Paralympics Australia has developed an online course intended to combat cases of intentional misrepresentation by Australian Paralympic athletes, the organization announced Thursday.
The course, rolling out next week, will be a mandatory selection requirement to make Australia’s 2020 Paralympic team.
“We are proud to be one of first National Paralympic Committees in the world to develop such a course like this and it’s our hope that it will provide clarity to all Australian Team members on the importance of the classification.” Paralympics Australia CEO Lynne Anderson said. “Integrity in Australian sport has been a major talking point recently and Paralympic sport is not immune.”
Para-swimming has been publicly marked in recent years by cases of intentional misrepresentation (IM), when an athlete intentionally makes their impairment seem more severe in order to be put into the wrong disability class. World Para Swimming implemented a new classification process in 2018 that has only yielded more chaos.
Paralympics Australia likened the “ever-present” threat of classification misconduct to that of doping. Thus, the new course was developed in conjunction with the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Agency, and is expected to reach more than 600 athletes, coaches, medical staff and administrators shooting for 2020 selection on ASADA’s e-learning platform.
According to the announcement, the course “outlines the classification process; the requirements of athletes, coaches and support staff to comply; training on ethical decision-making; and an overview of penalties for non-compliance.”
“Not understanding the classification rules is like not knowing the technical rules of each sport, or the anti-doping rules,” said Kate McLoughlin, Chef de Mission of the 2020 Australian Paralympic Team. “There are no excuses for misconduct or non-compliance during the classification process and there will be zero tolerance. We all must play a role to ensure the integrity of Paralympic sport is of the highest standard.”
Yeah, sure, that will stop them
How will this online course ‘deter’ Intentional Misrepresentation in a country with more than its fair share of shall we say classification ‘controversy’? I’m pretty sure that they are already aware of certain high profile athletes and support staff who have deliberately chosen to cheat the system and of course as a result, other athletes. This appears to be nothing more than a bit of spin. I’ll consider changing my opinion if they throw some of that ‘zero tolerance’ at the athletes and support staff that they are already acutely aware of.