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VANCOUVER — The federal government is throwing its weight behind the small group of teenaged female athletes looking to become the first women to compete in ski jumping at the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Ottawa and the female ski jumpers announced the terms of a mediated settlement late yesterday in an 11-month-old human-rights complaint, an agreement under which the federal government has committed only to put pressure on the International Olympic Committee to reverse its decision to exclude women ski jumpers from the Games. That will include a face-to-face meeting with the IOC next month in Vancouver.
But one of the athletes at the centre of the case, 16-year-old Katie Willis of Calgary, said she believes the government's intervention may force the IOC to change direction. "I'm just thrilled that they will back us up and join us in this fight," she said, taking a break from text-messaging her teammates.
Helena Guergis, Secretary of State for sport, said she will come to Vancouver next month to meet with the IOC, when president Jacques Rogge visits as part of a delegation. The IOC has repeatedly said its rejection of women's ski jumping is based on technical criteria, and that the sport is not yet ready for Olympic competition.
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But Ms. Guergis disagreed with that position in an interview yesterday, saying the dispute is a matter of gender equity. "This is not a criteria issue, this is a women's issue," she said. She also said she does not accept the argument that it is too late to add women's ski jumping to the 2010 Vancouver Games.
Ms. Guergis said she will work with the Canadian Olympic Committee and possibly other groups, including the Vancouver Organizing Committee, in deciding how best to approach the IOC.
The organizing committee did not comment directly yesterday, but said in an e-mail that it is aware of the announcement and will participate in discussions if asked to do so.
Ms. Guergis would not say what action the Canadian government might take if the IOC refused to change its position, but did note that 2014 would be the next opportunity to include the sport.
The original complaint, filed last February, asked for the federal government to pay for training and an alternative international-level women's competition in 2010 if the IOC continued to exclude the female athletes. The federal government has not made a commitment to do so, but Jan Willis, Katie's mother, said she views the agreement announced yesterday as an indication that the government is committed to some sort of solution.
And those funds are badly needed, Ms. Willis said. Dick Pound, Canada's senior Olympics official, told The Globe and Mail earlier this week that the female ski jumpers shouldn't waste their money on litigation to enter the Olympics through the "back door." The reality, said Ms. Willis, is very different. The group's lawyer works for free, and their trainer isn't much better paid.
"Right now," she said, "the girls are baking cookies to give to their trainer."
