Anne Ferguson,
British Canoe Union,
John Dudderidge House,
Adbolton Lane,
West Bridgeford,
Nottingham NG2 5AS
11th October 2005

Dear Anne,
Train the Chain

'Abuse: talk about it till it stops.'

NSPCC Campaign 2005


As you are aware, on Sunday I emailed Sue Campbell and asked her to take
urgent action to suspend the Bulgarian coach you and John Andrson had
appointed until all in sport knew about where he stood on drug taking. I
made it clear to Sue that, unless action had been taken within 48 hours,
in order to protect our paddlers, the reputation of the British Canoe Union,
the reputation of the British Olympic Association, and the reputation of
London 2012 that I would have no option but to take matters to a higher
level.

I will do that, but because of the events of yesterday when you spoke to the
three paddlers, I thought of a better way, by starting at the beginning of
the 'Chain', and by making it part of a book, which I hope will help
lead to a climate change in the way we manage ourselves in Britain. It is
something that I have been working on for many years, and this latest event
might well be the catalyst to move us from a command and control society,
where we are told what to do by our masters, to a coaching society where our
leaders create a society where we are all free to express ourselves and to
use our creativity to continually improve our world.

On Sunday, after I had emailed Sue Campbell, I talked to Graham Lyon the
Chair of the Coaching Service and we had a long conversation about the issue
of the appointment of the Bulgarian coach who apparently believed in
changing the system to allow drug taking. I read out the report from
Belgium and Graham agreed with me that, had we been aware of it, in no way
would this man have been considered for the job without some very special
reason, and not without some very rigorous checking, for, as you must be
aware, the British Olympic Association takes a very hard line on drugs, and
any athlete found to have taken them is banned from the Games for life.
Lord Coe, as leader of London 2012 takes a similar line.

As far as I am aware, Graham Lyon, who is a decent man, but faces heavy
opposition from Albert Woods, has been unable to take any action, and neither
has Sue Campbell. However I have heard that you have spoken to three
paddlers, and told them that you knew about these matters but were hoping
that they would not be raised this soon!!!! That is quite shocking news.
I believe that you have made a grave mistake, which is the latest of a
series, which in my opinion is damaging our chances for medals in 2012,
crushing the spirit of our British coaches, and turning young people off
sport.

When you were first appointed I was surprised, in view of the other candidate
- who was brilliant with young people and had a massive knowledge of our
sport. I raised the issue with David Gent, the then BCU Chair, and who now
works for Sport England. David told me that you had been appointed because
you were a woman - and Sport England had a policy of giving women preference,
that you were a friend of Sue Campbell who was on her way to becoming the top
woman leader in British Sport, and, because of your nature and management
style, that you would 'sort us out'.

At that time that top down command and control management style of bullying
us all into shape by the appointment of Czars and enforcers was becoming more
and more into fashion, enforced by the arbitrary target setting from the
Treasury, and it seems that David Gent saw you as fitting the bill. It was
something I fought very hard against with UK Sport, because I knew from past
experience it would fail, as it did in Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, East
Germany, and indeed Bulgaria, and because it was against the best methods I
know of coaching people whether in sport or industry. I tried very hard to
get UK Sport to get the message to the government, and I have never stopped
trying, because the management methods we are now using simply lead to
everyone being abused.

Like Walter Wolfgang, the eight two year old Jew, roughed up and ejected from
the New Labour Party conference last week, I too was roughed, by the powers
that be in sport, and ejected by the very methods used by Nazi Germany to get
rid of writers, artists and those able to express concerns against these top
down command and control regimes. Fortunately for me, being in Britain, we
have not yet built the concentration camps that I would have undoubtedly
ended up in had I lived in Nazi Germany. So, I lived long enough to be here
today to see that tide turning against the ever increasing totalitarianism of
the last few years, and the high exposure of the Walter Wolfgang incident
will, I think, in time be seen as the turning point in that process.

