Lisa Nandy has been accused of “making a mockery” of women’s sport after suggesting that there could be some circumstances in which trans athletes could compete in women’s sport.
Speaking to The House magazine, Labour’s Culture Secretary claimed that individual sports “should decide whether or not biological males should compete against women”.
She added: “We ought to respect the fact that they’re far more expert in making those judgments and decisions than we are.
“I want to make sure that they feel supported, to be able to make those decisions fairly, but I think most have come to the conclusion now, although they want to be as inclusive as possible, biology does matter when it comes to sport.”
However, hitting out at Nandy’s remarks, former Olympic athlete Mara Yamauchi slammed the Labour politician for contributing to the “corruption of women’s sport” by “leaving it to national bodies” to decide.
Speaking on GB News, Yamauchi explained: “She said biology does matter – she’s correct, that’s the truth, I welcome that. But the logical next step of ‘biology does matter’ is that males should not be competing in the female category under any circumstances.
“Sport needs to be fair and safe for women and girls. But what she said instead was, let’s leave this to our national governing bodies to decide – in theory that would be okay, but in practice, it has proved not to be.”
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