MR MATTHEW READER, MR JOHN SCOTT AND MS ALLISON HOLLOWAY

19 JULY 2006

  Q1 Chairman: I welcome you all to the first formal evidence session of our inquiry into the human enhancement technologies in sport, and welcome particularly this morning Ms Allison Holloway, the education manager for Drug Free Sport UK, Mr John Scott, the director of Drug Free Sport UK, and Mr Matthew Reader, the head of the Elite Sports Team the Department for Culture Media and Sport. This session is being televised and beamed all around the world as we speak, so if we could be aware of that if things get heated. The purpose of this inquiry, because we have the Olympics here in 2012, is to look forward and say is this an Olympics that is going to be noted for its level of sport or, in fact, are the drug cheats or gene cheats going to dominate the agenda in 2012? What are we doing about it given we put so much store in having the Olympics in the UK? That is really the background. I have to say that one or two of the Committee and our science adviser were out in Lausanne at a conference a couple of weeks ago looking at sports science and what is happening in this area. Clearly this is an issue that everybody across Europe is concerned about. It is a very friendly session this morning and we hope you will enjoy it. Perhaps you could chair your panel, John. If you feel you can deflect the questions, then you are in charge. How much input does DCMS have into the drugs free sports programme in the UK and is there enough being done?

  Mr Reader: The short answer is yes. There are probably three broad areas where government has a very important role to play in this area. Firstly, government clearly is responsible for setting the public funding landscape for sport. As you probably know, government does not run sport but we do direct, in terms of our public funding, to where we best think it has most effect. The second area, quite typical in DCMS, is that we sponsor a whole range of non-departmental public bodies, NDPBs, and UK Sport is an example of that. Where the government sets the overarching national policy for drug free sport, we look to our NDPBs, in this instance UK Sport, to actually deliver that policy. They are responsible ultimately for delivery of that. The third area in which the government has an important role to play concerns the things that government can do that effectively an agency is not able to do. If I can give you an example, you probably will have heard of the UNESCO International Convention Against Doping in Sport, which I am pleased to say the UK has adopted and ratified. We are one of only 14 countries to have done so. Clearly that is something that governments can do, and a role we play, but something that a public agency would not be able to do. There are a whole host of other things that our department and our ministers do. Another example, the World Anti-Doping Agency, or WADA, is made up of 50% financial contributions from sports and 50% financial contributions from government. That is replicated in terms of the structure of the executive committee and the foundation board. As holders of the EU presidency last year, our Minister was one of the EU representatives on the WADA foundation board so he attended two meetings. At international level, and through a whole host of other international and European ministers meetings, we can influence in a way that probably UK Sport, whilst it is very much involved in international committees and forums, does not have.

  Q2  Chairman: You see UK Sport as the delivery arm of government policy. How much interface is there between your ministers and UK Sport?

  Mr Reader: On a formal basis we monitor the performance of UK Sport through our funding agreement. We have regular quarterly review meetings which are formal meetings to look at what UK Sport is doing against its funding agreement, and there are a number of measures and targets in that. Having said that, I would also like to say that we have a very good working relationship, and John will back me up on this. We are in regular contact about a whole host of issues in the drug free sport area. If there are certain issues that the government can do, whether it is across government with other government departments or on the international level, to support UK Sport's delivery of the national programme then we are very happy and willing to do that.

  Q3  Chairman: It is often claimed, and you have claimed yourself, that UK Sport is a world class resource. How effective is UK Sport in drug testing? Would you say that is world class?

  Mr Scott: Yes, I believe UK Sport is one of the world's leading National Anti-Doping Organisations. If you look at the speed with which we were able to respond to the new World Anti-Doping Code and receive the endorsement of WADA for our approach to its application, we were one of the first NADOs to receive that. That indicates that we have had a good system and, more importantly, we have been prepared to adapt and improve that system. I am certainly confident that we are certainly, in terms of comparison with our peers, one of the best. What struck me with your first question, is enough being done, I think the answer would have to be no but we are doing more. If you look at the increased investment that the Government has put into this area, but also that the board of UK Sport has chosen to direct more resources internally towards the issue of anti-doping, shows that we are taking this seriously. One area I would like to highlight where enough was not being done historically was in the whole area of education. Since I took over I have quadrupled the budget in education so there is a lot to be done.

