UK Sport has today announced the outcomes of the Board meetings that
took place on 6-7 February 2017 at which seven National Governing Bodies (NGBs)
took up the offer to make representations to UK Sport’s Board. This
opportunity was offered to national governing bodies, and sits outside the
formal appeals process, allowing them to make direct representations to UK
Sport’s Board to reconsider the decisions made in December 2016 on the
investment into Olympic and Paralympic sports for the 2017-2021 (Tokyo 2020)
investment cycle.
The following sports made representations at the meetings:
-
Archery
-
Badminton
-
Fencing
-
Goalball
-
Powerlifting
-
Table Tennis
-
Weightlifting
-
Wheelchair Rugby
Following this process, the UK Sport Board has made one change to its
original investment decisions. UK Sport had originally decided to award the
World Class Programme investment for Powerlifting to the English Institute of
Sport where the programme would be managed. Following the representations on
this matter by British Weightlifting, this decision has been reversed and the
award will now go to British Weightlifting to manage, as per the Rio cycle.
All the remaining representations were unsuccessful and UK Sport’s
original decision stands. UK Sport is therefore unable to invest in these
sports for the Tokyo 2020 cycle.
Rod Carr, Chair of UK Sport, said: “I’d like
to thank all the sports for their professionalism and openness throughout this
process. Our decision is in no way a reflection on them, their athletes or
support personnel and everything that they have achieved to date.
“I appreciate that for the majority of national governing bodies that attended
the representation meetings today's outcome is extremely disappointing. We are
operating in a tight financial envelope, and have responsibilities to both develop
the system underpinning our best athletes as well as the sports and athletes themselves,
and sadly our investment won’t stretch to these sports for the Tokyo 2020
cycle.”
Liz Nicholl, CEO of UK Sport, said: “Our investment approach prioritises investment in those World Class
Programmes with the greatest chance of delivering medal success. It’s a winning
formula that has been proven to work over the last three Olympic and Paralympic
cycles. It is uncompromisingly focused on excellence, relative merit and what
it takes to pursue the ambition to win more medals and create more medallists
in Tokyo to inspire the nation.
“The sports that made representations to our Board were unable to
provide any critically compelling new evidence that changed our assessment of
their medal potential for Tokyo. Their position in our meritocratic table therefore
remains unchanged and they remain in a band that we cannot afford to invest in.
"This is the first time that we have been unable to support every
sport that has athletes with the potential to deliver medals at the next Games.
We don’t take these decisions lightly as we are acutely aware of the impact
they have on sports, athletes and support personnel.
“To support those affected, we have put in place a comprehensive
transition and support package and are working closely with these sports to
help staff and athletes move out of UK Sport funding.
“In the meantime, we will still be supporting more than 30 sports with
the collective potential to win more medals in Tokyo 2020 and sustain success in 2024, in a way
that will make the nation very proud once again.”
Sports may now choose to
go to formal appeal through Sport Resolutions UK who will consider the
integrity of the decision-making process used by UK Sport but do not have
authority to make investment decisions on its behalf. In the meantime, UK
Sport’s Board will be considering at its next meeting in March what
relationship UK Sport will be able to have with non-World Class Programme
funded sports going forward. Any solutions need to be considered in the context
of affordability and resource.