Captain Jan, the transsexual Para, sues the Army for unfair dismissal

Jan Hamilton, a former male captain in the Parachute Regiment who is now living as a woman, will lodge court papers claiming she was sexually discriminatedagainst and unfairly dismissed in April from a £45,000-a-year post.

Captain Hamilton, 42, had been due to become head of media relations for the British Army in Gibraltar in May.

But after she refused to turn up at a medical examination dressed in a male uniform – which her lawyers argue would have been 'humiliating and demeaning' – the job offer was withdrawn.

Her lawyers have, to no avail, repeatedly sought an informal meeting with her Army bosses to settle the issue out of court. Captain Hamilton has now been without a salary for four months and has racked up several thousand pounds in legal bills.

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'I would have been happy if someone had just asked me to come in for coffee to discuss what I was going through,' she says. 'All I want is to carry on working for the Army in an equal-opportunities capacity.'

Earlier this year, Captain Hamilton told The Mail on Sunday exclusively about her decision to undergo sex-change surgery. As Ian Hamilton, he served in Iraq and Afghanistan and became highly decorated. More recently, he had been working as a Territorial Army officer.

But the announcement in April that he intended to live as a woman came as a shock to the Ministry of Defence.

Captain Hamilton has not had a single face-to-face meeting with an Army official to discuss her transition, despite several requests. 'This has caused me an untold amount of mental and emotional stress,' she says. 'I am under medical care and on anti-depressants because of this. I don't want to go to court but they are pushing me into it.

They have ignored me and sidelined me because I am a paratrooper and an officer and it's seen as an ungentlemanly way to behave. It is inconsiderate and rude and it has been massively emotionally traumatic.

'My transition hasn't changed my ability to be a good serving soldier.' The Army has launched an internal investigation into her treatment that is due to report in the next two weeks.

An MoD spokesman said: 'Where the Ministry of Defence has a legal liability to pay compensation, it will do so.'