Sunday 4 March 2018

Is UK Sport institutionally racist?

UK Sport is the funding organisation for, er sport in the UK.  It allocated £28 million to the Winter Olympics, which has returned some medals and, I suppose, some national prestige as a result. The funding principles of UK Sport seem to be based entirely around elite sport and the winning of medals. Not that different in terms of objectives than East Germany, just a bit different in means (unless cycling really is still rotten).

Now I've enjoyed watching Brits do well at the summer Olympics in recent years. The lottery funding for carefully selected sports, together with a rich vein of talent like Mo Farah, Chris Hoy, Jason Kenny and Adam Peaty has transformed our medal winning performance and given us some great entertainment. But should it just be about elite sport?

The argument about role models with medals inspiring young people to take up sport doesn't seem to flow through to actual participation. And, in the case of the winter Olympics that isn't easy anyway. We have to face the fact that we just don't have the climate. Where is your nearest ski slope? But money is still funnelled to minority niche sports simply because there is less competition in them and so a greater likelihood of a medal.

In the meantime, sports with huge participation potential receive literally nothing. The most blatant example is basketball, a very competitive sport internationally at which Britain has never excelled.

But shouldn't at least part of the funding be spent against objectives such as health and welfare? Basketball has huge potential to give young people in low income areas something to do rather than join gangs.

I've seen several commentators make this point but not in the following admittedly extreme terms. Isn't there something fundamentally racist about expensively sponsoring privileged white people to train abroad snowboarding or sliding down the ice on a tea tray rather than providing the means for thousands of young, mainly poor, mainly black people to participate in a sport like basketball in their local area?

I know this is "dumb tax" (i.e. lottery) money rather than taxpayers' dosh but it's still cash controlled under the direction of our elected representatives. It's not right and it ought to change. I'd call for a boycott of the winter Olympics but next to no-one watches it anyway!

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