According to today's news, Prime Minister David Cameron, the idiot from Eton, has announced that he intends making it compulsory for all primary school children to partake in competititve team sports. When this will actually happen seems unclear but it is quite clearly a typical 'knee-jerk' reaction to an assortment of criticisms about the nature of the 'Olympic Legacy' which we are supposed to experience in the future.
Forgive me for being cynical and not a little angry about this nonsense, but wasn't this type of central control and direction a principal characteristic of Communist Russia ? Didn't this country and many others roundly condemn the old Soviet Union for its excesses in this area ?
That Cameron is an idiot for this announcement will gradually become clear as people realise that providing access to a range of sports, team or otherwise, will require the involvement of a huge number of trained coaching staff who will, no doubt, look for appropriate financial reward. That many sports require playing fields which no longer exist and specialist equipment which will be unaffordable for many has obviously not been considered.
That many sports are not of a team nature - most athletics, gymnastics, tennis, golf, boxing, swimming, cycling and so on, has been ignored. That many children will have no aptitude for football, cricket, rugby, hockey, or netball, has been ignored; so have the undoubted screeches of the 'health and safety' lobby which will object vehemently to small children being put a risk by playing almost any sports.
Making involvement in 'team sports' compulsory is ludicrous. It will do nothing to encourage the next generation of Mo Farahs, Jessica Ennis's or Rebecca Addlingtons and others who prefer individual competition. Cameron's announcement is nothing more than a pathetic piece of political spin, designed to keep him ahead of the game - in this case he's unlikely to win a medal of any colour and may well find himself disqualified.
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