Barry Soper: ZB senior political correspondent on the Government softening regulations for transgender people in community sports

The Government has softened some restrictions impacting trans people in community sports.

As part of National's coalition agreement with New Zealand First, there was a threat to withhold public funding if sports bodies didn't keep trans athletes out of grassroots competitions.

Sport and Recreation Minister Chris Bishop will now take a watching brief, after feedback from Sport NZ.

ZB senior political correspondent Barry Soper says this sort of thing will be difficult to enforce a blanket ban on.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Barry Sober, Senior Political Correspondence with US. Now, Hey, Barry,
good I Heather, what do you make of the government
softening at stance we'll basically dropping the threat to defund
community sports who include transgender women.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Well, I know it was said by the Minister of
Recreation Sport Chris Bishop, but look all the statements that
have been made up until now. It'll be interesting to
see what Winston Peter says to you tonight about it.
But he essentially has been saying, look, if sports want
to maintain their funding, then they must abide by the

(00:31):
Coalition agreement on this matter, and that's to withhold funding
for sport. And the first utterance of it really was
from remember our old mate, the Mayor of Wellington, Andy Foster,
who's now their sports spokesman New Zealand first that is,
and he said if sporting codes didn't fall into line

(00:53):
the policy said, he said, funding would certainly be cut. Now,
this is transgender women being involved in community sports, so
it's at a lower level. And there was a comprehensive
report done by Sport New Zealand CEO Raileian Castle. She said,
and she pointed out that look, transgender people in community

(01:16):
sport are players, coaches, officials and administrators, so it's very
hard to have a blanket ban on this sort of thing.
The New Zealand First party would argue it's about safety
and fairness. But look, this is, as Chris Bishop said,
a very tricky set of issues.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
There will be more of this, right if there is.
If people voted for New Zealand First and the hope
that they were going to be able to enact their
blanket hardline on transgender community, they're in for a big
disappointment because none of the stuff's going to see the
light of day, like those weird toilet rules about girls
not being able to wear in boy bathrooms and stuff
that's also going to get ditched.

Speaker 2 (01:55):
Yeah, well most likely I would imagine which government to
support that non and I don't know whether it'll be
a die in the ditch issue really for New Zealand First.
But now it's come to the four. Of course, Winston
Peters has to argue one way or the other.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
Hey, I cannot believe that we're sending the jet to
pick up the PM. Did we not learn from the
other day, Well, you.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Know it can fly at a higher altitude now and
for now. New Zealand Defense has been working very hard
on it. But look, it seems to me almost inevitable
that two jets will be bought, and yeah, and fairly
it'll be done fairly soon. I would imagine you had

(02:36):
Nikola Willitts on air this morning. She was basically saying that, look,
these were the issues that the government will be working through,
that is to get the new planes and luxon from Japan.
Just a short while ago he gave a pretty strong
indications indication of the planes would be replaced.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
No government wants to be seen to be spending money
on it. And as a result, what happens as you
end up deferring the inevitable investment and you end up
in the situation that we are today where we're trying
to manage assets that are aging and what is a
very difficult fiscal constraint. So I think his owners understand
that situation. We are in a place where we need
to make sure that we can replace that seven five

(03:18):
to seven.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
So there you go, and that dreadful noise in the
background he was on a naval ship in Japan. Ah
And to that end, I mean the New Zealand Defense
Force will be sending an ANZAC class frigate will be
deployed to Japan in twenty twenty six. That we frigate

(03:43):
go up later this year as well, and a P
eight aircraft. Now they'll be up there for essentially monitoring
sanctions against North Korean. I heard your Peace on North
Korea earlier on that. You know, it's really hot up
in that part of the world, and New Zealand is
really showing its flag there.

Speaker 1 (04:05):
So Cinda's got a new job.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
Yeah, no, it Isn't it magnificent? You know, It's what
it goes to show in my view is look, I
traveled with Jasinda Dern during the course of her Prime
minister ship overseas people overseas lover they thought she was
absolutely fantastic. So she's landed a new venture where she.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
Really needed to talk fast. She'll be working because I
am getting trigged so to talk fast.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
She'll be working with global political leaders on a program
about leading with kindness.

Speaker 1 (04:38):
And they don't say that in the boat.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
I do say it, and tell that to those Tell
that to those who faced restrictions during the COVID and
being refused to come home unless they want a ballot
or tell that to those who refuse permission to visit
dying relatives and hospitals or indeed go to that's all.
That's hardly kindness. And oh no, no, thank you, very good,

(05:01):
save thousandswards.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
That's enough, Barry, thank you. Barry Soper, Senior political correspondent.
We're having a little monitor moratorium again on just sin there.
We'll come back to it at another stage, many many
years from now.

Speaker 2 (05:11):
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