The view that men cannot transition to become women is a “protected belief” under equality law, a UK tribunal ruled yesterday.

An appeal panel led by a High Court judge found that a tax consultant was legally entitled to post social media comments arguing that gender identification was not the same as biological sex.

Maya Forstater was dismissed from the London office of the Centre for Global Development, a think tank, two years ago after she was said to have made “offensive and exclusionary” comments on Twitter.

She argued at an employment tribunal in 2019 that comments such as “woman means adult human female” or “trans women are male” were statements of neutral fact and were not transphobic or expressions of antipathy towards trans people.

But the tribunal rejected her claim and ruled that the decision to dismiss her was lawful.

However, on Thursday morning an employment appeal tribunal overturned that ruling, saying the original judge had “erred in law”.

The ruling of the three-strong panel, led by Mr Justice Choudhury supported Forstater’s argument that her comments were protected as a “philosophical belief” within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010.