Australia’s largest participation sport for girls issued a sharp rebuke to the federal government about a private member’s bill seeking to ban transgender athletes from women’s sport as it emerged no major sport had been consulted on the move.

Netball chief executive Kelly Ryan said neither Prime Minister Scott Morrison nor the Liberal senator who tabled the bill, Claire Chandler, had asked the organisation for its views on the issue and suggested sports should be left to make their own decisions.

Transgender athlete Hannah Mouncey (left) playing in the VFLW in 2018.Credit:Darrian Traynor

“We haven’t had any dialogue with any government on what their views are,” Ryan said. “It should be up to each sport to represent whatever it is that is required in their own spaces to put forward their positions.”

Netball and the NRL were the only major sports bodies to offer public comment on the matter since Morrison publicly backed the bill on Tuesday, with the latter also confirming it had not been engaged by Chandler on the matter. The AFL, Cricket Australia, Tennis Australia, Football Australia, Rugby Australia and Athletics Australia all confirmed to the Herald and The Age there had been no contact from the senator or Morrison government representatives before the bill was tabled this month.

In an interview on ABC radio in Hobart on Wednesday, Chandler said she had been inundated with messages from concerned parents fearing girls and women would be “crowded out” of their sport by transgender athletes.

When pressed by host Leon Compton, she could not offer an example of a sport at the centre of such concerns, or any sporting organisation or administrator that had expressed such fears or asked for her help.

Netball Australia chief executive Kelly Ryan has asked the Morrison government to mind its own business on transgender participation in sport.

Chandler was also challenged by a member of her own party, with senator Andrew Bragg condemning the bill. Bragg was one of the Liberal senators who indicated they would cross the floor on the government’s now-defunct religious discrimination bill.

“We don’t need to import a US-style culture war,” Bragg said. “A mark of a society is how it treats minorities which deserve protection not persecution … I am unaware of examples in Australia which warrant law reform. Equally, I have not been provided advice that suggests protections in the Sex Discrimination Act are deficient.”

The bill again dragged onto the public agenda a tricky matter for Australian sports, which are broadly welcoming of transgender athletes but have different positions on their participation, dependent on the mechanics of the sport and whether the athlete is playing at an elite or community level.

“The AFL approach is guided by the recognition that football is a game for all, as well as a commitment to supporting the inclusion of gender-diverse people participating in our game in a safe and inclusive environment that is free from harassment and discrimination,” an AFL spokesman said.

But in other cases, such as rugby union and athletics, sports are subject to policies and rules set by international federations, which may conflict with Australian law.

Last year, rugby’s powerful international governing body banned transgender women from women’s rugby, “because of the size, force- and power-producing advantages conferred by testosterone during puberty and adolescence, and the resultant player welfare risks this creates”.

Rugby Australia, however, allows it when all parties agree it is safe and practical for it to happen.

In 2020, RA was one of eight peak bodies – as well as AFL, Hockey Australia, Netball Australia, Tennis Australia, Touch Football Australia, UniSport Australia and Water Polo Australia – that affirmed their commitment to landmark transgender inclusion measures.

A year prior, the seven major professional and participation sports – AFL, cricket, rugby, rugby league, tennis, football and netball – worked with Sport Australia and the Australian Human Rights Commission to clarify the law around the issue for sporting organisations.

The Sex Discrimination Act prohibits discrimination against transgender athletes but allows for a “competitive sporting activity exemption” for athletes aged 12 and older. It allows a sporting organisation to stop a trans athlete’s participation if “the competition would be uneven because of the disparity between the relative strength, stamina and physique of male and female competitors”.

The act, as it affects community and elite sport, is outlined in some detail in a 2019 policy document compiled by Sport Australia, the Australian Human Rights Commission and the Coalition of Major Professional and Participation Sports.

“If a sporting organisation decides to rely on the ‘competitive sporting activity’ exemption to exclude a person from a particular competition, it will need to satisfy itself that ‘strength’, ‘stamina’ or ‘physique’ are relevant and how the organisation assesses this,” the document states.

“Given the diversity of sports and the role of different skills and physical characteristics (strength, stamina, physique) in each sport, the assessment should be specific to the sport in question.”

Critics of the private member’s bill say it is unnecessary to add extra protection for sporting organisations, but Chandler believes grassroots organisations are vulnerable to costly legal action if they take a stance against a transgender athlete.

In her reading of the bill into Parliament on February 10, she said modern interpretations of the act had been, “used as a weapon to pressure sporting organisations to allow males to play women’s sport”.

On Wednesday, a Sport Australia spokesman said the Australian Sports Commission expected sports to “ensure the integrity, fairness and safety of women’s sport and sporting competitions is maintained”.

“The ASC is committed to ensuring women and girls have equal opportunities to participate, volunteer and work in sport and delivers a range of programs to support women athletes, administrators and coaches, at all levels,” the spokesman said.

“Any changes to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 or the Australian Sports Commission Act 1989 are a matter for the Australian Parliament.”

with Matthew Knott

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