UK Sport’s New Elite Sports Body Raises Fears of Uncertain Olympic Future

The leaders of Britain’s Olympic and Paralympic sports have enjoyed some of the country’s greatest successes in recent decades. But a series of changes is now creating growing unease within the system.

Many will not have heard of Sport Org, the organisation recently established by UK Sport. It emerged largely from British Curling and now draws on that team’s leaders and expertise across curling, para-curling, para table tennis, squash and, from 2030, bobsleigh and skeleton.

The move has proved far more controversial because UK Sport also wants Sport Org to take over GB Snowsport’s high-performance programme and to control £12.5m of lottery funding ahead of the 2030 Winter Olympics.

According to one observer, this has become part of an “all-out war” between UK Sport and GB Snowsport, which won two of Team GB’s five gold medals at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics and believes it should remain in charge of the sport’s elite programme.

Meanwhile, the Guardian has revealed that the creation of Sport Org has caused confusion and speculation, prompting UK Sport’s chief executive, Sally Munday, to hold an unprecedented 75-minute video conference with the chief executives and chairs of every Olympic and Paralympic sport to address their concerns. “I think the best rumour I’ve heard so far has been that UK Sport is intending to put all sports into Sport Org,” she told them. “For the avoidance of doubt, that is a million miles away from the truth.”

Instead, Munday and UK Sport’s deputy director, Simon Morton, stressed the benefits of the new organisation and how it could improve spending efficiency and provide greater access to performance expertise. Not everyone was convinced.

When the call for questions came, the head of one national governing body said they initially feared Sport Org might be “a bit like Ofsted” and intervene if it was not impressed with a sport. Munday insisted that was not the case. “There is no intention for us to swoop,” she said. “We’re not imagining a world where the majority of sports end up in Sport Org.”

UK Sport was also asked why the chief executive role at Sport Org, held by former British Curling head Nigel Holl, had not been advertised and why its board had not been reconstituted, “which is quite unusual from a governance perspective”.

To the surprise of some, it was Holl who answered the question, not UK Sport.

Since the meeting, the Guardian has spoken to more than half a dozen sports leaders. While some praised Munday for addressing certain issues, most said the video conference had only scratched the surface of their concerns or had “raised more questions than it answered”.

“One or two of the chairs think it is a good idea,” one chair of a national governing body told the Guardian. “But generally people are either scared that they will be next, or they have not got the confidence to stand up to UK Sport.”

Some smaller sports fear they might be taken over by Sport Org, even if they believe they would have more success with their own elite staff who have been in the sport for years. “What can curling performance staff really teach us about swimming, say, or archery?” asked one chief executive.

Asked whether he would put his name on the record, he replied: “No, because there is an air of fear around this.”

That message was echoed by another chief executive who has doubts about Sport Org. “When UK Sport can pull the financial trigger, you have to be careful,” they said.

Others did agree on the need for efficiencies but wondered why UK Sport focused on the elite sport side rather than areas such as legal, communications and HR, where sports could pool resources.

Of course, there are two sides to every story, and UK Sport insists that in the case of squash and para table tennis, Sport Org has already demonstrated its value by enabling public funding to flow to those programmes.

During last Friday’s meeting, Holl insisted that efficiencies were also being made, citing a sports coach who told him that Sport Org had saved him four hours a month through a better expenses claim system.

The Guardian asked UK Sport a series of questions about Sport Org, the criticisms made against it and its dispute with GB Snowsport. It replied with a statement saying: “Sport Org is a specialist, independent, multi-sport organisation established to operate performance programmes on behalf of national governing bodies where it is felt that this can enhance the performance, efficiency and resilience of those programmes.

“The establishment of Sport Org is intended to strengthen the environments that surround British Olympic and Paralympic athletes, ensuring performance programmes have the expertise, resilience and resources they need to succeed,” it added.

“This is an important part of the bold reform we believe the UK’s Olympic and Paralympic system urgently requires to protect and enhance the competitive advantage of GB’s athletes.

“Sport Org will not replace national governing bodies, nor is it a model that would be appropriate for every sport. It provides an additional option where there is a clear rationale for doing so.”

However some still find it odd that Sport Org is essentially the organisation that was British Curling. Indeed its registered office address at Companies House is the National Curling Academy in Stirling.

Others wonder how truly independent Sport Org is from UK Sport, even though it has its own executive and board, and ask if it will be held to the same standards as every other sport.

“After the next Winter or Summer Olympics, every sport will be held accountable for its performance by UK Sport,” one attendee told the Guardian. “But for, say, para table tennis, UK Sport is going to be passing judgment on its own in-house programme. It is like asking Donald Trump whether he is a great president. Where is the independent scrutiny?”

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