A TOTAL OF 99 people had gender recognition certificates granted to them last year under the Gender recognition legislation.

The Gender Recognition Act allows individuals to apply through the Department of Social Protection for certificates so they can be legally recognised by the State under the gender they identify.

A 2017 report on the Act, which was brought to Cabinet today, revealed that since the legislation commenced three years ago, 297 have been issued with gender recognition certificates upon application.

Following the battle of Irish transgender woman Lydia Foy, who spent 20 years of her life involved in a difficult and complex litigation to have her gender legally recognised in the Irish State, the Oireachtas passed the Gender Recognition Act in 2015.

Where a gender recognition certificate is issued, a person’s gender shall from the date of that issue become, for all purposes, the preferred gender. If the preferred gender is the male gender the person’s sex becomes that of a man, and if it is the female gender the person’s sex becomes that of a woman.

The Act provides a process enabling trans people who are over 18 to achieve full legal recognition of their self-identified gender.

Young people aged 16-17 can also apply to be legally recognised, though the process is more onerous, according to Transgender Equality Network Ireland. There have been calls by FLAC for under 16s to be able to access gender recognition with parental consent.

The LGBT Youth Strategy, launched last week, seeks for non-binary to be included within the Gender Recognition Act, as well as gender recognition for under-18s people “as quickly as possible”.