Australian Sex Discrimination Commissioner Dr. Anna Cody was questioned by Senator Claire Chandler during a Senate Estimates hearing about the definition of “woman” and the scope of the Sex Discrimination Act.
Senator Chandler asked Dr. Cody to clarify a previous statement in which she said, “We are not one version of woman.” When asked what she meant, Dr. Cody responded that there is “a great diversity in who we are as women,” listing “culturally, racially marginalised women, First Nations women, women with disability, lesbians, trans women, [and] non-binary” individuals.
When Senator Chandler asked whether Dr. Cody believed biological males could be women, the Commissioner replied, “I think we have different language that perhaps you’re using than I would use. I don’t understand the term biological men.”
Senator Chandler then pressed whether the Sex Discrimination Act protects women’s rights based on biological sex. Dr. Cody said the Act “makes it unlawful to treat someone less favourably on the basis of their sex,” but clarified that “it does not use the language of biological female; it uses man and woman.”
Asked whether the Act protects female-only spaces and services, Dr. Cody stated that “special measures” are permitted “to achieve substantive equality,” citing the example of programs promoting women in trades such as carpentry. When asked if such measures could apply specifically to “biological females,” Dr. Cody repeated that the Act “does not use that language.”
Senator Chandler later referenced a Victorian case in which a male child sex offender was housed in a women’s prison after identifying as a woman. Dr. Cody confirmed that “the Sex Discrimination Act includes trans women within it,” and said the individual in question “is a trans woman.”
Dr. Cody was also questioned by Senator Malcolm Roberts about whether transgender women can access female-only spaces under Australian law. The discussion referenced Roxanne Tickle, the individual central to Giggle’s discrimination lawsuit.
Senator Roberts asked whether a “biological man who identifies as a transgender woman” could enter female-only spaces. Dr. Cody responded that Roxanne Tickle is a trans woman who has undergone transition processes and “has access or sought-access to the Giggle for Girls app,” noting that access was later removed.
When Senator Roberts asked Dr. Cody to clarify Tickle’s chromosomal makeup (XX or XY), she said, “I can’t answer that, Senator,” and did not provide a biological classification.
Dr. Cody’s responses affirm that, under current interpretations of the Sex Discrimination Act, access to female-only spaces is determined by gender identity rather than biological sex.