Strangely, your actions of the last few years and particularly the last few
days, could well accelerate the process.

The tide back towards a free society was helped, last week, when the
British Olympic Association made clear to the government that it was an
independent body, and would not become its pawn. It was further helped
last week when Matt Lawrence, with his crew mate James, stood out against
your pressure, despite being told that they would receive no funding unless
they came under the control of the Bulgarian coach and did as you and he
told them. It was hugely to Matt's credit that he refused to be
pressurised into deserting his coach, who he so obviously respects.

That spirit of defiance, against you, an administrator, for what he knew to
be right for him and James, was the very spirit we need in our athletes if we
are to get medals in 2012. It was a wonderful performance from Matt, and
whether he ever gets a gold medal, in my book he joins Walter Wolfgang and
the British Olympic Association in the vanguard of the resurrection of the
spirit of freedom we now need if we are to succeed in 2012. It seems we have
a modern October revolution on the way, which will be wonderful for sport and
society.

Matt and James, coached by Steve, finished 11th in the World Championships,
in an Olympic distance. They have some years to go to reach their peak,
which will be in 2012, and they are the only world class C2 in Britain.
They are talent to be nurtured, not bullied or bribed into submission, for
whatever reason you may have to do it. In football teams and, indeed, in
rowing a coach can be appointed to bring a crew together from a large number
of people, but in our sport, where we have very few people, what matters is
world class crew who have a first class relationship with their coach, and
who will stick together for years through thick and thin with constancy of
purpose to achieve their Olympic aims. To try to break it up is like
trying to break up a healthy marriage, and, in my book, an act of wanton
vandalism for some purpose of your own that has nothing to do with the
well being of the crew.

Earlier this year I learned how, for your own aims, you were the driving
force in the ill thought out talent selection programme that Roland Lawler,
the Chair of the Olympic Racing Committee, has described as tantamount to
child abuse - I would go much further. Alerted to what you were doing,
and the position of power you had reached, I went to the July Regatta and
listened to many people. I heard about you being sent as team manager of
the juniors and the incident with the K4. The boys had not performed too
well and as coaches we all know what we do in those situations. We wait a
while and then listen to the crew as to what went wrong, but not for you.
Without waiting for the coach you were there bullying the crew and telling
them that unless they did better they would lose their grants!!

I then heard about you, in your inexperience, giving the wrong time of the
race to a crew, which meant they missed the race, and which, in most events
would have led to them not being allowed to race in any other events in the
regatta. There were many more things I heard about your treatment of
coaches and staff which I am very happy to discuss with you, but there
are far too many to recall here.

However, let me tell you a personal story about the events of last week.
James's mum, Lisa, was deeply upset when she heard about what you had done
behind Steve's back with James and Matt. It was about eleven o'clock
at night and her eleven year old son got out of bed to ask her what was
wrong. Matthew is cautious in his approach to life, but this summer, at
12 years old, he has managed to conquer the C1, which is quite a feat at
twelve years old. Lisa told him how James and Matt, who he deeply
respects, had been told that unless they did as they were told and worked
under a new coach that they did not want, would get no money to help them
to achieve their Olympic dream. Matthew said, at twelve year old, 'But
that' s blackmail!' He then went on to say, 'I don't want to do
canoeing any more!!' I just wonder how many more young people that you
will turn off canoeing, and damage their dreams for Olympic goals, unless
you transform the way you are working.

I am a coach and have been all my life, and I rarely give up trying to put
forward a positive view. I have tried to understand your motives in acting
the way you have in all these cases and indeed in the latest case. I
realised that it was a little odd that you were dealing with it at all, as
Alan Williams is the Performance Manager for Racing, and it seems to me that
it his job to be talking to Matt, James and Steve. However, with all this
training you have been doing on trips, and knowing of your ambitions, it
appeared to me that perhaps you have set you mind on is the Performance
Manager's job, and were acting out the part whilst John Anderson, the
Performance Director was away in Australia. It seems to have led to a
pretty big mistake, but it is out of mistakes that we learn, and I hope
indeed that you do.

