This report by Policy Exchange claims that women and girls in amateur sport are being denied fair and safe competition due to authorities adopting gender ideology and demonstrates the fundamental incompatibility of fair and safe competition between men and women within both grassroots, amateur and elite sport.
Sport is the most visible manifestation of why biological sex matters in public policy because men are physically stronger than women. Sex categories exist precisely for this reason and have existed without problem for centuries.
Many responsible for setting policy within sport have recognised that a person’s self-declared identity must not compromise categories based on physicality when what is at stake is an intrinsically physical activity. However, there is a sense that protecting the female category only matters within elite or professional sport – for female athletes participating at the highest levels.
However, 14 million women and girls are regularly active in England – and 99.99 per cent of them are not professional athletes. The report says that that these women and girls deserve safe and fair play too and that governing bodies should have their funding cut if they fail to protect female sports amid concern about trans- gender players.
Policy Exchange is now calling on sport governing bodies, the UK Government and the International Olympic Committee to restrict categories for women and girls to biological females at all levels of sport. It recommends that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport should require all national governing bodies to update their policies within 12 months to ensure that there is a protected female single-sex category – and that they should lose taxpayer funding if they fail to do so.