UK Sport

Sports support independent panel

Rose Challies 25 February 2001

ATHLETICS AND swimming are two of the sports supporting the proposal for an independent body to be set up to deal with the disciplinary process for anti-doping as outlined in the National Policy for anti-doping.

At the same time officers from UK Sport and the home country Sports Councils, in conjunction with many governing bodies have strongly recommended that there be a centrally organised review panel for all sports. In this way consistency of the decision in respect of a case to answer can be guaranteed and athletes will be treated more fairly.

Under the National Policy for anti-doping all governing bodies are required to have, by December 2001, an independent and transparent disciplinary process made up of three stages - the review stage, disciplinary stage and appeal stage.

After a series of national policy workshops and seminars run by UK Sport it was evident that governing bodies felt that the best suggestion to achieve consistency across all sports was for the review stage to be centrally co-ordinated.

NOW DAVID Moorcroft from UK Athletics and David Sparkes from the Amateur Swimming Federation of Great Britain have aired their support for the idea.

Moorcroft stated that not only would it ensure consistency and independence, it would also help enormously in terms of the international perception of anti-doping in this country.

The Sports Minister, Kate Hoey, has acknowledged and backed their views, suggesting that a solution will come about with a combined effort from governing bodies, the government and UK Sport.

Governing Bodies of Sport will be meeting with officers from the Sports Councils to discuss the adoption of policy standards and the disciplinary system needed in the UK at a seminar on March 26.

The funding arrangements for such a disciplinary system will be a key area of discussion among delegates.

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