Basketball (Funding)

John Leech Excerpts

Monday 28th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Mosley]

Again, my hon. Friend is correct. At the moment, there are schemes in which temporary basketball pitches are put up in town centres so that the game can be played in the middle of the town. I understand—I am looking at the chair of the all-party group on basketball, the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson)—that in summer people will be able to go to Trafalgar square and do some hoops—[Interruption.] Yes, shoot the hoops. The basketball game is very conscious of that, and it is a good way of getting young people involved and enthused by the sport. Our problem is that UK Sport funding is based on what it considers to be each team’s realistic chances of gaining a medal or a top eight finish in Rio or the 2020 games.

[Mr John Leech (Manchester, Withington) (LD)]

The hon. Gentleman is being generous with his time. Is not the real challenge that the formula for deciding funding has been an overwhelming success, and changing it might end up jeopardising some of our success in other sports?

[Stephen Mosley]

My hon. Friend has a point. I can be fairly relaxed about taking interventions because I think I can stand here until 10 pm tonight, although I reassure the Minister that I will not take quite that long. I have reservations about the funding process, on which I know the Minister has recently commented. A couple of weeks ago in The Sunday Times he expressed doubts about how the current funding process works; going for medal positions and the top eight in the Olympics may not be the right way forward. I do not argue that the whole process should be scrapped and restarted for all sports, but I do argue that with the right funding, the Great Britain basketball team has every chance of a top eight finish at Rio, and even greater potential for success in 2020.

[Mr Leech]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way a second time. Does he agree that there may be scope for looking at team sports, as opposed to individual sports, slightly differently? Individual sports currently get an awful lot of the funding.

[Stephen Mosley]

The competitive situation of team games at the Olympics tends to be more difficult in terms of the number of people who play. Every country in the world plays basketball, but some of the more successful sports in the UK have a more limited pool of participants. Perhaps there are arguments for looking at team sports slightly differently from individual sports. My point, however, is that Great Britain basketball has a fantastic opportunity in 2016 and 2020. Will the Minister explain how UK Sport has assessed the Great Britain team’s potential for success in Rio and beyond? Who was consulted during that assessment, and what reasons were behind the conclusion?