Hungary has published a bill that would make it impossible for people to legally change their gender. The government made the move on International Transgender Day of Visibility. It came just a day after Hungary’s parliament voted the government sweeping emergency powers to manage the COVID-19 pandemic.

Opponents say the powers allow the government to shut down democracy in the country and rule by decree. Critics also say it allows them to jail independent journalists. There is no time limit for when the emergency powers will end. However Prime Minister Viktor Orbán promised to use his extraordinary new powers ‘proportionately and rationally’.

Despite this, Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén has submitted an omnibus bill that includes a ban on legally changing your gender.

The bill changes the Civil Registry Act to say ‘gender at birth’ will be the ‘the biological sex determined by primary sexual characteristics and chromosomes’. This ‘gender at birth’ will be put into the civil registry, and the law will forbid people from changing the registry.All other official documents – including ID cards, driving licences and passports – take their information from the civil registry.

So, under the law, it will be impossible to legally change your gender in Hungary. Likewise, transgender people will no longer be able to change their first names to ones that match their true gender. It is not clear how this will affect people who have already changed gender in the country.