UK Women’s Sport Taskforce – The urgency to centre women, girls and their communities
- virginie-bellaton
- Sep 24
- 9 min read
The exciting opportunity of a Decade for Change in Women's Sport
It has been a glorious summer of women’s sport, and as the back-to-school season begins, the energy generated shows no signs of slowing. The Rugby World Cup is in full swing. A series of events is celebrating women’s sport, and industry leaders are actively working to shape the future of women’s sport.
With another major victory for the Lionesses at EURO 2025 and vast increases in viewership and participation, investors’ appetite is surging. Few other sectors offer such commercial growth prospects (see UEFA’s Business Case for Women’s Football report issued after EURO 2022 and EURO 2025 surpassing all audience records). The challenge now is to ensure the whole of British women's sport capitalises on these achievements, not just commercially, but also socially, creating change towards gender equality.
It is in this context that the new Women’s Sport Taskforce met earlier this month, hosted by the Rugby Football Union in Brighton. Its objectives aligns with the government’s wider Plan for Change and extends beyond economic growth to deliver equal access, better facilities and a fairer chance for women and girls to participate and compete in sport. It brings together government, professional experts, field practitioners and academics with the ambitious goal of inspiring a generation and positioning the UK as a global leader in women’s sport.
Setting out for transformational change and technological challenges
The Taskforce’s first meeting focused on innovation in athlete health research and combatting online abuse. The longstanding gender gap in sport health research and the online vitriol against women, particularly women of colour, are urgent issues to address.
By affirming online harassment as a top priority, the Taskforce shows it recognises the threat of regressive anti-gender movements and the organised backlash seeking to control women’s bodies. As it develops its strategy, this awareness must remain central to avoid falling into the traps of victimisation, securitisation or policies that inadvertently remove women’s agency – all three tactics used to politicise and control women.
While the motives behind the chosen priorities reflect a responsiveness to recent events and a determination to offer concrete technological solutions to gender gaps, a top-down approach narrowly focused on securing elite women and their performance risks constraining a progressive vision for women’s sport. What sportswomen want and need is transformative and normative change – the kind required for the UK to become the global women’s sports leader it aspires to be.
“We will fight for what we think we deserve. […] We are demanding from the game because we want more for the game. We're delivering success, and these things are vital for us to reach the next level. […] From now on, we will go with confidence to the decision maker and outline what we need. That doesn't make us divas, just athletes who want the game to go in the right direction.”
Lioness Beth Mead
Feminist methodology offers a valuable framework for setting strategic goals conducive to transformative change. In women’s sport, it can create space to reflect on stakeholder power dynamics within the sector and uncover biases that hold women back. It pushes us to go beyond mediating the symptoms of inequalities towards reframing objectives to enable systemic change and build inclusive solutions.
Given its early priorities, the Taskforce should be asking: Who stands to benefit from research on female athletes’ bodies and the digital security solutions proposed? Will women’s and girls’ agency be centred? How can the future of women’s sport be safeguarded against the consolidation of vested interests and ensure alignment with a genuine vision of gender equality in sport and beyond? These questions are particularly critical because they will shape how research is conducted and technological innovation is implemented. The evaluation of research programmes and tech solutions must assess who bears risks and responsibilities for the changes they seek to create, especially their impact on diverse and vulnerable women and girls. At each stage of the development process, potential negative consequences should be identified and mitigated.
Enhancements in sport science and technology must support women and girls, not come at the expense of women’s self-determination. Innovations should not become tools for organisations to dictate how athletes train and compete. or to impose limitations and unfair scrutiny on women’s bodies and actions. Nor should the tech sector govern what security means for women or even what it means to be a woman.
Female athletes have worked so hard and proved themselves, breaking records on shoestring budgets at great personal cost. They share their achievements with the support they got from their communities, but institutional backing has been hard won. Today, their unwavering commitment to the future of women’s sport must be matched by the organisations invested in their success. The Taskforce has a duty to establish guidance that enables deep societal change, so that all women and girls can thrive through sport and for sport itself to be a powerhouse for equality. To succeed in breaking down barriers and creating opportunities for women in sport, not only will it need all hands on deck, but also intentional investment in women’s capacity to lead. Women and girls must be given the opportunity to advocate for themselves at every level. They deserve their seats at the tables where investment decisions are made, and they need to be prepared to negotiate effectively the outcomes they desire.
Growing the industry and DCMS focus on infrastructure and elite events
The Football Governance Act 2025 highlights sustainability risks in elite sport and the need for the legislator to get involved. Men’s professional football has shown how large-scale investment can prioritise profit over the wellbeing of individual sportsmen and their communities, dismantling club ecosystems while failing to tackle discrimination and violence.
The Taskforce represents a unique opportunity to ensure the commercial success and professionalisation of women’s sport do not repeat those mistakes and instead support industry growth by embedding diversity and inclusion beyond gender. They must work to strengthen local clubs and community-led initiatives alongside elite competition. For this reason, focusing on specific direct investment in human resources and in Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging programme (EDIB) capacity-building is needed.
To ensure the sustainable development of women's sport and its long-term impact, the Taskforce must centre women’s and girls’ meaningful participation at every level from the outset. Grassroots women’s organisations and sporting communities must be involved in shaping the strategies that will build on the successes they have contributed to.
Investment in facilities is essential. If well-guided, industry appetite can accelerate equity outcomes. The announced £400 million grassroots budget could make a real difference. To do so, it must include a ringfenced allocation for women and girls, with binding requirements to ensure investment plans improve their access to sport. Without explicit safeguards, new pitches and upgraded centres may benefit partnering industries eager to profit from women’s sport, while doing little to correct inequities.
