SEX DISQUALIFICATION (REMOVAL) ACT 

GIVEN ROYAL ASSENT: 23 DECEMBER 1919

‘A person shall not be disqualified by sex or marriage from the exercise of any public function, or from being appointed to or holding any civil or judicial office or post, or from entering or assuming or carrying on any civil profession or vocation, or for admission to any incorporated society (whether incorporated by Royal Charter or otherwise), and a person shall not be exempted by sex or marriage from the liability to serve as a juror.’

The giving of royal assent to this act opened doors for women to become lawyers, barristers, accountants, vets, enter other professions from which they had previously been excluded.

Universities could not preclude women by their charters or statutes from admission to membership of a university or obtaining a degree. 

However, judges could appoint all male juries and the civil service could create their own regulations regarding women’s employment (stopping women working when they got married , preventing them from entering the diplomatic or foreign service and excluding them from high positions within the service). Women were still not allowed to enter the church or armed forces. 

This was a step in the right direction but women could not vote on the same terms as men until the 1928 Equal Franchise Act nor could they sit in the House of Lords until 1958.