Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment Participation, Training and Sport) Share this | Hansard source

The Local Sporting Champions program is one that the opposition has embraced and supported. Providing financial support to our up-and-coming sporting athletes who are required to travel long distances to compete in national sporting competitions is a worthy cause. An email I received from a successful recipient of a Local Sporting Champions grant in my electorate said:

I would just like to thank you for the local sporting champions grant. I really enjoyed competing in the National Downhill Championships in Canberra and your grant helped me greatly to get there. I came fourth in my U17 age group. I was pleased with my result, being my first national Champs.

Thanks again

Grant Womersley

It is important that governments, along with local communities, work to break down barriers that restrict participation in sporting activities. One of the main barriers to increasing participation in sporting activities is the cost. Buying sporting equipment such as uniforms and boots can be expensive, especially when a young person participates in more than one sporting activity. But for young people who are seeking to further their early careers by competing in national competitions, travel costs can be an additional burden that cannot be met. The Local Sporting Champions program seeks to alleviate this cost burden, which is why the opposition gives the government its support. In a great sporting nation such as Australia—a nation that dominates the cricket world, embraces four football codes, dominates the Commonwealth Games and matches it with the best at the summer Olympics and Paralympic Games—it should not be the case that a young athlete has to give up on their sporting goals because they cannot afford to attend national championships.

The coalition in government and in opposition has always strived to implement policies that improve participation among children and young adults. High levels of participation in community based sport are essential to maintaining a healthy, active society. Along with its obvious health benefits, it provides the opportunity for important social engagement and contact. The key to improving participation throughout a person’s life is to ensure they develop good motor skills at an early age. If a young person fails to develop good motor skills or forms a negative view of sporting activities or physical activity generally, that person is less likely to stay physically active and participate in community sport at a later age. This is why the former coalition government introduced the Active After-school Communities program, which is now providing sporting activities for 150,000 primary school students in after-school care.

The Australian Sports Commission recently stated that the Active After-school Communities program has led to increased participation in sporting club and community based sporting organisations. This program has succeeded in getting inactive kids up and moving. Almost 90 per cent of parents who responded to a survey conducted by the Australian Sports Commission said that their children were inactive prior to joining the program. The success of this program is helping address the issue of overweight and obese Australian children.

In addition, it was the former coalition government that put physical education back into primary schools, forcing state Labor governments to ensure their primary school students were provided with at least two hours of physical activity a week. I note that this Labor government has decided to remove this provision from the new funding agreement. The Minister for Education said, in response to a question on the Notice Paper:

Responsibility for physical education lies with individual jurisdictions and non-government education authorities.

Along with our support of the government’s Local Sporting Champions program, the opposition would welcome a move by the Minister for Sport to guarantee the Active After-school Communities program continues beyond 2010 and also to make sure our primary schools are offering an adequate level of physical education.

The Local Sporting Champions program is unique. It is one of only a few new sporting programs that this government has implemented since it has been in government. So far, things are either on hold or funding is just being rolled over in sport. Funding for the Australian Sports Commission has been frozen. With the international sporting arena becoming increasingly competitive as competitor countries such as Great Britain pour more resources into Olympic sports, our elite athletes are receiving nothing extra. They are being told to work with what they have.

Every time that this government is asked about what is happening in sport, the standard response of the government is that they are awaiting the results of the independent review. While the coalition supports the government’s review into sport led by David Crawford, the time it is taking to have this report completed is ridiculous. It is time that the government pulled sport off the holding pattern that it has been in since August last year and starts providing some direction for sport in Australia. Even if this report is completed and the government responds to the review by the end of the year, as it now says that it will, this would mean that it has taken the Rudd government two years to come up with a sports policy. While we commend the minister on the Local Sporting Champions program, she needs to get the ball rolling in other areas, because there is still a lot more to do.

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