DR RICHARD BUDGETT AND DR ARNE LJUNGQVIST

29 NOVEMBER 2006

  Q198 Chairman: Good morning and may I give a special warm welcome to Dr Richard Budgett and Dr Arne Ljungqvist. Thank you for coming before the Committee this morning and welcome to visitors to the Committee as well. May I begin by way of introduction by saying that this particular inquiry into human enhancement technologies in sport was originally designed looking ahead to the 2012 Olympics in London and whether in fact the Olympics in London in 2012 would be noted for their irregularities in terms of performance enhancement rather than in fact the sporting prowess of our athletes and what in fact we should be advising the British Government and indeed what we should be advising broader bodies like WADA in terms of preparation for the Olympics. That is the background to what we are doing. I think it is fair to say that we are increasingly finding it difficult, as I think many organisations involved in this area find it difficult, to be ahead of the cheats, to be ahead of the people who are developing the latest illegal enhancements and the new technologies. We are trying to get a handle on all of that as to how best we can keep our sport clean and how best we can deal with sporting prowess. We are particularly grateful to both of you for coming this morning to answer a number of our questions. I would like to begin with you, Dr Budgett. The percentage of athletes found to be taking illegal enhancement drugs or other technologies is relatively small: in 2005, out of 183,000 cases, 2.13% according to WADA. Should we be bothered about this at all? It is a terribly small percentage.

  Dr Budgett: I think there are three ways of looking at it. The first is that the deterrent effect of the testing is keeping that percentage low; the second is that that is still an unacceptable percentage; and the third, which is what a lot of athletes suspect and many of us in doping suspect, is that there are people who go undetected. If you really were detecting everyone who was cheating, you would expect to catch almost nobody eventually because you would have a very strong deterrent effect, but obviously some people are still cheating and therefore I am afraid that we are catching everybody.

  Q199  Chairman: Lots of people say to us that this really masks the real problem and that that very, very small percentage should not be taken as an accurate reflection, as you have just said. What would you guess to be this sort of extent then?

  Dr Budgett: Unfortunately, in the position I am in, I am going to be the last person with whom athletes gossip. I really would be guessing and I do not know. Almost more important than what is the percentage is the perception of the athletes, the public and everybody else as to how serious this problem is. Some of the athletes to whom I have spoken and who I have known who have then been found guilty of a doping offence and who were guilty of a doping offence, it was not just an accident, justified it to themselves by saying, "Of course, lots of other people are cheating, most of my competitors are cheating, so I am just levelling the playing field". Their perception is that lots of athletes are cheating and that is as bad as was really the case.