US anti-doping boss Travis Tygart slams Australia's former government over supplements scandal
Date
October 7, 2014 - 10:00PM
Roy Masters
Rugby League Columnist
The United States' leading investigator into doping in sport has slammed the role of Australia's former federal government in the AFL and NRL supplements saga.
Travis Tygart, the chief executive of the US Anti-Doping Agency, described the intervention of former federal sports minister Kate Lundy and her senior advisors – in seeking to have AFL players escape sanction, while NRL players are penalised – as undermining the global campaign against doping.
"The political influence in the ASADA case in the two football codes in Australia has done a disservice to anti-doping," Tygart said.
Federal Health Minister Peter Dutton, whose portfolio embraces sport, has indicated he will launch a judicial or Senate enquiry into the role of the former government in the supplements investigation.
Dutton has previously stated he would wait until Essendon's Federal Court case against ASADA was over before initiating an enquiry.
Essendon have indicated they will not challenge the comprehensive judgment against the club, while coach James Hird has sought an expedited appeal hearing.
Tygart said he had followed the ASADA case.
"There has been some interaction between the agencies [ASADA and the USADA]," he said.
USADA is independent of government, while ASADA is a quasi-government body with the federal sports minister making major appointments, including the chief executive and the advisory board.
Tygart said he doubted whether he would have been able to successfully prosecute Lance Armstrong if his agency had been subject to the same influence the government exercised over ASADA.
Both US state and federal politicians, principally from Armstrong's home state of Texas, tried to shut down the enquiry into the seven-time Tour de France winner.
Tygart also had three death threats during the Armstrong investigation, and security around him was tightened by the FBI.
"We are independent of sport and government from a governance standpoint, but that didn't stop politicians and sport, in the Lance Armstrong case, from pressuring us," Tygart said.
"When you've got big money at stake, involving actions against high-profile teams that make big money, then big money and power go to work to shut down those people doing their job to protect clean athletes.
"It is politically pleasing to rake dirty athletes over the coals but it can also be politically pleasing to let dirty athletes go free. You can't have it both ways.
"In the US, this would be so if we were subject to the winds of politics."
Justice John Middleton, who presided over Essendon's Federal Court case, was not required to consider the intervention by the then federal government in seeking to have AFL players escape sanction.
However, he did point out the ASADA Act does not allow the minister to give a direction to the ASADA chief executive relating to "a particular athlete, or a particular support person, who is subject to the National Anti-Doping Scheme," or presumably a group of them. He concluded this section of his judgment with: "Ministerial direction outside the specific permission given by the act would normally be treated as impliedly forbidden."
Evidence presented in the Essendon case revealed attempts by senior public servants to have the AFL players escape with a "no-fault defence", which usually applies to athletes who have been administered prohibited drugs while unconscious during medical procedures.
Tygart said: "USADA got a tremendous amount of pressure from UCI [the international cycling body] and both the Senate and House of Representatives, plus some state representatives, pressed for legislation to frustrate us.
"I made four trips to Washington to answer questions. We made a decision to, firstly, disregard all the opposition and, secondly, to move forward with the evidence against Armstrong. Our board and staff remained dedicated and knew we had no choice but to pursue those aims."
Aware that governments can undermine the work of national anti-doping agencies by reducing their grants, Tygart said: "If they cut our funding, we just get new jobs but this will be very sad for clean athletes."
