SEX has been in the news this week (although, when, in some form or other, is it ever not?), thanks to that most unlikely source, the Office for National Statistics.

With the next British census a mere four years away, the ONS has decided to put the cat among the pigeons early by suggesting that, in 2021, Britain could become the first country in the world not to require citizens to identify their sex.

The politically correct reasoning behind this suggestion (and the ONS is quick to stress that no decision has yet been made) is that by expecting people to say whether they are male or female may be deemed "intrusive and irrelevant" - although it is fairly obvious that the real reasoning is the desire not to upset Britain's population of transgender or "non-binary" people or those who, to quote the ONS's report on gender identity "cannot choose male or female as a reflection of their current sex or gender".

Well, I'm sorry, but I can't see anything remotely irrelevant or intrusive about a national census wanting to find out how many males and females there are in the country. Yes, it may offend the sensibilities of a tiny fraction of society who are unsure of their "current sex or gender", but then by existing at all, we are all constantly at risk of being offended - and most of us manage to cope.

It is, of course, difficult to state with any authority how many transgender, non-binary, gender fluid etc people there are in the country, although most estimates put the figure of transgender people at somewhere under less than half a per cent of the population (0.1 per cent is the figure that comes up most frequently on searches).

Even if we take 0.5 per cent as the actual figure, that's a tiny proportion of the nation - and certainly, in my opinion, not enough to airbrush the question of gender from something so important as a census.

The ONS has toyed with the idea of including an "other" option, along with "male" of "female" on the proposed form, but it will come as no surprise to anyone that that idea has been ditched because the "other' option was (again, to quote the ONS) "thought to homogenise trans people and differentiate them from the rest of society".

But (deep breath here) trans people are different from the rest of society, and insisting otherwise is simply an exercise in obfuscation. Whether campaigners like it or not, one's gender is a matter of biology. We are born either male or female; and the chromosomal differences between the sexes matter. And it is actually quite important to know how many males and females are living in a country at any given time - however much the framing of such a question might be considered "intrusive" to the tiny proportion of trans people in society.

Taking a patently obvious example, let's consider health care provision. I would have thought it is fairly important to have a clear idea of the gender breakdown in society in order to be able to look at, oh, such minor things as maternity provision. Or to be able to do research into gender specific types of cancer.

And what about the hard-won advances in sexual equality? Take questions of gender out of the equation and we are in danger of going back to square one, with women's rights being sidelined through lack of information. Progress? Hardly. Needless to say, feminists such as Germaine Greer are furious about the ONS report and its potential ramifications for the feminist cause. Women, asserts Greer, are "losing out everywhere" as a result of the growing tendency to dismiss gender.

I have to agree - although I think men are just as at risk from this current insistence upon gender neutrality in the national discourse.

Whether the trans lobby like it or not, it is important to know how many males and females are living in a country at any given time. Pandering to a tiny minority at the potential expense of more than 99 per cent of the rest of society is silly.

However offended people grappling with their gender might be by being asked what sex they are, biological reality cannot - and should not - be ignored. We are all born either male or female. Deciding to change sex, or wishing to change sex, does not alter that.

Politically-correct tinkering with a national census is simply ridiculous. There's a reason Britain would be the only country in the world not to require citizens to identify their sex: it's ludicrous. Let's hope the ONS sees sense before 2021, however "offended" a very small number of people might be.