A brand new national report on how abuse and maltreatment are handled in sport says “Canadian sport has lost its way” and the federal government must act to raised protect athletes across the country.
The Way forward for Sport in Canada Commission released its preliminary report Thursday, saying it heard that there are “deeply ingrained” issues across the country, from a culture of silence that has led to abuse and maltreatment to underfunding and a scarcity of diversity.
“The primary finding that emerges … is that the Canadian sports system is in crisis,” commissioner Lise Maisonneuve said at a press conference in Ottawa. “As many have told us, it’s broken.”
Maisonneuve, former chief justice of the Ontario Court of Justice, was tasked with leading the commission after it was created by the federal government in 2023 in response to athletes speaking out about systemic abuse.
The commission visited a dozen cities, heard from greater than 825 people and received greater than 1,000 written submissions and survey responses before writing its 384-page report, which included 71 recommendations.
The commission’s findings are supposed to guide debate and shape solutions at a September summit in Ottawa. A final report is anticipated by the top of March 2026.
Over the past yr, the commission has heard about meagre funding, archaic governance, and a problematic concentrate on high-performance sports.
Athletes and witnesses also recounted abuse and maltreatment, starting from physical punishment and sexual assault, to humiliation and intimidation to failure to offer medical care and training while injured.
Hearing the commission’s findings was validating, said Amelia Cline, managing director of Athletes Empowered.
“It’s fundamentally broken, the way in which we deliver sport in Canada,” said Cline, a former gymnast. “And the truth is, that system just isn’t secure. So it’s heartening to see that the commission understands that.”
Pressure on the federal government to make change has been constructing since athletes began coming forward with their stories of abuse and maltreatment several years ago, she added.
“I don’t think they will ignore this at this point,” Cline said. “To fail to implement these recommendations in light of all of this might be absolute negligence at this point.”
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Efforts to deal with abuse and maltreatment in sport have long been suffering from jurisdictional issues.
Currently, the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport investigates only cases tied to national, federally funded programs, leaving lower levels to their very own patchwork systems.
Of 111 reports that got here into the CCES in the primary quarter of this yr, only 11 were deemed admissible by the CCES, and 82 were dismissed because they weren’t on the national, federally funded level.
Ottawa must work with provincial and territorial governments to create a national secure sport authority or tribunal that may administer all federal, provincial and territorial secure sport laws, the report said.
“We are able to have a uniform, centralized system in Canada to cope with complaints mechanism, in order that it’s transparent, open, and that folks understand where to go,” Maisonneuve said.
A national tribunal is something Cline and her colleagues have long been asking for.
“The present system is so fractured that it makes it almost not possible for victims to return forward and to navigate it and to know where to complain to,” Cline said.
“If you happen to don’t have consistency in sanctioning and discipline and transparency around those things, in fact you’ve gotten a perpetuation of abuse. Because nobody’s being held accountable, nobody’s actually being faraway from the system.”
The report also said Ottawa must mandate background screening requirements or develop a standardized background screening policy to be utilized by sports organizations that receive federal funding.
Allison Forsyth, a former Olympic skier and survivor of sexual abuse in sport, doesn’t consider standardized background checks will prevent abuse and maltreatment.
Screening needs to permit a sports organization to see whether a coach applying for a job has been sanctioned by one other organization, and that information won’t be discovered in a criminal-background check or a vulnerable sector check, said the founding father of Generation Secure.
“They’re not going to tug up 99 per cent of the people doing bad things, including the person that did bad things to me,” Forsyth said. “And it’s just a really narrow viewpoint.”
Public registries, too, pose an issue, she added, because each organization can have a special threshold for what sort of behaviours ought to be sanctioned.
Still, Forsyth was optimistic when reading the commission’s preliminary report and said lots of the recommendations make sense.
Change, though, will take time, she said.
“There must be a really deep level of cultural understanding, belief shifting,” Forsyth said. “What I see probably the most is basically understanding what harm is and that harm can result in trauma. And that’s an enormous societal conversation right away.”
Carla Qualtrough, who served as minister of sport in 2023 and 2024, called the report’s recommendations “thoughtful and daring” in a social media post.
“My first thought — there must be a proper apology by the Prime Minister to victims and survivors of abuse in sport. In reality, we should always all apologize. There will be little question that we failed,” she said in a series of posts on X.
“Bottom line: the sport system needs an overhaul. People have been harmed — children have been harmed. We owe it to everyone who was hurt, maltreated, discriminated against, bullied, denied access, and excluded to see this as a possibility to do higher for all Canadian children.”
Canada’s current secretary of state for sport Adam van Koeverden said in an announcement that the federal government welcomes the commission’s report.
“Like many within the sport community, the federal government will fastidiously analyze the complete preliminary report,” the statement read. “Because the commission’s work continues, we stay up for the ultimate report back to be released next yr, which is able to offer further guidance on strengthening safety and integrity in sport.”
The Canadian Olympic Committee also issued an announcement on Thursday, saying it “commends the efforts of the Way forward for Sport in Canada Commission to construct a safer and more inclusive sport system.”
“We are going to take the time to fastidiously review the commission’s full report, and we stay up for helping shape the long run of sport in Canada,” the statement read.
Governments have been prompted to act by athletes and witnesses who got here forward with their stories of abuse, harassment and discrimination, Maisonneuve said, but “transformative and profound” change is now needed.
“We must seize this chance that we now have,” she said. “We heard that folks wish to have a greater system and have an interest to work together.
“It’s time for Canada to shine on the rostrum, but in addition across this nation in hockey arenas, soccer fields, gymnastic clubs, pickleball courts, simply to name just a few. Let’s construct on the present momentum.”