The Government has come under fire for backtracking on planned changes to birth certificates, but done they make the right move? 

Internal Affairs minister Tracey Martin last week announced she had deferred the Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registration Bill, which would have made it easier for trans people to change to change their gender on birth certificates had been deferred due to poor public consultation and legal concerns.

The bill had previously faced strong opposition by conservative, religious and feminist groups who had challenged whether enough thought had gone into the consequences of the move and what it would mean for women's prisons and refuges.

In a statement, Martin said significant changes had been made to the bill by the select committee around gender self-identification and stakeholders had not been given adequate opportunity to make submissions on this.

Speaking as part of the Sunday Panel, commentator Liam Hehir says that while it is a loaded topic, the Government has an obligation to follow proper procedure. 

"The reason they have gone backwards is that the current state of play included a significant amendment that came after select committee had taken placed. The reason we have select committees is so we can iron the kinks and we can get as much consensus as possible." 

Journalist Frances Cook says that she thinks the Government needs to pass the law. 

"Trans women are women, and in the sisterhood, I would like to stick up to them. I have to say I have never been intimidated by a trans women." 

She says that the argument that men who want to hurt women will abuse these laws is ridiculous, as abusers would not go to that much effort. 

Cook says it is really important to trans people that they can change their birth certificates. 

"It doesn't really impact the rest of us."

She likens it to the debate around the marriage equality, when people argued about a "slippery slope" that never came about.

"The National Government had the backbone to deal with the nastinerss in the Marriage Equality debate, whereas this Government has no backbone to deal with a very small, very vocal minority who claim they weren't consulted but this change came about through the select committee process."