Richard Colbeck: The AFL’s illicit drug policy is not fit for purpose

The AFL has a big problem, writes former Federal Sports Minister Richard Colbeck. And if the league isn’t prepared to make changes, there should be consequences.

The AFL has a big problem.

The act of deliberately avoiding a drug test is a breach of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Code – it must be.

Therefore, the act of giving a test to determine the presence of drugs to avoid game day testing and the risk of testing positive must be a breach of the WADA Code – it is an act of avoidance, a deliberate one.

If as it appears from reporting and admissions to date under the AFL’s illicit drugs code, then that code is likewise in breach of the WADA Code.

While the AFL illicit drugs code may have been once fit for purpose, it clearly no longer is.

Every one of the players who is alleged to have used this mechanism to avoid game day testing is or should be liable for sanction under the WADA Code as would any other athlete who is found to have attempted to avoid testing.

The AFL and players should be well aware of this, recall the AFL player who offered a sports drink as a sample.

Richard Colbeck has slammed the AFL’s illicit drugs policy. Picture: Lukas Coch

Anyone knowingly facilitating the avoidance of testing should likewise face sanction if the allegations aired are true – it’s going to be a pretty long queue!

There is absolutely no way that either WADA or Sport Integrity Australia (SIA) can let this current situation go without investigation and resolution.

If this current situation is allowed to continue, how do you expect every other

athlete who is required to comply with testing and availability requirements to comply?

The whole system is undermined.

If anyone thinks this is in any way unreasonable, for some perspective, think of the many athletes who are required to advise testing authorities of their whereabouts for the possibility of being tested, and the penalties they face for not doing so or being available.

Most of them earn nowhere near AFL players’ salaries but are on a much tighter leash.

What must they be thinking when we see what has come out this week and the, “there’s nothing to see here,” approach from the AFL?

AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon. Picture: Mark Brake/AFL Photos/via Getty Images

What is clear, is that the AFL illicit drug policy needs to be revised, and the practice of aiding

and abetting avoidance of testing stopped.

If the AFL aren’t prepared to make the changes required to bring their policy into compliance with the WADA code, their WADA accreditation should be on the line.

The AFL illicit drug policy has long been controversial, there are many who say it has been effective and worked well – until recently, when it has morphed into a WADA non-compliant monster.

Now is the time to fix it, and if there is a bigger problem in the AFL, time to fix that too.

Australia is seen as a global leader in sports integrity with dozens of nations looking to us and SIA as a model.

What sort of tragedy would it be if that leadership was brought undone by our national code.

It is in all our interests that this gets sorted out, now, and quickly.

Senator Richard Colbeck was Minister for Sport 2019-22, oversaw the creation of SIA from ASADA and was a WADA Foundation and Executive Board Member.

Originally published as Richard Colbeck: The AFL’s illicit drug policy is not fit for purpose