German sport, together with politics, is making a new attempt for more top performances. An agency for competitive sports and a law are the most important building blocks.
With the reform of the failed top-class sport reform, a turnaround in the fight for more medals at the Olympic Games should succeed.
In a rough concept presented by the Federal Ministry of the Interior and the German Olympic Sports Confederation, the planned agency for competitive sports and the introduction of a sports promotion law are the central building blocks. This should set the course for a modern and transparent funding system, according to a statement from the Federal Ministry of the Interior.
Make top sport fit for the future
“With the agreements reached, we are making top-class sport in Germany fit for the future,” said Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD). “We want sporting performances at an international top level and set standards when it comes to values and integrity.” After the top sports reform of 2016 has not brought the desired success in the past six years, this is the second attempt at restructuring. Since the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, when there were 82 medals, the trajectory has gone down. At the Summer Games in Tokyo 2021, German athletes only won 37 medals.
“We agree in sport and with politics that German competitive sport needs new, innovative impulses,” said DOSB President Thomas Weikert. “We want to create a trend reversal in the international successes of our athletes.”
According to the rough concept, in the planned agency for competitive sport, the control and promotion of competitive sport should be in one hand for the first time. With the Sport Funding Act, the aim is to ensure long-term financing and thus give the associations planning security. The federal government is currently deciding on funding from year to year, which makes long-term and strategic training and competition planning more difficult.
“In this way we achieve more flexibility in the system, bureaucracy is reduced and our associations can concentrate again on what is important in international competition: the long-term development of top performance,” explained Weikert. With the present rough concept, a joint working group of the BMI, DOSB and the federal states is to work out the details from January 2023. Other participants, especially athlete groups, should be involved.
Criticism from athletes Germany
The Association of Athletes Germany did not feel involved in the development of the rough concept, except for “selective consultations and irregular exchange of information”. “A competitive sports reform cannot succeed without the co-determination and participation of the athletes,” said a statement from the interest group, which calls for equal co-determination in all decision-making processes.
The SPD agrees to the preliminary concept presented. “The fundamental decision has now been made that it is not possible to continue like this in top-class sport and that comprehensive and structural innovations are required,” said Sabine Poschmann, spokeswoman for sports policy for the parliamentary group. The concept offers the chance to finally cut through the knot that has formed during the reform of top-class sport and to lay the foundation for future top performances by German athletes at the top international level.
Source: Stern
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