The government has announced plans to add the two football tournaments to the list of protected events that must be shown on free-to-air television.
Sports minister Nigel Huddleston has written to governing bodies and broadcaster proposing the change to the protected list.
Under the proposals, the FIFA Women’s World Cup and Women’s European Championship will added to the list of protected events, which was first compiled 26 years ago, as part of the 1996 Broadcasting Act.
Other protected events include the Olympic Games, the FIFA (Men’s) World Cup and Wimbledon finals. This guarantees coverage on one of a list of qualifying free-to-air services. These include BBC One, BBC Two, ITV/STV, UTV, Channel 4 and Channel 5. It also includes their digital offshoots broadcast on Freeview multiplexes PSB1 (BBCA) and PSB2 (D3&4).
Huddleston said the Women’s World Cup and Euros fulfil the criteria of having a “special national resonance”.
The moves comes ahead of England hosting the Euro 2022 women’s tournament this summer.