Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak in support of Motion No. 466, which states:
That, in the opinion of the House, the government should continue to engage in the anti-doping movement, encouraging national governments to follow Canada's lead and ratify the UNESCO International Convention against Doping in Sport.
It is a real shame that athletes feel pressure to take performance enhancing drugs in order to remain competitive in their respective sports, but we have seen it time and time again, most notably in sports such as major league baseball, cycling, track and field and others.
In some sports, there continues to be a bit of a “look the other way” culture. It is changing, but there is some of that, and it allows athletes, trainers and coaches to get away with using these illegal drugs. It is important that we eliminate this culture in sport and that those who do practise doping are caught and dealt with.
Every time one of them is revealed to have taken a performance enhancing drug, it destroys the image many young people have of these athletes or, even worse, it makes these kids think that doping is acceptable or necessary to be competitive.
Kids do look up to their sports idols. I have two children. My daughter Emma is a great soccer player. My son Conor is a great hockey player and a tremendous fan of sports. He would be devastated if he knew that some of his heroes had succeeded by breaking the laws and also in going against the ethical standards that we insist on as parents.
I come from the riding of Dartmouth—Cole Harbour. One of Canada's greatest athletes, and in fact I would say the greatest athlete, Sidney Crosby, comes from that area. Now that the Montreal Canadiens are out of the playoffs, I hope he wins the Stanley Cup. A guy like Sidney Crosby is someone we can look up to, and the kids can safely look up to him as a hero worthy of emulating.
I would also suggest that my colleague, the member for York Centre, is another one of those athletes who would not take advantage of anything except hard work and sacrifice in order to achieve his goals.
At a time when we are concerned about the epidemic of childhood obesity and when we are encouraging our kids to be more active, we need to promote the values of honesty and sportsmanship that go with that. We have seen in the United States the major spectacle of congressional hearings on drugs in sport. This is an issue that people are taking seriously.
Professional and amateur sports have to remain accessible to athletes who refuse to dope. Those who do it have to be punished accordingly. Of course, the large majority of amateur and professional athletes do not take these drugs, but there have been exceptions that we all recall.
I recall the Olympic Games of 1988 in Seoul and how excited and how galvanized Canada was as a nation when Ben Johnson won the gold medal, but then how crushing and disappointing it was for Canada when he lost it. Floyd Landis was stripped of his title as winner of the Tour de France in 2006 because he had taken synthetic testosterone. On the women's side, Marion Jones, who won medal after medal in the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, was disgraced after she admitted she had used performance enhancing drugs.
These athletes inspired millions of people with their triumphs and then they let them down when their cheating was disclosed.
The Olympics are a world class event and we look forward to having them in Vancouver and Whistler. They bring together elite athletes from around the world. They should be free from the doping scandals that we have seen in recent years.
Dick Pound, of course, has been a champion on this file. The former president of the World Anti-Doping Agency and a former vice-president of the IOC, he campaigned tirelessly for better rules to prevent doping. While at the World Anti-Doping Agency, he oversaw an unprecedented strengthening of drug testing and spoke out against nations that were looking the other way when athletes took performance enhancing products.
Canada played an important role in devising the UNESCO International Convention against Doping in Sport in 2005 and was one of the first countries to sign and ratify it. This convention supports international efforts to stop doping in sport through the World Anti-Doping Agency. It demands that we take a stand to locate and punish those athletes who take performance enhancing drugs and encourage other countries to do the same.
Canada complies with the convention through the excellent work of the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport, which provides educational programs and research and also administers Canada's anti-doping program.
Canada should remain a leader in this area, not only by continuing with our anti-doping program at home, but by pushing other countries to develop their own programs so that we can protect the integrity of international sport.
I am pleased our colleagues on this side are in support of this. Our member for Vancouver Centre has spoken passionately about this. Our member for Cape Breton—Canso has been very involved in athletics, both as a participant and strongly as a coach, and has pushed kids to be their very best, but to the limits of their ability and not beyond, because they were rewarded by using performance enhancing products.
Canada should be a leader in this. The world looks to Canada in this area as it does in many other areas. We need to push other countries to develop their own programs so we can protect the integrity of international sport.
I congratulate the member for Perth—Wellington for introducing this motion. I am proud to support it and I encourage all other members to do the same.