Mark Mitchell quoted the NZ First coalition agreement when he wrote to Sport NZ in July. Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii
Sport NZ urged the government not to scrap its guidelines for the inclusion of transgender people in community sport, but ministers did so anyway, citing the coalition agreement with New Zealand First.
The government directed the Crown entity to remove the guidance from its website in July, despite having earlier asked it to review and update the principles.
Information obtained by RNZ under the Official Information Act included a May briefing from Sport NZ to its minister Mark Mitchell, providing an update on that review.
The briefing referred to an earlier meeting among officials in early April where the option of Sport NZ "no longer providing guidance" was canvassed.
"As noted in the meeting, we would advise against removing the Guidance altogether," the document said.
It said the Guiding Principles, published in 2022, had been produced in response to "increasing requests from sports organisations for support regarding transgender participants".
The officials stressed it was a challenging area for sports organisations to address and so: "it is important that they have guidance around how to approach this."
"We have received positive feedback on the usefulness of the existing guidance through this and, therefore, consider that it should remain available to the sector to support them on this matter."
Despite that, Mitchell wrote to Sport NZ on 22 July saying he had come to the view the agency should no longer have guiding principles published after considering feedback from his colleagues.
He quoted the NZ First coalition agreement which committed to "ensure publicly funded sporting bodies support fair competition that is not compromised by rules relating to gender".
Mitchell said key decisions should be left up to individual sports and community organisations. He then requested Sport NZ to work with his office on public communication about the decision.
Speaking to RNZ on Friday, Mitchell said he consulted with NZ First, after receiving Sport NZ's advice, and proposed new guidance.
"It didn't meet [NZ First's] expectations in the coalition agreement, so we just decided to scrap the advice altogether."
Mitchell said he took coalition commitments seriously and believed the best decision was made in the long run.
"I just don't think government should be meddling and getting into areas that... the sports themselves are best placed to know how to run their code in a safe and fair way."
What did Sport NZ propose as the updated guidelines?
The May briefing to the Minister set out Sport NZ's "significant rewrite" of the guidance as a result of its review.
"The Guidance has been reworked, shifting from 'inclusion' as the overarching principle to a foundation of 'inclusion, safety, and fairness'.
"The initial document also presented 'guiding principles', whereas this draft more explicitly offers guidance to the sector for their consideration."
The draft version of the new 'Guidance for the inclusion of transgender people in sport' was released as part of the OIA request, dated May 2025.
It made clear that the inclusion of transgender people in community sport should be facilitated wherever possible and stressed the importance of using "concrete data and evidence" when evaluating potential safety risks on the playing field.
"The gender identity of a player does not in and of itself create a danger or risk to safety."
The guidance noted that fairness was "foundational principle" in all sport but "challenging" to define as every person brought a unique set of advantages and disadvantages to their sport.
To balance fairness and safety and to include transgender people, sports could consider implementing weight classes to ensure safety, it said.
The guidance noted that age and development stages were important, so using age based categories would help manage differences and promote fair competition.
It also suggested mixed-gender competitions could be offered where feasible to encourage inclusivity and maintain balance.
Practical considerations for including transgender people in community were also outlined, such as: integrity, facilities, uniforms, travel, and privacy and dignity.
Considerations for applying those in practice were: privacy policies, registration forms, language (such as pronouns), respect and dignity, and social media policies.
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