TIPPED off that Scotland’s greatest ever triathlete might have something to contribute to The Herald’s story about the treatment of Lara Gorman, who was drawn into a relationship with her coach at the age of 16, I was hugely impressed with Catriona Morrison’s response.
Of all the many people I have had contact with on this subject, none would have been more entitled to decline involvement. A four-time world champion who has been awarded an MBE, she could easily have stepped back and said this was a matter for the sport’s administrators. She even had the excuse of being abroad when the story broke last week, as she still is.
Instead, once contact was established, it was immediately clear that she fully understood the importance of revelations that have lent momentum to a hugely important NSPCC campaign to close a legal loophole in order to protect adolescent youngsters.
Catriona noted that she loves her sport, was aware that this issue has the potential to be deeply damaging for it, but that there is something much bigger at stake.
She explained, too, that the coach she was working with when she went to her first Commonwealth Games in 2002 was John Dargie – the individual who had, as a 33-year-old, had that relationship with Lara – but that she was never subjected to inappropriate behaviour and that there had been no acrimony when they stopped working together.
Her contribution related not to him as an individual, but how the matter was dealt with by her sport.
In short, while she would not describe it as such, she showed the leadership that she had called on others to offer, only to be disappointed.
In an era where routine claims are made about the “world class systems of governance” in place in Scottish sport, which they certainly should be given the vast number of administrators employed in it, she is not the only one who should feel that way.
When Lara’s father Cameron originally contacted me about this story in February, he did what might be seen as a rather naïve thing, but I thought it simply showed his honest desire to see something done, by effectively alerting the whole of Scottish sport that they were ready to go public when copying none other than Stewart Harris, chief executive of sportscotland, in on his email.
Naturally, out of a sense of fair play, my first reaction was to invite Stewart to explain what he intended to do, noting in my opening line that I imagined he would have found the message as disturbing as I had. He did not respond himself but passed it on to a PR man, who replied more than three hours later to say Stewart was “currently driving to an engagement and has asked me to look into your enquiry” before suggesting the family should contact the police, if there was any suggestion of criminality, or the NSPCC hotline.
They had no awareness of the issue, he went on, but would expect Triathlon Scotland, as the governing body, to have dealt with it appropriately.
Since that indicated no interest in investigating the matter further we went to work and eventually unveiled a disturbing story that should be of great concern to anyone interested in sport.
In the course of that, Triathlon Scotland were obviously invited to explain their actions and their chief executive, Jane Moncrieff, explained that they had applied the rules and regulations they follow – in keeping with sportscotland guidelines – in imposing an ineffective two-year suspension on John Dargie that did not prevent him from coaching.
It was clear in our discussions that Catriona Morrison had reluctantly accepted, at the time the case was originally dealt with, that Triathlon Scotland had felt unable to do anything more. However, when she heard that her former coach had, two years ago, been deemed to have been sufficiently rehabilitated that he was re-employed by Triathlon Scotland to work with teenagers, she was shocked and felt the need to intervene.
She duly asked the right questions and, as outlined in The Herald’s news pages yesterday found the response from Andy Salmon, chairman of Triathlon Scotland, unsatisfactory.
There is a world of difference between robotic application of rules and regulations and the demonstration of leadership, whether “world class” or even just at a functional level. The issue here, as outlined by the NSPCC, is the protection of youngsters and they are fortunate to have identified, in Catriona Morrison, a woman of standing who understands the meaning of the words “world class”.
By contrast, when it comes to governance in Scottish sport, this case demonstrates an urgent need to examine these claims that “world class systems” are in place. To that end the politicians who allow the existing agencies and governing bodies to distribute public funds also now need to demonstrate their ability to lead by calling in those who are happy to take titles such as chair or chief executive and asking them why they responded as they did.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel