The funding models in Canada are based primarily on two things: there is general participation across the country, and there is high-performance success. In sports such as ours, which are focused primarily on competition at the high end, we inevitably have fewer people who compete, compared with other sports. Everyone compares with hockey; none of our sports will ever become hockey.
The challenge I suggested in my presentation about the discrepancies among our funding partners is that often, in order to gain more results, we need to train more athletes and be able to reach out our identification of talent deeper into the Canadian population.
Unfortunately, as a sport that hasn't been able to crack into the medals regularly at the Olympics, certainly not for the last 20 years, we are not able to access any money to do that, and so the system tends to revolve around people who are performing and will then continue to put money into those sports to the detriment of other sports.
I have some sympathy for sports that are doing well. They should continue getting funding. I totally agree with that. However, when I look at the overall mission, particularly the mission of OTP, which is to try to win medals, if we're leaving 40% of the medals at the Winter Olympic Games off the table because we are not adequately funding those sports and are not making the long-term investments required for real progress, we will eventually get to a position in which we have a Canadian on every single podium but will still not have access to that 40% of the medals.
If that's what we are looking to do, then that's great. If it's not, then....