Australia’s highest court has shut the door for good on Giggle for Girls, ending the app’s last chance to overturn a ruling that it broke the law by kicking a transgender woman off its women-only platform.
Quick Take
- The High Court of Australia denied special leave to appeal on September 11, 2026, ending the case for good.
- The Federal Court first ruled in 2024 that Giggle indirectly discriminated against Roxanne “Roxy” Tickle.
- The Full Court toughened that ruling in May 2026, finding two acts of direct discrimination and raising damages to $20,000.
- The case is the first major test of how far women-only service exemptions stretch under Australia’s gender identity discrimination law.
High Court Ends Giggle’s Legal Fight
The High Court of Australia refused to hear a final appeal from Giggle for Girls on September 11, 2026. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported the refusal “shuts down the final avenue of appeal” in the long-running case. That decision leaves the earlier discrimination finding against the app fully in place, with no further legal options left for the company or its founder to challenge the outcome.
Roxanne Tickle, a transgender woman, sued Giggle for Girls after the app removed her account. Giggle was built as a women-only social app that used artificial intelligence to screen out men from signing up. Tickle held an updated Queensland birth certificate listing her sex as female at the time she joined the app, according to the Federal Court’s published judgment.
How the Legal Fight Began
The Federal Court first ruled on the case in August 2024. Justice Robert Bromwich found that Tickle’s direct discrimination claim failed, but her indirect gender identity discrimination claim succeeded. The court ordered Giggle to pay $10,000 in compensation plus legal costs. Giggle for Girls and founder Sall Grover appealed the ruling soon after, keeping the case alive through 2025 and into 2026.
The Federal Court’s online case file shows Giggle’s notice of appeal was filed in October 2024, opening a new round of legal argument over how Australia’s Sex Discrimination Act applies to single-sex apps and services. The appeal moved through the Full Court of the Federal Court over the following year and a half before a ruling came down.
Appeals Court Toughens the Verdict
The Full Court delivered its decision on May 15, 2026. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported the court found “two instances of direct discrimination against Ms Tickle” and increased her compensation to $12,000 in general damages plus $8,000 in aggravated damages, for a total of $20,000. The ruling did not just uphold the original finding. It went further, adding a direct discrimination finding that the trial judge had rejected.
Founder Says Ruling Threatens Women-Only Spaces
Sall Grover has argued the courts got the law wrong. After the first ruling, Grover said the decision “misconstrues the rights of women and girls and the need for single-sex spaces” and claimed the court overlooked evidence and misread the Sex Discrimination Act. Grover has also said publicly that she faced a discrimination complaint and financial penalties simply for excluding a person she considered male from a women-only app.
A Law Written in 2013 Faces a New Test
Gender identity became a protected category under the Sex Discrimination Act in 2013. The Giggle case is the first major court test of how that protection interacts with services designed only for one sex. Equality Australia’s summary of the case says the ruling confirmed gender identity discrimination claims can succeed even when a business argues it is offering a single-sex service.
Giggle for Girls denied appeal with Australian High Court after trans male Roxy Tickle sued over discrimination
Read: https://t.co/lBsSdYxrsX pic.twitter.com/SF4BoDHPoe
— Human Events (@HumanEvents) September 11, 2026
The case now stands as settled law in Australia, with no further court able to revisit it. Groups on both sides of the debate over sex-based versus gender-identity-based protections are treating the outcome as a landmark, though they disagree sharply over whether it protects vulnerable people or erodes women-only spaces built for safety and privacy.
Sources:
humanevents.com, abc.net.au, en.wikipedia.org, fedcourt.gov.au, bbc.com, adfinternational.org
