Another disagreement has arisen between former Minister for Sport Bernard Allen and the chief executive of the Irish Sports Council, John Treacy. Yesterday Allen asserted that the proposed new Irish Drug Testing Programme is fatally flawed and opens up Irish sports federations to the possibility of massive litigation. Allen went on to criticise the programme, which is not yet in place, as "inherently weak".
Allen, the Fine Gael spokesperson on Tourism, Sport and Recreation, asserts that the proposed way of dealing with samples when they arrive back into Ireland from a testing laboratory outside the state is simply to pass on the analysis to the governing body. It is the governing body who are then expected to interpret the analysis and take sanctions against the athlete in the case of an adverse finding.
He also argues that this chain of command opens up smaller organisations to the threat of litigation which most can ill-afford. The Cork TD also insists that federations could subject themselves to sanctions from the Sports Council if they do not act on positive tests.
"When samples are sent back to the Sports Council they just pass on the analysis to the governing body. They are effectively passing the buck to the federations," Allen said. "The federations are like the meat in the sandwich."
"Wealthy federations will take on the challenge but smaller federations will find it extremely difficult because they may face massive legal challenges. There is an inherent weakness in that system. I've spoken to a number of people who are very concerned that the threat of long and costly litigation would mean a less vigorous approach to the fight against drugs."
Treacy yesterday completely rejected Allen's criticism: "No agency anywhere in the world can impose sanctions on an athlete," he said. "The only ones who can do that are the governing bodies. We don't have the power to do it. No agency in the world have the right to do it, only national federations.
"We will look to ensure that all processes are in place. If there is a situation where something is not quite correct we'd say that we're not satisfied with the process, so we won't pass it on the governing body. The Sports Council will undertake the testing for the federations. We're providing the service so they can apply their rules and regulations.
"We'll work very closely with the governing bodies on this and we'll help take them through the process."
Two weeks ago the new swimming body, Swim Ireland, backed down from a move which would have removed Michelle De Bruin's name from the official Irish record lists after she threatened to take the organisation to court. De Bruin, who holds more individual senior records than everyone else combined, is serving a four-year ban for tampering with a urine sample.
The Irish federation had no international federation backing for its original move, but the speed at which it backed down in the face of a legal threat was sobering. Swim Ireland claim they would not have the money contest a possibly lengthy court battle. The principle of the matter was simply set aside.
"The Sports Council is passing on results without interpretation and that's a huge weakness. It will create terrible problems for federations. This is an issue that I will hopefully bring up in the Dail the week after next," said Allen.
Treacy also announced yesterday that the Sports Council plan is to begin the Drug Testing programme at the end of next month and not early next year, as was extensively reported. A collecting service, International Drug Testing Management (IDTM), is already engaged and Treacy hopes to have a contract signed this week with the accredited laboratory that will carry out the tests.
"The only other component is the transport, which we hope will be in place next week. Our date to implement the programme is immediately after our conference next month, November 20th to 21st," he said.
