Finland's five governing coalition parties have so far failed to reach agreement on how MPs should vote in the upcoming parliamentary motion on long-awaited amendments to the nation's transgender legislation.
The split in opinion comes down to whether lawmakers should vote as a "matter of conscience" — meaning each individual MP decides themselves how to vote — or along party lines.
Yle understands that Prime Minister Sanna Marin's Social Democratic Party (SDP), the Maria Ohisalo-led Greens and Li Andersson's Left Alliance are fully behind the government's proposal, which was submitted to Parliament last month.
However, some members of the Centre Party have informed their coalition partners that they are not prepared to vote in favour of the bill, and they have called for the vote to be a matter of conscience.
Chair of the SDP's parliamentary group Antti Lindtman told Yle that the Centre Party's leadership had warned the other government parties in advance that some of the party's MPs would not be prepared to accept the proposal. However, Lindtman added, the other parties did not want to "dramatize" the situation.
The government's proposal is currently being considered by a parliamentary committee before progressing to the main chamber for a plenary debate and vote.
The current law — last updated in 2002 — stipulates that in order for transgender individuals to legally change their gender, they must be sterile and unable to reproduce.
If passed in its current form, the updated law would mean self-declaration would be sufficient for gender confirmation. In the past, legal gender reassignment required a lengthy medical process. This amendment seeks to separate the legal side of transitioning from medical treatments.
Additionally, the requirement of being unable to reproduce children would be abolished. Under the current law, transgender people are required to have a medical certificate proving they are sterile, in order to legally confirm their true gender.
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