I do not believe that being a woman - or man, knowing Sue Campbell, and being
employed to bully us, really fits you out for Performance Manager in our
sport, but if you can learn from all the mistakes, transform your ways, and
find a sport which you love enough, then one day you might achieve such an
ambition. There are people in life who wish to achieve power so that they can
tell people what to do, and there are people who wish to gain power, or
influence, to create a culture where people are free to grow and achieve
their dreams, as with Matt and James. You are a product of the first, but it
is a system which is changing and, if you have the will to change, then I am
sure that you can. It is certainly worth a try, and the latest books that I
have learned from, which might set you on that path are listed below.

But, whilst reading books might be fine, there is nothing like experience to
start the transformation. Sue Campbell has not acted to protect Matt, James
and the other paddlers from possible abuse. Graham Lyon has seemingly
failed to do so. I am in no position to tell you what to do, but it is
clear that the first step in that transformation on your path to Performance
Manager of a sport you love, would be to protect the paddlers of the British
Canoe Union, by suspending this Bulgarian coach, until a very detailed
investigation is carried out.

As well as his views on drugs you will also note from the report that he is
reluctant to talk about why he cannot go back to Bulgaria. It seems a
little odd, and I may be able to help out. I will write to my MP Peter
Luff, to Lord Moynihan and Lord Coe to see what I can find out.

I enclose a copy of an article from the Times Ed last week about the
NSPCC's latest campaign to make people more aware of abuse. It is
headed 'Train the Chain' and you are at the bottom of a chain which goes
to Sue Campbell:Chair UK Sport, Tessa Jowell MP, Gordon Brown: Chancellor
and Tony Blair: Prime Minister. Your mistakes have given me the
opportunity to write to all in that chain and I hope that we will get a
positive result to tell the world about.


I spoke to Stephen Boocock of the NSPCC, last week, who has said that the
NSPCC will run a conference on the the issue of children's rights, which I
originally reported as a result of your Talent ID programme. I am sure that
the issues of the rights of athletes to have a say in who coaches them would
be on the agenda. Stephen said that he hoped that when the conference is
held that you, as the star who started all this would be 'comfortable'
to be there, and it would indeed be good if, by then, you were far
enough along a new 'coaching' path to be happy to have the world know
what had happened in the past when you lived in the now failing top down
command and control system.

The slogan of the NSPCC's campaign is 'Abuse: talk about it till it stops'.
It is a great slogan and the story of your transformation would help us to
get the message to Sue Campbell, Tessa Jowell, Gordon Brown, Tony Blair
and all in Olympic sport. You would be famous and we would all be winners.
Truly a WIN-WIN situation!!

Remember, that the first easy step, is for you to suspend the Bulgarian coach
- you can never be too sure when it comes to protecting children from
strangers!!!

My very best wishes,


Good paddling,


David.

cc. Rt Hon Tony Blair MP., Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP., Rt Hon Tessa Jowell
MP., Sue Campbell CBE., Peter Luff MP., Lord Moynihan, Lord Coe, Ken
Livingstone: Mayor of London, Kate Hoey MP.

British Canoe Union., British Olympic Association, Fladbury Paddle Club.

Books: How to help children find the champion within themselves. David
Hemery - from Smiths.

Human rights in youth sport. Paulo David

Coaching for Performance John Whitmore.






--

"Allan Bennett" wrote in message
...
Anne Ferguson,
British Canoe Union,
John Dudderidge House,
Adbolton Lane,
West Bridgeford,
Nottingham NG2 5AS
11th October 2005

Dear Anne,

snip very tolerant letter

applause for DT

IMHO the whole Performance Dept needs scrapping. I want our sport back under
our control even if that means no more funding from UK Sport.

David Kemper
Not a fan of invisible strings.