The state of affairs in protecting women’s sport
Progress has been made, but some sports are still lagging behind in spite of the Supreme Court judgment. What action is needed?
The sports councils are in denial
The four national sports councils – Sport England, Sport Wales, Sport Scotland and Sport NI – are responsible for developing participation in sport and physical recreation among the general public. UK Sport is concerned with elite sport leading to international competition.
In 2021, the Sports Councils Equality Group (SCEG) published transgender inclusion guidance which said that it is not possible to balance fairness and safety for female participants with the inclusion of males in the women’s category.
The guidance offered two options. A sport governing body can prioritise fairness in the female category based on “sex at birth”, or it can prioritise “inclusion” – by which it meant allowing males into women’s categories as validation of their cross-sex identities. The guidance proposed testosterone suppression to reduce the unfairness. It recommended checking testosterone levels for trans-identifying men four times a year. The lawfulness of allowing some men but not others into the women’s category was not challenged, nor was the requirement for a medical intervention as a qualifying condition.
The Supreme Court judgment in For Women Scotland would suggest there is no lawful basis for sports governing bodies to create a women’s category and then define women as anything other than biological sex. However, Sport England has said the SCEG guidance remains lawful and does not need to be reviewed in the light of the judgment.
We have obtained the updated legal considerations document through FOI (May 2024 document; June 2025 update). The only acknowledgement of the landmark judgment is the addition of this paragraph:
“Case law has defined “sex” under the EA as meaning biological sex (as opposed to certified or self-identified sex). Sex is binary being male or female. Case law has also separately provided that gender reassignment covers a broad range of persons, who live other than to [sic] their biological sex.”
And “biological” has replaced “natal” in this sentence:
“This principle applies in the same way that biological males do not typically participate with biological females in gender-affected activity.”
That’s it. No proposed changes to the transgender inclusion guidance itself, which means that sports that do not have a female-only category but only a “female plus males who suppress their testosterone” category are still doing it, and the sports councils, funded by the taxpayer, are endorsing that choice.
Many sports have changed, but there are hold-outs
The biggest sports by participation – swimming, athletics, cycling – restored a female-only category for competition in 2023. Many others across the UK have too, but by no means all.
Sports that have still to restore fairness for women and girls include baseball, gymnastics, handball, lacrosse, roller derby, rounders and taekwondo. The last is a combat sport, but there are also safety as well as fairness concerns in the other team sports, particularly handball, lacrosse and roller derby, which as contact sports can be very physical.
Some governing bodies claim to be reviewing their policies, but it seems to be a never-ending process.
Scotland and Wales are lagging behind
In some sports, the governing body for one home nation, usually England, has amended its rules while the other nations have not. The Football Associations in Scotland and England stopped the dangerous practice of letting men play in women’s games after the FWS Supreme Court ruling, but the Welsh FA has not. In England, badminton, basketball, table tennis and volleyball now have a genuine female category, whereas in Wales and Scotland those sports still allow men who say they are women to compete in women’s events (and in hockey, netball and weightlifting in Wales).
Precision sports are still a problem
The two legal challenges in pool (one brought by women, one by a trans-identifying man) have settled the issue in that game for women, but snooker and darts are still letting a man take precious tournament places, prize money and victories in so-called “women’s” events.
Mind games such as chess and bridge do not have the same factors of physical disadvantage for women, but both are so male-dominated that they run women’s tournaments to encourage female participation. While chess has determined that these events must be female-only, bridge is still admitting men who say they are women. This has led to the inclusion of a young man in the England national women’s team.
Two-tier policies
The England and Wales Cricket Board has abandoned its appalling two-tier policy for cricket, but several others have policies that provide male-free competition for women only at higher levels. These include tennis in England (under the Lawn Tennis Association), yachting across the UK (under the Royal Yachting Association), and golf across the UK (under national governing bodies).
Many men are flouting the rules
In athletics, many men continue to enter road races with female names and to claim female finishing positions. England Athletics’ attitude to reports of this, which is officially cheating under their own rules, is somewhat laissez-faire. Some race organisers such as London Marathon allow and even endorse this, claiming their event is not competitive.
The same is happening in cycling, which has a variety of types of event, some of which, such as gravel racing, are not governed by British, Welsh or Scottish Cycling.
