The NSPCC has removed guidance stating that adults supervising children while they change at swimming pools or sports centres should be the same sex as the pupils, meaning male teachers could now oversee girls in changing rooms.
The child protection charity's previous safeguarding briefing said: "Adults who are supervising children getting changed should be of the same gender as them." That line has been deleted entirely from the NSPCC's latest "safeguarding considerations for changing rooms" briefing for schools.
Campaigners and MPs called on the NSPCC to reinstate the policy, accusing the charity of making the change under pressure from transgender activists.
NSPCC's shifting explanation
The NSPCC initially said it had made the change after a similar recommendation was removed from Department for Education guidance updated this summer. The Department for Education denied this, saying no such recommendation had been removed.
The NSPCC then said instead that it had based the decision on a "variety of sources." A spokesman for the charity said its guidance was updated recently "to reflect the latest version of the Department for Education's statutory guidance for schools," but could not point to where the Department for Education's guidance made such a recommendation.
The spokesman added: "It is categorically untrue to say that any updates to the NSPCC's information briefing were made as a result of external lobbying."
Campaigners react
Women's rights campaigners said that instead of changing the reference from "gender" to "biological sex" in line with the Supreme Court's April 2025 ruling, the NSPCC "came to its own decision" to remove the safeguarding guidance altogether. The UK's highest court ruled last year that the legal definition of a woman under the Equality Act is based on biological sex.
Joy Morrissey, the Conservative Party's equalities spokesman, described the NSPCC's move as "completely unacceptable." She said: "Male staff should not be supervising young girls while they are getting changed and nor should female staff be supervising young boys. That is just common sense."
She added: "The Government needs to urgently review this guidance and ensure there are clear safeguards for sex-based supervision. We must put the safety and wellbeing of children first."
'Cowardly, weak and hypocritical'
Maya Forstater, chief executive of the campaign group Sex Matters, said it was "cowardly, weak and hypocritical of the NSPCC to try to pass the buck" for scrapping the "common sense" policy.
She said: "This NSPCC guidance was never about equality law, or even the Supreme Court judgment. It was common-sense guidance, based on years of experience about how to safely supervise children changing."
Ms Forstater accused the charity of "failing in its duty to provide guidance on protecting children from harm" in a bid to do "what trans activists would prefer." She added: "As the leading UK body for the safeguarding of children, what is the NSPCC for if not to do its utmost to protect children? It appears instead to have decided that the safer route is to avoid offending trans activists, even if that puts the safety, privacy and dignity of children at risk."
What happens next
The NSPCC, one of the UK's best-known children's charities, denied it had made the decision under pressure from trans activists. It said it may consider changing the guidance again when there is more direction from the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the body responsible for enforcing equality law in Britain.
