Former Olympian Mara Yamauchi has criticised Lisa Nandy’s refusal to intervene on behalf of women to ensure males do not compete in their sport, saying she wanted to see the Culture Secretary putting pressure on governing bodies to ‘restore fair and safe sport for females’.
Speaking on GB News Mara Yamauchi said: “I think it's important to look at the details of what [Lisa Nandy] said. She said biology does matter. She's correct, that's the truth and 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, because sports 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. And in theory, that would be okay. However, in practice, it's proved to be not okay.
“Here we are now nearly three years after the UK sports councils issued their report, which was very clear. It said, fair and safe sport for women and girls cannot coexist with males in the female category.
“And despite nearly three years passing, most sports in the UK still allow males in the female category, there are only a tiny number who have protected the female category.
“So what I would like to see from Nandy is leadership and encouragement and pressure on the governing bodies to restore fair and safe sport for females.
“If a sport is sex affected, i.e. there is a difference between males and females, then there must be a separate male category. A sport like equestrian, as I understand it, can be mixed sex, because there's no clear advantage held by males.
“But if a sport is sex affected, even to the tiniest degree, there must be single sex categories. There can also be mixed sex categories, and that's fine for those who want to play mixed sex competitions.
“This matters at all levels, not just at elite level. Women at grassroots level, beginner level, recreational level, masters level: women and girls deserve fair and safe sport.
“We've seen males deliberately underperforming in the female category. This makes a total mockery of sport. Sport is about doing your absolute best and male sandbagging to try and hide their male advantage just totally corrupts what sport is.
“We saw this with Lia Thomas, we've heard of coaches shouting at male athletes from the sidelines saying ,’don't make it look too obvious’. This is a complete corruption of what sport is.
“The Equality Act explicitly permits single sex sport, so it is lawful to exclude all males, including holding GRC holders, from the female category.”
WATCH ABOVE.