  Q4  Chairman: I want to come back to that because it is a big issue. Can I challenge you on this issue of world class? You say that but where is the evidence you are world class, just because you get their quickly in signing up to the code?

  Mr Scott: That is one measure, but do not underestimate the difficulty of being code compliant. Underpinning code compliance is a whole raft of operational challenges, not least getting your sports on side, having your sports in a position where the rules and regulations will enable to you undertake doping, and if you catch someone that you are able to effectively prosecute them. It will involve things like quality assured doping control officers in a system whereby the entire chain of custody can be guaranteed and there are no loopholes that can be exploited by clever lawyers in breaking down a case. There is a whole raft of stuff. Do not underestimate being code compliant as simple; it is not.

  Q5  Chairman: I apologise. That is a crucial measure. What are the other criteria by which you judge yourself as world class?

  Mr Scott: We judge ourselves as world class in a number of areas, there is the technical competence of how we operate the programme. We are one of the few National Anti-Doping Organisations that has an ISO accreditation for our process. We are independently audited against an international standard. Secondly, we have one of the best accredited processes for training our DCOs. The doping control officers are absolutely critical in that interface with the athletes. They are the ones that are at the sharp end of this whole process. If they make a mistake, the whole thing falls apart. We put a huge amount of effort into recruiting, training and re-registering our DCOs. We are one of the few countries that has an annual re-registration process for all our DCOs where they are obliged to come to a two-day seminar to go through a complete re-registration.

  Q6  Chairman: What other countries would you regard as world class?

  Mr Scott: A number of the European countries are world class. A number of the Scandinavian countries, where we have very good working relationships, are world class. Australia is another country that is world class.

  Q7  Chairman: What about China?

  Mr Scott: We do not know a huge amount about China. This is one of the areas where we are trying to get more information. Another responsibility within UK Sport is our international relations and we do have a memorandum with the Chinese. One of the areas we are trying to exploit through that memorandum is greater understanding of what they are doing in doping. They are not on the international scene. They do not participate in an open way with so much of this dialogue so it is difficult to assess, I have to be honest, the sophistication of their system.

  Q8  Mr Flello: How many people and what resources are you giving over to support the UK anti-doping policy, and specifically what more could be done? You mentioned about education but what more could be done with more resources?

  Mr Reader: Do you mean in terms of internally in DCMS?

  Q9  Mr Flello: Yes.

  Mr Reader: The Elite Sports Team is made up of five people, and we have a responsibility across the whole of elite sport from performance to anti-doping. Effectively I have one member of staff working on anti-doping in sport.

  Q10  Mr Flello: Do you feel that is enough? What is the rationale behind that?

  Mr Reader: The rationale behind that is, as I set out at the beginning, we look at delivery of the policy to UK Sport, therefore the active delivery and active operation is delivered through John and his team. I am probably not in a position to start speculating as to whether more staff would be needed. Clearly it would be foolish of me to say no, that more staff would not be helpful, but if you took a broad look over what we in the UK are achieving, and harking a little bit to what John said about our world class delivery of the anti-doping policy, then I cannot think of anything, off the top of my head, in terms of additional work we could do with additional staff. Probably at the moment it is about right. Perhaps I should add that in the run-up to 2012 clearly there are going to be additional issues that we are going to have to consider as part of hosting the 2012 Games. There is in DCMS the Government Olympic Executive hosted within DCMS. We are in regular contact with them and doping is an issue that we discuss as an agenda item from time to time.

  Q11  Mr Flello: I would like to address a similar question to John in terms of the number of people you have working in support of the anti-doping policy working with one person within DCMS. Do you think you have sufficient resources?

