Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Ro Edge: Save Women's Sport Spokesperson on the Government taking a watching brief on transgender involvement in community sport

Transcript

Ro Edge: Save Women's Sport Spokesperson on the Government taking a watching brief on transgender involvement in community sport · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Change your heart from the government over transgender sport and funding.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: So the threat was to cut funding to sport that
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: did not comply with a push to separate transgender athletes
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: from grassroots competition. So it was part of the coalition
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: deal between New Zealand First and National. They will now
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: instead be taking a quote unquote watching brief. This is
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: after extensive feedback from sport in New Zealand apparently, who
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: have advocated for flexibility, opposing a one size fits all solution. Now.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Row Edge is the co founder of Saved Women's Sport
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: and is with this road. Very good morning to you.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: Good morning Mane.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: You'd be disappointed, Yeah, I am.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: But look I could be wrong, but there's something about
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: this that actually reeks of government bureaucrats trying to create
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: problems for the coalition government by feeding a busy minister
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: and accurate information. Chris Bishop contacted me by email about
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: two or three weeks ago and sent me a letter.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: In it he wrongly stated that Sport New Zellain's transgender
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: guidelines had exemptions for ennis and safety in relation to
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: female sport, and they don't at all. So yeah, it
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: just feels like Bishop's been manipulated by officials, because I
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: would have thought he that have brought a fair minded
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: and reasonable view to this based on science and evidence,
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: not the catch opinions of Sport New Zealand, which unfortunately
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: they've long since played their cards on the table and
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: they're not a mutual party in this no.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: I know. Having said that, we've also got Winston Peters
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: on later and it's a back to. I think this
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: was more his idea than it was National Party's idea
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: and therefore that's a back down on his part. So
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: I'll be interested to hear what he's got to say
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: about this. So how do we get around this, because
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: I mean part of the argument from Sport New Zealand
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: is it's you know, each individual sport does each It's
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: a mess, isn't it, because we don't know where we're
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: at it.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well it's been created. A mess has been created
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: by Sport New Zealand developing these guiding principles. If they
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: wanted to allow sports to step back and create policies
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: that were right for each sport, they would remove those
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: guiding principles and that element of control. Because Sport New
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: Zealand is the funding leaver holds the funding leaver for
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: all sports, so if they don't comply with Sport New
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: Zealand's guidelines, sports are worried that those funding leavers will
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: be pulled. So if they do want to stay back
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: and allow sports to make the decision themselves, then they
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: need to take away the guiding principles and allow sports
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: for freedom to do that. We recently saw International Cricket
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: came out to protect the female category and New Zealand
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: Cricket had always told me they would follow their international
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: federation's guidelines, but because of Sport New Zealand's guiding principles,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: I believe they haven't. And in every sport I speak
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: to say that we've got to follow those and so
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: our hands are tired. We're not making any progress. You know.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: The only sport we've made progress with, apart from boxing
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: because Steve Hartley, the president of Boxing New Zealand obviously
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: doesn't want to condone male violence against women, is triathlon.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: And that's because last year they were the only sport
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: descend a representative to the International Summit on Women's Sport
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: over in Colorado. So it's you know, I mean, it's
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: really disappointing. Might we play sport with our bodies, not
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: our identity exactly? And we all know that male bodies
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: are bigger, stronger and faster than females.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Interesting, right, all right, good catch, uppreciative very much, row Edge,
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: who's the Saved Women's sport spokesperson? For more from newstalkst B,
• 3:01
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• 3:05
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