Hockey Australia warned to investigate claims or risk being stripped of taxpayer funding

The Federal Government has warned it is prepared to intervene as concerns emerge over Hockey Australia’s inquiry independence.

The Hockeyroos are in crisis.

Hockey Australia risks losing all of its public funding if it fails to acknowledge the seriousness of the scandal that has rocked one of the country’s most beloved Olympic teams.

The shocking accusations that have emerged about the toxic culture inside the Hockeyroos have not gone unnoticed by either the Federal Government or the most powerful national sporting authorities.

Canberra has been warning taxpayer-funded sporting organisations for years that they need to properly investigate any reports of abuse and intimidation of female athletes or action will be taken.

Around two dozen past and present players and staff have come forward in the past week to accuse Hockey Australia of turning a blind eye to serious complaints about the way the women’s high-performance program has been run over the past decade.

The deeply disturbing claims include reports of body-shaming, bullying and intimidation. They have led to players developing serious eating disorders, self-harming and simply walking out on the sport they love.

Finally, their cries for help are being heard.

The Sunday Telegraph can exclusively reveal federal authorities are now preparing to intervene if Hockey Australia fails to conduct a fully independent inquiry and take action on the findings.

If that doesn’t happen, Hockey Australia could be stripped of funding in the same way Equestrian Australia’s cashflow was cut off earlier this year because of concerns about its governance model.

Hockey Australia high-performance director Toni Cumpston.

Hockey Australia chief executive Matt Favier.

That forced Equestrian Australia into voluntary administration, with the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) taking over the running of the high-performance program.

Hockey Australia’s review into the accusations began this week but there are already real concerns about how “transparent” the process will be after president Mel Woosnam in a newspaper report cast doubt on some of the claims.

Chief executive Matt Favier also set off alarm bells when he revealed that only people who were involved in the high-performance set-up from 2017 onwards will be allowed to testify and the full findings will be kept secret.

Serious concerns have also been expressed in Canberra as to whether the review can be considered truly independent because of the ties between key figures, including Favier, who is a former director at the AIS.

Richard Redman, who has been asked to oversee the inquiry, manages the AIS Conduct & Professionalism team while Toni Cumpston, Hockey Australia’s high-performance director, is also a former AIS employee.

While there’s no suggestion any of them would not carry out their duties independently, the feeling in Canberra is the perception is not a good look.

Gymnastics Australia read the writing on the wall when it called for a fully independent investigation into claims of abuse in its sport, but the death this year of Russian-born Australian figure skater Katria Alexandrovskaya prompted an overhaul of whether sports that don’t comply should be able to investigate themselves.

Big changes are coming.

Three months ago, the Australian Olympic Committee, Commonwealth Games Australia and Paralympics Australia created a working party with Sport Integrity Australia and the National Sports Tribunal to develop a fully independent framework to deal with abuse, intimidation and other safeguarding issues in Australian sport.

Once up and running, authorities will independently investigate serious sports issues – including a provision to protect whistleblowers — instead of leaving it to bodies such as Hockey Australia.

One thing that won’t change though is who gets to pick Olympic teams.

There have been calls for Hockey Australia to reselect its team for next year’s Tokyo Olympics after the review is finished but the AOC confirmed it will not interfere because selection is always a matter for individual sports to decide.

“The nomination policy is written by the sports and approved by the AOC, providing they do everything in line with their policy,” chief executive Matt Carroll said.

“So if any sport wanted to change their nomination policy, which obviously a lot of them had to do because of the pandemic, we obviously listen to that as well, but the matter of how they manage their internal affairs is entirely a matter for Hockey Australia.”