  Mr Scott: We have seen an increase in our staffing in the last 18 months or two years. We are now 18 people in the Drug Free Sport Directorate. Of course, one of the services we provide to the department is we are the advisor to government on these matters. A lot of the information they require we are providing, and obviously the individual responsibility for doping is our primary conduit for that. As Matthew has explained, we also have these dialogues at both the monthly meetings that our management team has with DCMS and then our quarterly reviews. Doping is always an agenda item on those meetings so there is also that flow. The latter part of your question, is there enough resource, certainly for the time being. Where we have been increasing our resources has been on the information, science and education side. We are going through a major review of the programme application. In our submission you have seen us talk about intelligent testing. One of the agendas that is very much being debated internationally now is that it is not just about doping numbers, the test numbers that you do, it is about the effectiveness of those testing numbers. I think it would be fair to say there are a large number of tests internationally that are basically wasted because they are never going to catch someone who is doping in the way they are applied. What we have to do is use the 7,000 missions that we have got much more effectively, and we are working on that with what we call the intelligent testing model. That does not necessarily mean you need more staff but you need smarter systems.

  Q12  Mr Flello: One of the roles of UK Sport is to promote sport, but do you feel there is any conflict of interest between that role and in detecting doping?

  Mr Scott: This is an issue that has been debated long and hard and there have been a number of inquiries and investigations into this. It is one of those probably that will always be on the table because there are some people that have very firm views one way or the other. What I know, as the director of Drug Free Sport, is within UK Sport there is a culture of total commitment to the highest possible ethical standards and that is manifested in the application of a unique approach to funding. We are now the only country internationally that will not allow any continuation of funding for an athlete caught with a serious doping offence. Other countries are following the formal sanctions process of WADA, whereas we do not believe it is acceptable at all for anyone who has chosen to take drugs to receive public funding. That is an example of the severity with which UK Sport addresses the problem. Some of the operational benefits of being within a high performance agency like UK Sport is a better understanding of the environment in which athletes operate. If we are to have a much more effective testing system, we have to understand that. We have to get close to the athletes, you have to understand what makes them tick, what are the sort of pressures they are under and what are the programmes they are pursuing. It is very beneficial for us to have knowledge of that leading edge of technology.

  Q13  Chairman: In this section can I finally ask you about the boundaries between different sports. There is an assumption, when one looks at the Olympics, that we are looking particularly at athletics, but your brief, and the other Olympic sports, is much wider than that. I wonder how you exert influence over the difference sports? A sport like cycling seems a law unto itself. Professional soccer is definitely a law unto itself. What influence do you have? How do you try to stop them falling through the cracks between the different sports?

  Ms Holloway: We are very lucky with our education programme. We have very good partnerships with all of our governing bodies, and it is one of the areas where governing bodies are all working towards the same objectives. To begin with we are very fortunate, whether or not individual sports want to promote the same programme that we promote, for example with the 100% Me programme, is another matter, but the same principles are being promoted through education to all athletes. The Football Association is a very good example because they have a very good education programme, one they have been running for many years. They deliver education right down to grass roots level in football. Cycling is also a sport very supportive of promoting the consequences of doping in the sport. From a governing body perspective, they are very committed to promoting those issues.

  Q14  Chairman: In terms of applying the sanctions that you are talking about, does that apply across all sports?

  Mr Scott: The means of achieving that has been through what we call the National Governing Body Anti-Doping Agreement. That is a legally binding agreement between the sports councils, because it is a tripartite agreement, and the national governing body. That sets out the basis under which public funding or services will flow to a governing body. For example, to belong to the national anti-doping programme, in other words for testing to take place, you have to abide by the conditions of the agreement. We have been negotiating those for the last year to ensure that the governing body in signing up to that is code compliant. You will not be surprised to learn that one of the last to sign up has been football but that has been because of the lack of clarity from FIFA in terms of its rules being code compliant. I am sure you have read about the dispute that FIFA had with WADA which ended up in the Court of Arbitration for Sport. That has been resolved and those rules are coming down. We are confident that within the next few weeks we will have a formal agreement with football as well. We have that in place with all the other professional sports, rugby league, tennis, cricket; the agreement is in place. There is now a tight frame work, rules and regulations, under which they operate.