Initiatives to increase female participation won’t say no to men
Judo has fair competition but its national “Female Fighters Festival” event continues to allow trans-identifying men.
British Cycling has a popular programme of recreational Breeze Rides which are advertised as for women and led by women, but in fact include men who identify as such – sometimes as ride leaders.
Canoeing and kayaking have a similar initiative called ShePaddles where the rules are unclear.
Women-only swimming sessions and exercise classes have long been recognised as a way to remove barriers to female participation. But local authorities and other gym and leisure centre operators continue to allow access to men who say they are women, or to avoid stating a clear policy to women who seek assurance that no one male will be present in a women’s session.
Facilities are still a barrier for many women
Access to female-only changing rooms is important to many women and girls, but far too many gyms, leisure centres and others are still refusing to deny trans-identifying men access to women’s spaces.
Sport England and UK Active, the industry body for gyms and leisure centre operators, conducted research “to better understand concerns, behaviours, and perceptions women and girls have about participating in activities within gyms and leisure centres” in 2021. The research report, called As Told by the 51%, shows the importance of male-free spaces to female participation. A quarter of those surveyed said that female-only changing facilities and toilets were a factor in whether they would participate. Among those who had used a facility in the past three years, this rose to 40%, showing it is a live issue. 22% wanted female-only gym and swim sessions. 13% of all women were concerned about the risk or threat of sexual harassment, intimidation or embarrassment from sexual harassment in a fitness and leisure centre. 64% of those attending in the preceding three years said they had taken measures to protect themselves from sexual harassment in a fitness and leisure centre.
Yet many providers still will not give women the reassurance they need that men who say they are women will not be permitted to use the women’s facilities. Virgin Active backed down on this when faced with a legal challenge from TV presenter Michelle Dewberry, supported by Sex Matters. Despite this, others are still flouting the law.
This is why Sex Matters is bringing a legal challenge against the City of London Corporation for its policy of allowing men who identify as women into the Kenwood Ladies’ Pond on Hampstead Heath, and women who identify as men into the Highgate Men’s Pond. We say this is unlawful sex discrimination, against both men and women. There is already a Mixed Pond that anyone can swim in, including people who don’t want to swim in the pond for their own sex. If we win this case it will provide helpful clarity for service providers of all sorts including gyms and swimming pools.
Then there’s Parkrun
This free weekly timed 5k run, which happens in hundreds of UK locations at the same time every Saturday morning, as well as in many other countries, encourages men who identify as women to register as female for the sake of what it calls “inclusion”. This is despite offering four categories: male, female, another gender identity and prefer not to say.
Anyone can turn up and run or walk. Everyone lines up together, without numbers or other identification. Registration is a one-off private matter done online, so that each runner can get their result, but even that is not a requirement.
Each event’s results are published in rank order and can be sorted into M and F categories. Each runner is given an age-graded percentage score based on world-best 5k times by age and sex.
Parkrun claims that what it is doing is lawful because the runs are not competitive events but community health interventions with physical and mental health benefits. To support this argument, it removed some data from its website, including course records and lists of fastest finishers. It is “a run not a race”, but still provides pacers once a month and publishes ranked results just as races do.
Parkrun defends allowing men to register as women as a way to encourage participation of trans-identifying people. Others say it is a deterrent to female runners, who lose recognition (for example, as fastest woman, or as age-grade record holder) and whose positions are worsened every single week for every woman who finishes behind a man claiming to be a woman. On more than 250 occasions, male runners have finished first in the “female” category; and numerous records are held by men (Parkrun stopped publishing records in February 2024 but they are still published on the 5k app, which uses Parkrun data). One man who ran for nearly five years in the male category and finished first only once moved to the female category and has finished first more than 70 times in less than two years.
We will take action – and so can you
Sex Matters is engaging with many of these organisations, as we have done for some time. Following the For Women Scotland judgment, the legal position is clearer than ever. But we and others may have to go to court to enforce it.
We also gave feedback to the EHRC on its draft code of practice and we hope the final version will be better.
On facilities, you can use our resources to demand unequivocal single-sex changing room and toilet policies from your sport, club, gym provider or leisure centre. On sport rules, tell your governing body that it must comply with the law, using the resources here to help you. Please tell us, too, if you have had any problems as a result of their failure to set and enforce lawful policies that provide fair, safe sport for women and girls.