Premier Peter Malinauskas defines woman as ‘an adult female’ amid controversy around removing gendered pronouns from parliament

Premier Peter Malinauskas has revealed his definition of what a woman is amid controversy around a decision to remove gendered pronouns from state parliament.

Premier Peter Malinauskas has revealed he defines a woman as “an adult female” amid controversy around a bipartisan decision to remove gendered pronouns from state parliament’s rules of procedure.

The definition question has recently made international headlines, with New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins last week stumbling when he was asked at a press conference.

“To be honest, that question has come out of left field for me,” Mr Hipkins said.

“People define themselves, people define their own genders.”

UK Labour leader Keir Starmer faced criticism when he commented that 99.9 per cent of women “haven’t got a penis”.

Asked on Tuesday how he and the state government defined a woman, Mr Malinauskas responded with “an adult female”.

Peter Malinauskas takes a selfie with female members of the Labor s cabinet. Picture: Mark Brake

He did not elaborate further.

Oxford Languages defines the adjective “female” as: “of or denoting the sex that can bear offspring or produce eggs, distinguished biologically by the production of gametes (ova) that can be fertilised by male gametes.”

His comments come after state parliament adopted a range of changes to the Lower House standing orders, which include replacing gendered pronouns he, she, him and her with neutral terms like they, their and them.

The government and opposition both supported the changes, which were recommended by a parliamentary committee and are in line with the federal government’s content guidelines regarding gender and sexual diversity.

But more than 90 per cent of those who responded to a poll on advertiser.com.au, which asked “do you agree with state parliament removing gender-specific terms?”, thought the move was “a step too far”.

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The terms “Her Majesty” referring to the monarch and “His Excellency” referring to the governor, both now outdated under King Charles and Governor Frances Adamson, will also be made gender-neutral.

“Her Majesty” will be replaced with “the sovereign” and “His Excellency” will instead become “the governor”.

Jeremy Mann, spokesman for the Australian Monarchist League, said “His Majesty” is a much more personal title than “the Sovereign” when referring to King Charles.

“The Sovereign is an accurate title in certain official circumstances, but that doesn’t mean that the King’s personal title should be removed entirely,” he said.

King Charles III would lose his traditional royal title in SA’s parliament. Picture: Yui Mok

“Any further changes beyond what is being proposed would be a blatant move towards republicanism by stealth.”

Police Minister Joe Szakacs on Tuesday described concern about the changes to gendered language as “a bit of a storm in a teacup”, and added he has used gender-neutral language like “chair” instead of “chairman” for some time.

“This is entirely a non-issue and one that has been happening now for years,” he said.

“It’s never felt comfortable or natural to me referring to a chairman when a woman has been the chair of a committee.

“I can only speak for the Labor Party, where we have more than 50 per cent of our representatives in the Lower House being women, I think it’s a bit odd calling a woman a man.”