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CCPR warns of red tape threat to sport
The “dead hand” of bureaucracy is causing severe problems in many areas of sport and recreation, according to CCPR President, HRH The Prince Philip.
Speaking at last week’s AGM, he criticised the ever-increasing load of legislation, regulation and bureaucracy and appealed against all risks being removed from sports.
Chair, Brigid Simmonds, echoed these sentiments in her speech, saying that the government spent much of its time promising to remove red tape while, at the same time, imposing new regulations.
The biggest problem didn’t arise from the DCMS, but from other departments who do not consider the implications of their actions on the sport and recreation industry, she said.
The CCPR is spending an increasing amount of time lobbying against such legislation, says Simmonds. The Private Security Industry Act has been one example of a lengthy, time-consuming campaign.
Initially brought in to regulate pub and nightclub door supervisors, this has had knock-on effects for volunteer stewards at sports events. The CCPR is hopeful of an exclusion for sport though an agreed framework.
Similarly, Working at Height, a regulation emanating from Europe, was designed to protect window cleaners, builders and scaffolders, but required mountaineers to change their practices which had been in place for generations.
Thankfully, the Health and Safety Executive had now decided the good practice was sufficient. Since becoming a partner in the EU Sports Office in Brussels, the CCPR receives early warning of European legislation likely to present difficulties.
Simmonds pointed out that much has been made of the legacy of the 2012 London Olympics, yet at the moment it looks like the real legacy will be confined to the East End of London.
“If legacy was meant to be about sports facilities for all, and the wonderful opportunities to encourage every local authority in the land to invest in sport and recreation to encourage participation, then I feel there is a need to be strategy-led at national level and I see very little evidence of this happening now,” she said. “The longer it takes, the less likely it is that there would be a national legacy.”
On this same point, Simmonds pointed out that only 26 sports from the 150 or so governing bodies would be in London in 2012, and that the CCPR had already worked on UK Sport to retain funding for British Waterskiing and Orienteering, but other sports had lost their funding.