Editing Gender Recognition Act 2004 (section)

==Background==
{{see also|Christine Goodwin (activist)|Goodwin v United Kingdom}}
The act was drafted in response to court rulings from the [[European Court of Human Rights]].

The previous precedent dated back to 1970, when [[Arthur Cameron Corbett, 3rd Baron Rowallan]] had his marriage annulled on the basis that his wife, [[April Ashley]], being [[transgender]], was legally male. This argument was accepted by the judge, and the legal test for sex in the UK had been since been based on the judgment in ''[[Corbett v Corbett]]''.

The European Court of Human Rights ruled on 11 July 2002, in ''[[Goodwin & I v United Kingdom]]'' [2002] 2 FCR 577, that a trans person's inability to change the sex on their birth certificate was a breach of their rights under [[Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights|Article 8]] and [[Article 12 of the European Convention on Human Rights|Article 12]] of the [[European Convention on Human Rights]]. Following this judgment, the UK Government had to introduce new legislation to comply.