STAND UP AND DO THE SAME
After swimming makes brave call to ban transgender athletes in women’s events, Sharron Davies urges other sports to...
SHARRON DAVIES has called for other sports to follow swimming’s lead after the seismic decision to ban transgender athletes from elite women’s races.
Swimming’s world governing body, FINA, yesterday voted through a major new policy stating that trans women who have ‘ experienced any part of male puberty’ can no longer enter female events.
The move was hailed as a ‘victory for women’s sport’ by former British Olympic swimmer Davies, who has been a long-time campaigner on the issue. The 1980 silver medallist now wants other Olympic sports to copy FINA’s strict stance.
Last week, cycling updated their own rules but were criticised for continuing to base transgender inclusion on testosterone levels and admitting they could not ‘eliminate all advantages held by a transgender (athlete)’.
‘I am so proud of FINA for at last being the first to be brave enough to stand up for female athletes,’ a tearful Davies told Sportsmail following yesterday’s announcement.
‘This is a very good move and I hope now that all the other associations pick it up.
‘I think what cycling has done is disgraceful. They have basically said they are happy for female athletes to compete with a disadvantage. I’m afraid that is not acceptable in a world
where we don’t believe in sex discrimination.’
The new swimming policy came following an Extraordinary General Congress when members heard a report from a transgender task force comprising leading medical, legal and sports figures.
American Summer Sanders, who won two gold medals at Barcelona 1992, and Australia’s current four- time Olympic champion Cate Campbell were among those from the sport to speak out against trans women competing in female races.
The rule — which states any trans athlete must have
completed transition by the age of 12 — was passed with 71 per cent of the vote from 152 FINA members and comes into force today. FINA will also establish an ‘open’ category for swimmers whose gender identity is different from their birth sex.
‘FINA’s approach in drafting this policy was comprehensive, science- based and inclusive, and, importantly, emphasised competitive fairness,’ said the governing body’s executive director Brent Nowicki.
FINA president Husain Al-Musallam added: ‘We have to protect the rights of our athletes to compete, but we also have to protect competitive fairness at our events, especially the women’s category.’
The debate around transgender athletes in swimming catapulted into the spotlight in March when Lia Thomas became the first known transgender swimmer to win the highest US national college title.
The 22- year- old won the women’s 500-yard freestyle having swum for the Pennsylvanian men’s team for three seasons before starting hormone replacement therapy in 2019.
Thomas had stated her aim was to qualify for the Paris Olympics in 2024, but FINA’s new policy bans her from racing against women at the Games or any other international events.
‘It’s the first victory and an extremely important one,’ added Davies. ‘I can’t tell you how hard it has been. I have hardly worked for three years because the trans activists made my life hell.
‘ But I was so determined because nobody stood up for my generation way back in the 1970s and ’80s. I was determined another generation wasn’t going to deal with that. Today’s swimmers will be relieved.’
Campaign group Fair Play for Women also said FINA had ‘done the right thing and brought back fairness for women and girls in competitive swimming’.
However, ‘Athlete Ally’ — the group who organised a letter of support for Thomas earlier this year — tweeted: ‘FINA’s new eligibility criteria for transgender athletes and athletes with intersex variations is discriminatory, harmful, unscientific and not in line with the 2021 IOC principles.
‘If we truly want to protect women’s sports, we must include all women.’
TRANSGENDER swimmers were last night banned from competing in elite female races in a landmark move hailed a ‘victory for women’s sport’.
Swimming’s world governing body FINA voted through a new policy blocking trans competitors from events unless they completed their transition by the age of 12.
The new rule means that US trans swimmer Lia Thomas, 22, who won a major college competition in March after starting hormone replacement therapy aged 19, can no longer race against women.
FINA will instead establish an ‘open’ category at competitions for swimmers whose gender identity is different from their birth sex.
The policy was brought in to counter the effects of male puberty which gives competitors who later identify as women a physical advantage.
The move has been welcomed by women’s rights campaigners, including former British Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies, 59, who was brought to tears by the news. She told the Daily Mail: ‘It’s a victory for women’s sport. I am so proud of FINA for at last being the first to be brave enough to stand up for female athletes.
‘It is common sense. You cannot make sports rules based on feelings. You have to revert to the science and the facts. It’s the first victory and an extremely important one.’
Fiona McAnena, of campaign group Fair Play For Women, said: ‘FINA have done the right thing and brought back fairness for women and girls in competitive swimming.
‘Scientific evidence, public opinion and, of course, common sense all support this move. Male puberty confers a lifelong performance advantage in sport which can’t be reversed.
‘Now other international sports federations must follow FINA’s lead.’
The policy was passed with 71 per cent of the vote from 152 FINA members,
who heard from leading figures in medicine, law and sport at a meeting in Hungary. The International Olympic Committee lets each sport set its own transgender inclusion policy so it means trans swimmers like Thomas will barred from the Olympics.
FINA president Husain Al-Musallam said: ‘We have to protect the rights of our athletes to compete, but we also have to protect competitive fairness at our events. FINA will always welcome every athlete. The creation of an open category will mean that everybody has the opportunity to compete at an elite level.’
Cycling’s governing body, UCI, earlier toughened its policy on transgender females. It halved the maximum testosterone level permitted and doubled the transition period from one year to two. Miss Thomas became the first known trans swimmer to win the
highest US national college title in the women’s 500-yard freestyle. She swam for a state men’s team for three seasons before starting hormone replacement therapy in 2019.
Miss Davies, who won a silver medal at the 1980 Olympics, has been a keen campaigner on the issue for years.
She said: ‘I can’t tell you how hard it has been. I have hardly worked for three years because the trans activists made my life hell. But I was so determined because nobody stood up for my generation way back in the 70s and 80s. Today’s swimmers will feel relief.’
Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries last night welcomed swimming’s move and stressed that people who had been through male puberty should never compete in women’s sport.
Miss Dorries told LBC radio: ‘It is just unacceptable that trans women compete in women’s sport. If you have been through puberty you cannot reverse the size of your feet, the density of your bone. Fairness should always trump inclusivity in principle.’
FINALLY, a welcome outbreak of common sense. Transgender swimmers will be banned from women’s elite races if they have been through male puberty.
All sport should aim to be inclusive. But human biology is real. It’s not fair for women to be deprived of opportunity by having to compete against someone with the size, strength and speed advantages of a male just because they identify as female.
Hopefully, this triumph of science over ideology is contagious, not just throughout sport but every sector of public life.
To take just two examples in today’s paper. Isn’t it preposterous that ‘wokery’ put diversity before patients in a recent review intended to tackle NHS bureaucracy?
And it’s madness that education watchdog Ofsted penalises primary schools for not teaching sinister gender identity dogma. That’s indoctrination, not education.
GOrDON Brown, in No 10 at the time of the 2008 financial crash, says rishi Sunak should scrap the planned corporation tax hike and loathed fuel levies to help struggling families and businesses. When a former Labour PM extols tax cuts to a Tory chancellor, isn’t that proof the Conservatives’ fiscal policy is topsy-turvy?