Rishi Sunak: Prime Minister appears to mock transgender women in leaked video - what did he say?

New footage from a Tory get-together which appears to show Prime Minister Rishi Sunak joking about transgender women has been slammed online, with the person who recorded it saying his comments left many younger MPs uncomfortable.

In the video clip - leaked to reporters at Pink News, a UK-based media outlet focusing on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender news - Sunak appears to take aim at Liberal Democrats leader Ed Davey's support of the transgender community, saying that instead of plans to make British students study maths until they turned 18 - that he should have focused on biology.

Pink News reports the clip was taken at a party with the 1922 Committee - a group of Conservative MPs that meets weekly when Parliament is sitting - on 5 June. There were around 100 MPs in attendance, they report.

Transgender rights have recently become a hot button issue in the UK, with fiery debates raging between transgender rights activists and so-called TERFs - or trans-exclusionary radical feminists. Famed author JK Rowling has become a key figure in the anti-transgender rights movement, and the clashes have started to reach Parliament.

Earlier this year, Sunak controversially used a Section 35 order to block Scotland’s historic Gender Recognition Reform Act. The act would see the process in which trans people go through to legally change their gender shortened and simplified, and would have brought the legal age of those seeking to change their gender down from 18 to 16.

The government has also signalled plans to re-write the Equality Act - which The Guardian reports would likely have a detrimental impact on trans people.

But what exactly did Sunak allegedly say in the video, and what has the response been from Downing Street? Here's everything you need to know.

What does Sunak appear to say in the video?

In the footage, which is 32 seconds long and appears to have been shot with a cell phone - with the camera partially covered by a hand throughout the clip - a man who appears to be the Prime Minister takes aim at Liberal Democrats leader Ed Davey.

Davey "has been very busy", the man says, referring to his support of the LGBT community. "Like me, you will have probably seen that he was busy trying to convince everybody that women clearly had penises," he said, to laughter from the crowd.

"You all know I am a big fan of everybody studying maths to 18, but it turns out we need to focus on biology to 18," he continued, before the clip ended.

How has he responded to the leaked footage?

NationalWorld approached Downing St for comment, and received a statement from the Prime Minister’s official spokesman. It said: “You’ve heard the Prime Minister talk about his enormous compassion and understanding for people questioning their identity and that they should be treated with dignity and respect.

"On this specific issue, these are points he’s made in interviews publicly, with Piers Morgan, with ConservativeHome. Obviously, I can’t get into the political aspects of that, but he’s made the same broader point in interviews," he continued.

What has the reaction to the comments in the clip been?

The person who shared the video with PinkNews told the outlet: “The veneer of freedom of speech publicly is one thing but to make jokes in private, it’s another thing altogether.

“You wouldn’t make jokes about other marginalised people the way he did about trans people," they continued. But while many in attendance appeared to laugh at Sunak's comments, they said “there were quite a few younger attendees who looked visibly uncomfortable".

The video has been broadly condemned by the public on Twitter, with many commenters slamming the comments as everything from "horrifically transphobic" to "shameful conduct for a PM".

Many posters who are part of the LGBT community themselves have expressed that the comments are no surprise, while some have called for his resignation.