Family First's lead Upper House candidate for the South Australian election, Deepa Mathew, has labelled Opposition Leader Vincent Tarzia as "weak" for suggesting an investigation into biological males in the state's prisons.
"What needs to be investigated? Why not just commit to getting all biological males out of women's prisons? It's not rocket science. The Northern Territory Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro didn't need an investigation, she just acted.
"Or is Vincent Tarzia like Victorian Liberal leader Brad Battin, who only wants to get male sex offenders out of women's prisons while leaving other biological males incarcerated alongside women? South Australians need to know."
Ms Mathew said both Premier Peter Malinauskas and Opposition Leader Vincent Tarzia needed to state where they stand on the wider and growing problem of biological males encroaching on the spaces of girls and women.
"It's not just prisons where girls and women are being failed," she continued. "At a South Australian Catholic school, a 13-year-old biological male identifying as a girl has been allowed to compete against girls — breaking multiple records in javelin, discus, high jump and running events. Parents were left angry and heartbroken as their daughters lost opportunities they had trained hard for."
Ms Mathew said both leaders' silence on this issue was deafening.
"Mr Tarzia has been silent on the Catholic school case and on whether he supports girls and women having their own sports protected from biological males. The Premier, meanwhile, refuses to even think about the problem. It's time both leaders came clean — would they protect girls' and women's sports, or continue to appease activists?
"Families don't want the pressure of woke schools enforcing radical ideologies. They want to know their daughters are safe and their kids are not being indoctrinated.
"Family First will continue to fight to take the pressure off families by restoring common sense — keeping women's prisons, women's sport, and women's spaces safe for women."
Ms Mathew said it was appalling that Premier Malinauskas has dismissed the issue of biological men in women's prisons as "niche" and "not a priority", even after the shocking alleged sexual assault of a female inmate at Port Augusta Prison in 2019 by Krista Richards, a biological man identifying as a woman.
