Tuesday 5 August 2014

Financial Aid for Elite Athletes


The Commonwealth Games (Gay Kiss Games) has finished and it is was a great success; there is something more personal to these Games then any other.

On Radio 4 there was a piece about how well some of the sports done especially Swimming they interviewed an Official from the Swimming Association who complained Government had cut their grant saying it was perverse, the reporter pointed out that the reason the grant was cut was because they GB Swimming did not perform well in the Olympic and grants were given on results he continued to say it was PERVERSE.

WHAT is Perverse is that most of the money doled out by Government and Lottery is given to the very few and not spread amongst the majority.

Millions of pounds went into the 2012 Olympics and we were promised a future legacy of sport, this has not happened the Governments own survey proves less people are doing sport, (the only plus is more people are using cycles) If that is the case why is that the majority of Government and lottery funding going to produce Olympic Champions in a few Olympic Sports? These few athletes may produce Olympic medals and in some cases become extremely rich because of it all funded by the Taxpayer. Of course these athletes train exceptional hard to reach that standard as someone who trained for the 1980 Olympics I know how hard that is. I also know the disappointment of not being selected like the great majority of Sportsman who tried for the Games. Fame and fortune only goes to winners in sport BUT should the Taxpayer be funding people to become extremely rich?

Back in the 1950’s, 60’s, 70’ and 80’s countries like Soviet Union, Cuba, USA and China would put millions into the Olympic Games a so called amateur event Why? Because they wanted to prove their political system was superior to all the others “Our Country has won all these medals that proves we are the best Country in the World” credit to GB sport we stood by the amateur ideal although we never won a lot of medals we knew we had played the game and did not cheat. That changed when the Olympics was opened to Professionals and we came more successful, suddenly Governments of all colours could see the capital they could make out of sport. So the Olympic athlete was not a poor struggling individual but some one who could live comfortably on government sponsorship, one diver complained when he had his grant stopped he would no longer be able to pay his mortgage. Is that what governments grants should be doing? I do not object to athletes making money from their sport after all they have a limited time to do it but surely the time has come for Government money spent on sport should be spread amongst all sports and let top athletes get proper sponsorship deal from companies and individuals NOT GOVERNMENT

Sport should be about making the Country healthy and fit amongst many other things. Although most have pride when you see a Brit on the Olympic Rostrum but I would have more pride if I see every Sports Club/Martial Arts Club full to the brim with members. If we do not have more participants we will eventually stop getting medals irrelevant of funding for Sport and Martial Arts are like a pyramid the Base has to be big and strong to support those at the top.

Just to finish is Government Funded Sport doing much to help working class people and poor people, take a look at the details below and make up your own mind?

The Old Sports Council used to have a saying “SPORT FOR ALL” I am sorry to say that is not now the case. The UK need


UK Sport, the body that distributes money to Olympic and Paralympic sports, will receive £125m per year. The level of funding from the National Lottery will be an estimated £87m per year, with around £40m coming from the Government.


2012 £6.1m over the next four years judo

Top five best funded Olympic sports
·       Rowing - £32.6m
·       Cycling - £30.6m
·       Athletics - £26.8m
·       Sailing - £24.5m
·       Swimming - £21.4m



Olympic Sports
    


No comments:

Post a Comment