Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
DEPARTMENT FOR
CULTURE, MEDIA
AND SPORT
AND UK SPORT
2 APRIL 2008
Q40 Chairman: Today is 2 April. For
how long has there been no Finance Director?
Mr Steele: We have had a Head
of Finance—
Q41 Mr Bacon: That was not my question.
For how long has there been no Finance Director?
Mr Steele: We have never had a
Finance Director.
Q42 Mr Bacon: You have never had
one?
Mr Steele: No.
Q43 Mr Bacon: For how long have you
been in existence as UK Sport?
Mr Steele: July 2005.[1]
Q44 Mr Bacon: Really? So for nearly three
years you have never had a Finance Director. What was your budget
when you started?
Mr Steele: What we have had is
a Head of Finance.
Q45 Mr Bacon: What was your budget
when you started in 2005?
Mr Steele: Around £50 million
a year.[2]
1997 (first 3 months)—£3.953 million (Exchequer)
1997-98—£11.791 million (Exchequer)
1998-99—£11.549 million (Exchequer)
1999-2000—£36.174 million (combination
of Exchequer and Lottery and Home Country contributions)
Q46 Mr Bacon: Mr Stephens, do you not
think that £50 million is enough to warrant a Finance Director
for an organisation from the outset?
Mr Stephens: I think it is very
important that we have a professionally qualified finance operation.
Q47 Mr Bacon: Why has there not been
one for the last three years?
Mr Stephens: They have that. The
burden of the comment is on the "director" rather than
the "professionally qualified". They had a Head of Finance
who reported to a Director of Corporate Services, which is a familiar
organisation for a way of organising these things for a relatively
small organisation, which is what UK Sport has been. As the Report
recognises, as I think the management recognise that as they have
grown their budget has grown and it is now appropriate to have
a Finance Director and they are putting that in place.
Q48 Mr Bacon: Mr Steele, it says
in the Report "by April 2008"; you are on track to do
that, are you?
Mr Steele: We are; that will happen
this week.
Q49 Mr Bacon: So you know who it
is?
Mr Steele: We do.
Q50 Mr Bacon: Has he or she accepted?
Mr Steele: They have but I would
not like to say anything for confidentiality reasons, but that
is the stage of the process we are at.
Q51 Mr Bacon: Excellent. I would
like to ask about funding by sport. In figure 9 it sets out the
changes in Podium funding between Athens and Beijing and in particular
it is really focusing on sports which won medals but did not meet
their targets and sports which won no medals. It is interesting
to see athletics decline and athletics, I think I am right in
saying, Mr Steele and Ms Nicholl, is one of the bigger sports
in terms of the amount of funds that it gets but it has none the
less gone down. Did I understand you earlier to say that the funding
will be reviewed after Beijing to see how it goes and the numbers
may then go up again between Beijing and London, is that right?
Ms Nicholl: The funding for all
the sports across all the sports is reviewed post-Beijing and
will be allocated on the basis of current performance and future
potential relative to a responsibility to contribute to the ultimate
goal in 2012.
Q52 Mr Bacon: It is not clear from
this but you may know this, and this is really what I am after,
what levels of participation are there in each of these sports?
One knows that there are major athletics clubs all over the country
and there are people who are quite serious activists, as it were,
but not necessarily elite, in each of these sports whether it
is athletics, cycling, diving or whatever it is. Do you have a
handle on how many people participate in athletics, in cycling,
in diving, in gymnastics and in shooting?
Ms Nicholl: It is not a relevant
factor in our funding decision, so it is not something that we
monitor in terms of we do not capture the detail; that is much
more relevant in relation to the home country sports councils
that are charged with investing in increasing participation.
Q53 Mr Bacon: Because you are only
looking at elite, you mean?
Ms Nicholl: Yes, we are looking
at the very best so these are very tight programmes with a limited
number of athletes being funded from the point at which their
potential to become future medallists at Olympic and Paralympic
level is identified.
Q54 Mr Bacon: The Report says somewhere
that you are currently funding 465 elite athletes, is that right?
Ms Nicholl: We are currently funding
1,400.
Q55 Mr Bacon: I am sorry, in paragraph
2.11 the Podium programme is 465 athletes.
Ms Nicholl: Podium level, yes.
Q56 Mr Bacon: Then there is another
600 or so on top of that, is that right?
Ms Nicholl: There are some at
Podium level, some at development level and the total is about
1,400 across those two.
Q57 Mr Bacon: Is it possible to send
us a note with a breakdown of how many individuals there are in
each of the sport?
Ms Nicholl: Absolutely, yes.[3]
Q58 Mr Bacon: Also because the figure
does not include every sport what I am really asking for is a
rehashed version of figure 7 but with numbers attached to it so
that you can see irrespective of whether they met their target
for medals or not and irrespective of whether they won no medals,
that you can show us the funding in each sport for Athens and
what is now proposed for Beijing—in other words, an expanded
version of figure 9 for each Olympic discipline. Is it possible
you can do that?
Ms Nicholl: We can do that, yes.
Mr Bacon: That would be great; thank
you very much.
Q59 Mr Dunne: I would like us to
start by looking at figure 5 on page 15 which shows—picking
up on the Chairman's opening questions—that the target in
terms of medals for London 2012 for the regular Olympic Games
is to achieve 60 medals, which is precisely double the level achieved
in Athens 2004. Are you able to give us a breakdown of that 60
or is that somehow confidential from the competitive point of
view in terms of sport?
Ms Nicholl: I should explain that
when we established our ultimate goal we projected what might
be possible on a sport by sport basis in order to give us the
assurance that this was indeed possible. Those figures will become
targets and post-Beijing we will review current performance and
the future potential for sports as at that point in time and each
sport will agree a target with us for 2012 performances. So the
breakdown that is more relevant, more agreed, more appropriate
is the breakdown as agreed by sport for our London 2012 targets.
Mr Dunne: Chairman, I do not know if
we will be reviewing this again in a year's time or so? If the
Auditor General could indicate whether we are expecting to look
at this again next year post-Beijing so that we would be able
to see such targets set out there?
Mr Burr: Absolutely, yes.
1 Note by witness: Mr Steele misheard the question.
He responded that he had been in post since July 2005. In fact
UK Sport has formally been inexistence since 1 January 1997. Back
2
Note by witness: The budget when UK Sport came into existence
and its early years was as follows: Back
3
Ev 14-15 Back
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