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India Willoughby has compared the World Athletics’ decision to ban transgender female athletes from competing in female events to ‘apartheid’.
The governing body’s president, Lord Coe, said female transgender athletes who had gone through male puberty would not be permitted to compete in female world ranking competitions from March 31 onwards.
The former Olympic champion insisted the decision was ‘guided by the overarching principle which is to protect the female category’.
Trans TV star India appeared on Good Morning Britain on Friday to discuss the issue, which has seen the likes of Piers Morgan weigh in.
She began: ‘It’s absolute nonsense.
‘When you look at the actual stats in the record books, trans women have been allowed to compete in professional sport since the 1970s.’
She continued: ‘During that time, we’re now 50 years, half a century, there’s never been a pro trans champion.
‘I remembering being on your show, almost a year ago to the day, when we were talking about Lia Thomas, the American swimmer, the college swimmer who had won a race and the story was that “Lia was trashing women’s sport and destroying it”.
‘But two days later, there were two 16-year-olds Bella Sims and Katie Grimes who broke her record, by 4.5 seconds. So the idea that there is not a level playing field is just rubbish.
‘The worst thing about this actually is the gaslighting from Lord Coe, he’s saying there that he won’t object if somebody doesn’t goes through male puberty, or at least that’s what he infers.
‘Does that mean that Sebastian Coe is in favour of allowing trans people to transition earlier?
‘Of course not, he would absolutely object to that.
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‘Make no mistake, this is a trans ban, it’s effectively sports apartheid, and having this separate category effectively saying, “Yeah, we’re going to include you, we’re being inclusive, but you go play over there not with the rest of us,” I’m sorry that’s not inclusion.’
At a press conference on Thursday, Lord Coe said: ‘The majority of those consulted stated that transgender athletes should not be competing in the female category.
‘Many believe there is insufficient evidence that transwomen do not retain an advantage over biological women and want more evidence that any physical advantages have been ameliorated before they are willing to consider an option for inclusion into the female category.’
He added: ‘The council has agreed to exclude male-to-female transgender athletes who have been through male puberty from female world ranking competitions from March 31 this year.’
Good Morning Britain airs weekdays from 6am on ITV1.
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