THE Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) could face major changes under the Government's national sports policy to be published today by the Minister of State for Sport, Mr Bernard Allen.
The council, an umbrella organisation for 27 national sports federations, has been the conduit for State funding for the various Olympic disciplines.
But there is speculation that the strategy group, under former Olympic marathon runner John Treacy, will recommend that the OCI's funding role be curtailed.
Relations between the Minister and the OCI's president, Mr Pat Hickey, have been strained since Mr Hickey became embroiled in a rift with officials of BLE, the governing body for athletics, during the Olympic Games in Atlanta last summer.
The allocation of State money forms an important part of the OCI's brief, but Mr Hickey said yesterday that any planned changes in that area would not interfere with the council's primary function.
"Our mandate is to promote the Olympic movement in Ireland, to assist in the preparation of athletes and to approve and submit Irish entries for the Games", he said. "Nothing in the Minister's report can interfere with that charter.
"We in the OCI object to the fact that selected items appear to have been leaked to the media while the council and its constituent members were denied sight of the document."
Mr Allen said he was disappointed, that much of what he had read about the strategy group's findings in the press was incorrect.
"I consider that this is a well researched and carefully thought out report which will serve sport well into the next century. In the past, there has been much criticism of sport's failure to attract the kind of State funding to which some felt it was entitled.
"One of the reasons was that there was never a coherent plan in place for sport. With this document, that omission has now been redressed, and that can only be good for everybody."