The NSW Minister for Women has said that men are eligible to win the state’s Women of the Year awards, and confirmed it was the state government’s position that biological males are female if they claim to be.
Labor MP Jodie Harrison, who sparked outrage in February when she declared that men who identify as women are women, said in Budget Estimates on Thursday that her scientifically inaccurate position had not changed when she was asked again to define the word “woman”.
Chair of the Justice and Communities Portfolio Committee Robert Borsak, of the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, put the question to Ms Harrison while asking her about safety in women’s sports.
NSW Minister for Women Jodie Harrison says men can win the 2026 Women of the Year Awards. pic.twitter.com/3NTPnFBTVZ
— The Noticer (@NoticerNews) August 22, 2025
“As Minister for Women, are you saying you’re also Minister for biological men acting as women, as well?” Mr Borsak asked.
“I am the Minister for Women,” Ms Harrison, a biological sex denier who regularly promotes homosexuality and so-called transgenderism on social media, replied.
“So what’s the definition of a woman?” Mr Borsak said.
“What I said at Budget Estimates last time still holds,” she responded.
Mr Borsak raised the issue of gender-deluded men again later in the hearing, and brought up a media release issued by Ms Harrison about NSW Women’s Week 2026 about awards for the Premier’s Woman of Excellence, NSW Community Hero, NSW Young Woman of the Year, NSW Aboriginal Woman of the Year and NSW Regional Woman of the Year.
“Minister, given the statements you made in the February budget estimates hearings, is it the position that a man who identifies as a woman – that is, a trans woman – is eligible to enter and participate in the 2026 NSW Women of the Year Awards?” Mr Borsak asked.
“All women can be eligible to be nominated,” Ms Harrison responded.
“Is it not an absurd situation that a biological man who identifies as a woman could potentially be announced at the 5 March 2026 event and awarded a 2026 NSW Women of the Year category?” Mr Borsak said.
“As I said, it’s the view of this Government that all women should be able to be nominated, and to be awarded. If they meet the standards that are needed to achieve these awards, that they be rewarded for that or recognised for it.”
The NSW Minister for Women has defined people who “identify as women” as “women” in a bizarre exchange about biological males being allowed in women’s sports, change rooms and toilets. pic.twitter.com/5rEI1ejwya
— The Noticer (@NoticerNews) March 8, 2025
Ms Harrison’s February comments were described as “utterly ridiculous” by women’s rights advocate Kirralie Smith, who has been subjected to years of lawfare by “transgender” extremists and smeared in the corporate media for saying men shouldn’t be allowed to play in women’s sports.
“How can someone identify as a woman if we don’t know what a woman is? It is complete nonsense! How can [Ms Harrison and Labor] be trusted with anything if they lie about the most fundamental fact of binary sex – there are only two options – male or female and no human has ever changed their sex,” Ms Smith said at the time.
“Is it any wonder then that a male won the Sydney Woman of the Year award? Is it any wonder that the NSW government allows males to be in the running for NSW Woman of the Year? Is it any wonder that males are in female sports, prisons or women’s rape crisis services in NSW?”
The Sydney Local Woman of the Year 2025 was awarded to a man who pretends to be a woman by homosexual Sydney MP Alex Greenwich in February.
A recent survey from The Australian Population Research Institute found that the vast majority of Australians reject radical gender ideology.
Only 11% of voters said they thought men who claimed to be women should be allowed to compete in women’s sports, with 74% opposed and 14% unsure.
And when asked the question “Some people argue that a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman, regardless of their sex when born. What do you think?” 25% agreed, 22% neither agreed nor disagreed, and 53% disagreed.
Header image: Left, Jodie Harrison in Budget Estimates. Right, Mr Harrison with Teddy Cook, a female WHO policymaker who sparked multiple court battles between Elon Musk, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner and Canadian anti-child-mutilation activist Chris Elston when she complained about being called a woman on X.
