Thank you very much.
On behalf of Special Olympics Canada and more than 34,000 athletes across our country, it's a pleasure for me to be here in front of this committee.
On behalf of Ms. Judd Campbell, Mr. Miceli and all the members of the great Special Olympics family, thank you for agreeing to meet with us today.
It was only a month ago this week that Special Olympics athletes from across our country came to Ottawa for a Hill day to speak with members of Parliament, to speak with Senators, and to have the opportunity to introduce our athletes, our sport, and what we have been able to provide for Canadians with an intellectual disability across our country.
On behalf of Special Olympics Canada, our ask is really quite simple. We are looking for incremental funding of $800,000 every two years to take care of the travel and uniform requirements for our athletes to attend national games. We are looking for a level playing field with other national sport organizations and other national games that compete across our great country on an annual basis. The next two national games are in 2012 in St. Albert, Alberta, and in 2014 in Vancouver, British Columbia.
These games provide a pathway of excellence for our athletes across the country.
It's important for everybody in this room to understand what our mission is. Our mission at Special Olympics Canada is to enrich the lives of Canadians with an intellectual disability, through sport. We do that by providing year-round sports programming for athletes like Christina beside me, and other intellectually disabled Canadians of all stripes across the country.
A Special Olympics athlete is no different from any other athlete: they're motivated to participate because of their love for sport, the rewards of being part of a team, and the athletic competition that Special Olympics provides.
Sport is a vehicle for inclusion of our Special Olympics athletes. It provides them with fundamental motor skills, health and fitness levels, and confidence in critical social skills necessary to become active and meaningful members in our society.
I'm a volunteer with Special Olympics Canada, and people will often ask me, “What are Special Olympics? When are the next games?” I tell them that Special Olympics are every day. They happen in communities big and small, in sport clubs, in rural areas, in urban areas, all across our country, in all languages, and that's at the heart of what our sport is all about.
We recently had our 2010 national summer games in London. We had over 1,400 athletes, coaches, and trainers who came to the city to allow them to participate and represent not only the provinces but, ultimately, earn the right to represent their country. It's important to note that every one of our chapters, and we have chapters in all 10 provinces and two territories--we're about to open up our third territory, Nunavut, hopefully by the middle of next year--has the burden of having to fund participation in those games, travelling to those games. We'd like to take that on ourselves to free up funding and free up moneys to allow individual programs to be increased in the provinces, to allow for athlete recruitment, volunteer recruitment, and ultimately to allow for more programs to be developed.
In London we had an example of an athlete who earned the right to represent Canada at the next world games in Athens, Greece. That athlete is a remarkable example of what Special Olympics is able to provide.
I'd like to ask Christina Judd Campbell, a Special Olympics athlete, to tell her story.