Is it the end of the road for stupid language games?

The NHS must use “plain English” in guidance for women and transgender people, Wes Streeting has said.

The Health Secretary stressed that women should not be “excluded or erased” in an effort for the NHS to be “trans inclusive”, such as by referring to “people with cervixes”.

He criticised the “totally misguided attempts” of NHS managers to be inclusive by removing the word women, which has included phrases such as “birthing people” and “chestfeeding”.

Misguided, idiotic, and profoundly contemptuous of women. You don’t be “inclusive” by erasing the female half of humanity.

Asked about NHS language on cervical screening, Mr Streeting said it had “annoyed lots of us”.

“Well, the thing that I’ve railed against is the erasure of women,” he told Times Radio. “So, when you’ve got well-meaning but totally misguided attempts to be inclusive of trans people by erasing women that, I think, has quite rightly and understandably, got a lot of women’s backs up.

“And not just women, I think it’s annoyed lots of us, because you don’t need to exclude or erase women in order to be trans inclusive.”

And if you did, you still shouldn’t, because 1. trans isn’t even a thing and 2. women are half of all humanity and people who claim to be trans are a much much much smaller fraction than that. You don’t get to erase half of all people in order to give a little thrill to a few thousand people. Those few thousand people will just have to get on with their lives without the treat of insulting women.

Following the Supreme Court’s ruling that the words “woman” and “sex” in the Equality Act refer to a biological woman and biological sex, Mr Streeting said updated guidance from NHS England would be “issued before the summer”.

A series of investigations by The Telegraph has revealed the widespread failure of NHS trusts across the UK to provide single-sex spaces to both patients and staff following high profile disputes, such as the case of the Dr Beth Upton, in which transgender NHS staff have used women’s changing rooms or lavatories.

In which male transgender NHS staff have used women’s changing rooms or lavatories. Even the Telegraph refuses to get it right.