Athletics Ireland Statement on International Carding Scheme

10 March 2005

Athletics Ireland made strong cases for all the International Carding Scheme applications which we received and presented to the Irish Sports Council.

While we welcome the recognition of some of our emerging and developing athletes, in particular the increase for David Gillick and Paul Hession, the extent of the culling of a large number of our leading International athletes has both disappointed and surprised us.

As a matter of urgency, we will be seeking an immediate meeting with the ISC to discuss the rationale behind the decisions made. In particular we are concerned with how some of the athletes removed from the carding scheme are going to get back onto the system.

Presently Sonia O’Sullivan and Mark Carroll have qualified for this summer's World T&F Championships in Helsinki on A standards while Peter Coghlan, James Nolan, Karen Shinkins and Tomas Coman have B standards, none of whom are recipients of any funding from the International Carding Scheme.