Put the cards on the table!

(published in the Slovak Sport Daily)

Even now, it can be stated with near certainty that the proposed new Sports Act will improve the current state of sport. The guarantees are clear: a broad team of participating experts, repeatedly declared political support, and especially the partial proposals made public so far. Two weeks ago, the chairman of Parliament and the Minister of Education promised “a very transparent environment” and introduced the idea of giving sports federations greater autonomy while increasing oversight. This is something one can only agree with. However, this was almost a mandatory gesture, inspired by proposals from the recent past. The real issue lies in the lack of public awareness of the full content of the proposal. After multiple delays, the latest plan is for the bill to go before the government in June...

Not only last week’s support from the ten largest sports federations, including football and ice hockey, for the philosophy of the law (despite the public knowing nothing about its financial aspects) is raising high expectations. Representatives of various sports, when voicing complaints about different problems, have long referred to the Sports Act as a cure-all. The belief that this law will help create a system of transparent funding was even expressed by President Kiska on Monday during a meeting with ice hockey players. So, there is a longstanding clear demand aimed at the executive branch to pass a good law.

The full text of the law is supposed to be published just before the first of three planned public debates. However, it will still only be the output of a working group of experts consulting their intentions with the Speaker of Parliament. But as we all strongly suspect, the experts’ draft may differ significantly from the final official version. Months of preparatory discussions, including a survey in November, were carried out by the working group...

It is essential that politicians publicly endorse the core ideas of the law as soon as possible, ideally at a press conference, and announce the proposed changes. Public discussion should then take place around a proposal officially endorsed by the central government body responsible for sport - the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport even if also backed by the chairman of Parliament. This should happen not only during the official comment procedure but even before that. If the working group had nearly two years, the official proposal deserves at least two months.

It’s finally time to put some real political skin in the sports game and present the key points, including the financial part. Will the proposal include tax-deductible items for sport, or perhaps for culture and other public-benefit activities? Will there be rules for how state-controlled companies distribute marketing funds to sport? A single central ranking of athletes? The sports community is waiting for answers to many questions. Even those taxpayers who are not sports fans will be listening closely.