Real progress begins with equitable access to existing resources and structured consultation of women's sport communities to define what they actually need to thrive. A further danger lies in powerful actors capturing the agenda, steering developments towards investments in conflict with women athletes’ goals. To prevent this, investment strategies must explicitly centre women’s and girls' voices from planning to delivery, making consultation outcomes and recommendations binding priorities.
The same principle of engagement must guide decisions pertaining to the far larger £500 million budget for international events hosting. Notably, this includes men’s EURO 2028, and it is unclear the share of funds this event alone will absorb.
Lionesses’ advocacy outcomes
Thanks to strong advocacy by the Lionesses, the recent government announcements, before and after the women's EURO 2025 win, are welcome news.
In June, the government has committed to “a national network will be developed to build strong partnerships between schools, local clubs and National Governing Bodies to identify and break down barriers to sport for children who are less active, primarily girls and pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)". Yet, the same press release concluded: "[The announcement] will boost physical access for all pupils, regardless of age, gender or ability [emphasis added]", pointing to potential contradictions. Gendered needs differ, and broad commitments risk diluting targeted action for girls. Clarifications on how the equity requirements for these partnerships will be shaped are needed.
"We want every young girl to have the opportunity to play football in school. This isn’t only about laying the foundations for future Lionesses to rise up, but also a chance for the power of football to help create change within the education system and set an example for equality. "
Lioness Lotte Wubben-Moy
In August, the government’s pledged to “double the share of primetime slots dedicated to women’s and girls’ teams at Government-funded facilities across England over the next five years, with a clear long-term target of reaching equal access as demand grows". Again, detail matters: will supply meet and keep pace with demand? Will women and girls finally gain the access men and boys have long taken for granted?
The Taskforce, and women in sport more broadly, have a critical role to play in ensuring commitments are realised, negotiating details and establishing accountability mechanisms to overcome inertia and resistance.
Best practice
"We Like the Way You Move" , Sport England’s new This Girl Can campaign
Investment and policy must function to enable women and girls not only to thrive in their sporting communities, but also to use sport as a tool to challenge oppressive norms. A healthy sport culture must benefit all women from grassroots to elite sport, while expanding on care practices that are overlooked but essential for the whole industry’s sustainable growth.
Purposeful change and growth are complementary, not conflicting. Care does not complicate but strengthen engagement, spurring growth efforts. Research shows that lack of purpose and care, misaligned values and miscommunication around change are responsible for disengagement and performance issues. This stands true in sport and any organised effort, be they organisation-driven, industry-wide or national policy.
The success of the new Taskforce efforts to drive transformational change will therefore hinge on two commitments:
Meaningfully engaging diverse women and girls across sport,
Equipping them with the tools to participate fully.
Launched last week, the latest This Girl Can campaign iteration, “We Like the Way You Move”, offers a powerful example of a research-led, community-focused engagement. It addresses women who have disconnected from sport because of the barriers they faced. It celebrates care, diversity, inclusivity and belonging, and it provides tools for women to advocate for themselves. This model could guide the Taskforce engagement with women in all their diversity and inform its strategy on allocating social, economic and policy efforts effectively.
Unfortunately, the press release on this initial meeting of the Taskforce does not update us on potential measures to tackle gender inequalities in grassroots investment or the lack of diversity at the elite level. Furthermore, diversity and the spirit of community, which were understood at the heart of men's football regulation reform this summer, were also absent from the government’s communication. To be fair, it is early days, and details are scarce. I am confident the women involved are making sure EDIB is part of the conversation, and I look forward to further information on the Taskforce’s strategy.
Raising the Bar Review – Reframing the Opportunity in Women’s Football
Karen Carney's Raising the Bar (2023) review on the future of women's football also made EDIB a central strategic recommendation. The report offers clear recommendations with many valid across sports, including: the participation of all stakeholders ("players, fans, staff, and everybody involved in the women’s game"), healthy career pathways, funding grassroots facilities, media representation and fair revenue redistribution. In fact, the government’s recent commitments to equal access to school sport had been flagged in this influential report.
The Taskforce has the momentum, expertise and tools such as Carney’s recommendations to raise the bar for women’s sport in the UK. Let's ensure women can seize this chance.
Equipping women with the tools to lead and build the future of sport
As the Taskforce begins its work, the core question is this: Are we preparing women not only to participate in sport, but to lead it? If women are excluded from negotiating resources, sponsorships, media rights and governance, the field will never be truly level.
Women industry leaders consistently note that real breakthroughs happen when women are equipped not only to play the game, but to shape it. That requires developing negotiation, advocacy and leadership skills, so women can drive collaboration at the tables where investments, resources and governance decisions are made, where policies are shaped and where the future of sport is decided.
Women in sport are not just athletes. They are changemakers. They inspire on and off the pitch. Their voices have the power to redefine what inclusive, equitable and sustainable sport looks like. Are we creating the conditions for them to advocate for themselves, their communities and future generations? Investment must include capacity-building programmes that support women to claim space, influence decisions and drive systemic change. With the government already invested, this is the perfect time to embed this layer of empowerment. By 2035, the UK has the chance not just to host a Women’s World Cup, but to showcase a model where women’s voices are at the heart of every decision.
My vision for the future of sport is clear: it is one where women are ready, willing and fully equipped to lead change. The moment to act is now. If this resonates with you, let’s connect to make it happen.
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