only been net negativity among the young on the three questions about providing transgender treatment to under-16s, as well as transgender women being able to participate in women’s sporting events. As of December 2024, this sentiment now extends to transgender men participating in men’s sports, as well as a reluctance to make it easier to change your gender legally, and resistance to the use of gendered changing rooms by transgender people who have not undergone gender reassignment surgery.
When it comes to the key questions of whether people should be able to socially identify as a different gender, the number of 18-24 year olds who say they should – 61% – remains almost exactly the same as in 2022. However, the number who say they should not has risen eight points to 25% over the same time period.
And when it comes to whether you should be allowed to legally change your gender, support among the young has actively diminished: while 50% still say so, this has fallen seven points since the prior study. At the same time, belief that you should not be allowed to change your gender legally has increased by a full 16 points, to 36%.
The results come at a time where transgender issues have been increasing in prominence. Our survey shows that 41% of Britons say they have paid “a lot” or “a fair amount” of attention to the issue in politics and the media, up from 35% at the time of the last study.
How many Britons think you should be able to change your gender?
On the core question of whether Britons believe someone should be able to socially identify as a different gender, the public still tend to say that they should, by 49% to 35% who say they should not. However, the former stance is down six points from 2022, while the latter stance is up ten points.
When it comes to whether the state should allow people to legally change their gender, these figures are reversed – 34% say it should, but 48% say it should not. This similarly represents a six point drop in the more permissive stance and an 11 point increase in the less permissive stance.
Combining people’s responses to these two questions provides a more detailed look at where individuals stand on trans identity. What we now see is a near even split among the public between people who think you should be able to change both your social and legal gender (32%) and those who think you should be able to change neither your social nor your legal gender (33%).
There are also a further 10% of Britons who think that you should be able to change your social gender, but not your legal one, and 7% who say that while it’s ok to change genders socially, they aren’t sure whether it should be possible legally. One in nine Britons (11%) are unsure on both counts, a figure which has dropped five points since 2022.
The increase in the number of Britons taking the view that a person should be able to change neither their social nor legal gender has increased across the board, most notably among 50-64 year olds (up 11pts to 36%) and men (up 10pts to 40%).
Should the process for changing your gender legally be made easier?
The current process for gaining a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC), which allows transgender people to change their gender on official documents like their birth certificate, includes having a gender dysphoria diagnosis from a doctor and approval from another doctor, and providing evidence a transgender person has lived in their new gender for two years. Their application is also subsequently approved or rejected by a panel of legal and medical professionals.
There have been calls by campaigners to make this process easier. In principle, few Britons support this, however, with only 19% saying it should be made easier, compared to 63% who say it should not.
Our survey also tested attitudes regarding the specific components involved in the current process, finding similar results.
Seven in ten Britons (70%) say that the approval of doctors should still be compulsory as part of gaining a GRC, and there is likewise resistance to allowing the number of doctors required to be reduced from two to one, a proposal Labour was reportedly exploring prior to the general election last year.
The same proposals considered by Labour likewise included removing the need to have a panel of doctors and lawyers approve GRC applications – again, the majority of Britons (57%) are opposed to making this change.
And when it comes to the requirement to live as your affirmed gender for two years, 66% of Britons again say this should remain.
Should transgender treatments be provided by the NHS, and should they be available to children?
The public are also generally opposed to gender transition treatments being available through the NHS. Most (57%) say gender reassignment surgery should not be provided through the NHS, with 51% saying the same of hormone treatments.
Where in our 2022 survey there had already been notably more people opposed to providing surgery on the NHS, opinion had been split 38% to 41% when it came to hormone treatments; as of our latest survey, opposition in this latter case now stands a full 18 points ahead of support.
One of the most contentious parts of the transgender debate is whether or not children should be allowed to transition.
This is the aspect of the transgender rights debate on which the public view is most one-sided. When it comes to treatments for under-16s, 75% say puberty blockers should not be allowed, with 78% saying the same of hormone treatments.
Currently hormone treatments may only be prescribed from age 16, and recent days have seen campaigners call for this limit to be raised to 18.
Last year saw the government stop the routine prescription of puberty blockers to under-18s, following the recommendations of the Cass Review, while transgender surgery continues to be available only for those aged 18 and above.
The public are even more opposed to allowing children to undergo gender reassignment surgery, with fully 87% saying this kind of treatment should not be allowed for under-16s.
The prospect that there may be a push to allow gender reassignment surgery for under-16s has commonly been raised by critics, often in the US, but is not presently legal here, and no mainstream advocacy groups in the UK actively campaign for it.
Should transgender people be allowed access to gendered spaces?
There is public scepticism towards allowing trans people to use gendered spaces, and particularly when it comes to trans women.
Almost half of Britons say that transgender men should not be allowed use men’s toilets (47%) or changing rooms (49%) – higher than the 32-35% who would permit it. For transgender women, resistance to allowing toilet and changing room access increases to 55% and 58%, respectively. Additionally, 52% of Britons say trans women should not be allowed to use women’s refuges for victims of rape or assault.
Such opposition increases further in our follow-up questions asking specifically about transgender people who had not undergone gender reassignment surgery.
In terms of the wider principle, most Britons (55%) say they believe that allowing transgender women to use spaces reserved for women, such as women's toilets or changing rooms, “presents a genuine risk of harm to women”.
Should transgender people be allowed to participate in sporting events for their new gender?
The question of transgender participation in professional sporting events has caused controversy in recent years. Recent developments in the UK have seen transgender women banned from competing in women’s hockey competitions, some women’s domestic tennis and padel tournaments, and women’s golf tournaments.
Most Britons are again opposed to allowing transgender people to take part in gendered sporting events, and transgender women in particular. While 60% say trans men should not be allowed in men’s sports events, this rises to 74% for trans women at women’s competitions.
Trans attitudes by voting and social group
The results of this and previous surveys show that women have more permissive attitudes on trans rights than men, and that young people likewise do so compared to their elders. Labour and Lib Dem voters also have notably more pro-transgender views than their Conservative and Reform UK voting counterparts.
None of these groups can be described as having consistently pro-transgender views, however. Across our battery of questions, the youngest Britons are generally the ones to hold the most permissive views. Even among this group, however, on only around half of the questions does the number of young people taking the more permissive view outnumber the number taking the less permissive view.
How many Britons personally know a transgender person, and how does that affect their support for transgender rights?
Overall, almost two in five Britons (38%) say they personally know someone who is transgender. This includes 12% who say they have a transgender friend, 7% a transgender colleague, and 4% a transgender family member. A further 21% say they personally know a transgender person who doesn’t fit into any of these categories. (These figures do not sum to 38% as some people will know transgender people in more than one category)
The younger Britons are, the more likely they are to know a transgender person personally. While 53% of 18-24 year olds say they know someone transgender, this falls with each successive age group, reaching 26% of those aged 65 and above.
The more closely familiar Britons are with a transgender person, the more likely they are to be supportive of greater transgender rights across every question we asked. However, even among this group there are some transgender issues that are relatively sparsely supported, with, for instance, only 33% thinking trans women should be allowed to take part in women’s sporting events.
Stances by transgender acceptance
Similarly, even among the third of the public who say that a person should be able to change both their social and legal gender, there is limited support for certain transgender rights. Only 32% say trans women should be allowed to participate in women’s sporting events, and just 26% think trans people should not be required to show they have lived in their new gender for at least two years before they can get a GRC.
Among other trans-acceptance groups, fewer than half take the more permissive view on any of the areas we asked about.
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Photo: Getty
