By Canadian Press

Transgender policies for Ontario hockey dressing rooms launch this season

Sep 7, 2016 | 11:30 AM

Transgender inclusiveness in Ontario minor hockey dressing rooms will go into wide effect this season.

Hockey Canada’s Ontario branches agreed to change its policies after Jesse Thompson, a transgendered teenage boy from Oshawa, Ont., filed a human rights complaint in Ontario against Hockey Canada in 2013.

Thompson said he was denied access to the boys’ locker-room during the 2012-2013 season. He said the exclusion “outed” him and exposed him to harassment and bullying.

A settlement was reached in 2014, but it has taken until this year for new policies to be developed and implemented.

Hockey Canada’s Ontario members committed to educate its more than 30,000 coaches and trainers by 2017 on transgender inclusiveness, according to an Ontario Human Rights Commission statement Wednesday. 

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The new policy states that “players who identify as trans can use the dressing room corresponding to their gender identity, be addressed by their preferred name and pronoun, and have the privacy and confidentiality of their transgender status respected.”

“I’m really happy that moving forward, trans kids will be able to fully participate with their hockey teams,” Thompson said in the statement. “For me, when I was on the ice with my team, nothing else mattered.”

“Hockey Canada is iconic and globally known and I hope other organizations will follow their example.”

The policies have yet to be adopted by Hockey Canada’s other provincial branches.

“This has not been tabled by our members for discussion at a national level,” Hockey Canada spokeswoman Lisa Dornan said in an email. “Hockey is a sport for everyone, and Hockey Canada strongly advocates the game as inclusive and welcoming of all athletes.

“Hockey Canada supported the Ontario branches through the process with the Ontario Human Rights Commission, including the development of the policies, which are now being rolled out with new eLearning modules intended to be available this season for Ontario coaches and trainers.”

Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press