  Q15  Adam Afriyie: Only a small percentage of UK athletes are found to have been using illegal human enhancement technologies. Do you agree that that is an accurate reflection of the reality of the situation, or do you think it might be something to do with the reporting and detection?

  Mr Scott: That is an extremely difficult question. Of course, a lot of the time you are dealing with supposition rather than fact. If you look at the facts of the current testing regime around the world, the average positive rate around the world is somewhere between 1.5 and 2% of the total number of tests undertaken. In the UK we are below that. Clearly there are certain sports where doping is a greater risk, where doping is probably more culturally acceptable or where the benefits of doping are more obvious. What we have to do is be very strategic in targeting how we apply our testing. We have done a lot of attitude testing with athletes, with young people, and it is interesting that there is clearly a resistance to doping in those young people but there are certain individuals quite clearly who will employ any technique if it means they are going to win. Uncovering who those individuals is the big challenge. We talk about the ABC types in UK Sport. A are the ones who will not cross the line. They are the ones who play by the rules. They are quite prepared obviously to seek the best possible advantage they can have through legitimate support, be it sports medicine, nutrition, all the scientific support that now underpins top level sport. Type B are those that have crossed the line once and seen the benefits, maybe have not been caught and are therefore tempted to continue. Then you have type C who are basically the more psychotic type that genuinely believe there is nothing wrong in cheating or perhaps they have every right to cheat.

  Q16  Adam Afriyie: Refresh my memory as to what is your own explanation of the difference between the incidence reported in the UK and the figures reported to WADA?

  Mr Scott: The global figures are an average across all countries. Our figures would be in line with a country like Norway or Sweden. I think Australia were slightly higher than us. If you look at comparable countries, we are actually remarkably similar. You are absolutely right to ask the question because it was the first question I asked when I took this on. If we are doing so many tests and we are apparently catching so few athletes, is the system not effective enough or are there far less drugs in the system than we thought? It is probably a bit of both, and that is why we have to continue to ensure that there is an effective deterrent in the number of tests you do. More importantly, we are continuing to gather the right kind of information and intelligence to get closer to the athletes and find out what is coming now.

  Q17  Chairman: When you talk about the 2005-06 1.3% of tests being positive compared with roughly 2.3% from WADA across the global network, for that 1.3% are they UK athletes or were they at least tested in the UK? If it is the latter, how many of them were UK athletes?

  Mr Scott: Those are UK athletes because the result for an international athlete would be handled by the international federation, so those are reports of our athletes.

  Q18  Dr Harris: Do you think all performance enhancing substances and methods should be considered cheating?

  Mr Scott: Obviously the determination of what goes on to the prohibited list, and it is both substances and methods, is a long and exhaustive process. The final criteria that any addition has to meet are two of the three principles of the code. I think you understand that it is either performance enhancing, a danger to health or against the spirit of sport. Clearly there are a number of experts that are involved in that from across the world. There is a fairly exhaustive consultation process that goes on each year in terms of review and upgrading of the prohibited list, and there will also be differences of opinion. From a UK perspective, we have a number of concerns over the sorts of challenges that the inclusion of social drugs has had to the code, a number of individuals being caught there and whether that is the appropriate sanctioning mechanism, whether it should not be through a code of conduct mechanism with some opportunity for rehabilitation.

  Q19  Dr Harris: That is an interesting point. Your evidence said, and I quote from paragraph 4.2 "The government believes that the use of performance enhancing substances and methods is cheating, contrary to the spirit of fair competition and damages the value and image of sport." Did you mean illegal or prohibited performance enhancing substances, or was that your genuine view not an error but a Freudian slip? Do you think that all performance enhancing substances should be prohibited?

  Mr Scott: It is in reference to the code. The link is directly to those substances that are deemed to be prohibited.