This month the team at Sport Integrity Australia bid farewell to our Deputy CEO of Strategy and International Engagement Darren Mullaly as he packs up a rich history in Australian sport taking on the role of Government Relations Director at the World Anti-Doping Agency. Darren has much to celebrate after an 18-year career protecting the integrity of sport in Australia.

With a background in law and accounting, Darren joined the former Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) in 2006 taking on a role in Legal Services. In 2020, with the creation of Sport Integrity Australia (SIA) Darren became Deputy CEO of Strategy and International Engagement.

Darren has an impressive CV, including leading SIA’s strategic policy units and international engagement, representing the Australian Minister for Sport and Australian Government at key international sport integrity meetings, and being the Minister for Sport’s Registered Deputy at WADA Executive Committee and Foundation Board meetings. 

Our Media Advisor, Tim Gavel, sat down with Darren before his departure to reflect on his career at SIA and chat about the new opportunities ahead with WADA.

Vodcast available via Sport Integrity Australia YouTube channel.

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This episode of our podcast On Side talks to champion cyclist Anna Meares, Australia’s new Chef de Mission for the Paris Olympic Games, and Sport Integrity Australia’s Advisory Council Chair Sarah Kenny. 

They discuss the importance of embedding integrity in sport, how to create a safe environment for athletes to perform in and their roles in influencing the sporting landscape.

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This episode of our podcast On Side talks to Play the Aussie Way campaign ambassadors, NBL legend Cal Bruton, Ellie Cole, Australia’s most decorated female Paralympian, and young soccer player Harry about the culture shift they hope to lead.

While Playing the Aussie Way means something slightly different to each of them, there are common themes – respect, inclusion, fun and trying your best.

Sixteen-year-old Harry says his enjoyment of sport changed when he took the result out of the equation.

“Last year was the first year I tried just playing for fun and I really felt more connected to the sport and felt more like I wanted to play each week and like I wanted to go to training,” he says. “So I think that's the better way to approach the game.”

Basketball coaches are renowned for histrionics, with Cal even admitting he was at the wrong end of the whistle once. The NBL Hall of Famer, who still has to deal with racism in sport, says “it's always the challenge”.

“I try to live my life to be the best possible person I can be and be a mentor and a leader for all young disadvantaged youth that are looking for an opportunity to be on the right track and grow and sport is a just a tremendous vehicle for that.”

And, while there are still challenges when it comes to racism and discrimination, sport has come a long way.

Ellie says this really hit her at the Tokyo closing ceremony.

“I was wrapping up my entire 17-year Paralympic career and I was surrounded by people who have chosen to be the best version of themselves despite what has happened to them,” she says. “That's exactly what Play the Aussie Way is about. It's about everyone having access to an opportunity like what I had.”

Find out more information at https://www.sportintegrity.gov.au/

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Hosted by Tim Gavel, in this week’s program we explore life after sport and how hard it is for athletes to find their niche.

We talk to AFL forward Josh Bruce, who retired near the end of the AFL season, 3-time Olympic gold medallist, swimmer, Petria Thomas, and Ben Hardy, an Olympian and former captain of the Australian national volleyball team.

Find out more information at https://www.sportintegrity.gov.au/

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Produced by Ryan Micallef

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Mental Health Awareness Month (October) encourages all of us to think about our mental health and wellbeing.

In this episode of On Side, we talk about mental health, the impact and how we can make mental health and wellbeing a priority in sport. We are joined by former ABC sports broadcaster and mental health advocate, Craig Hamilton, and Georgia Ridler, Sport Integrity Australia's consulting Mental Health Advisor.

Craig talks about his own mental health battles, which manifested at the peak of his career as he was preparing to be part of the ABC commentary team for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.

“It changed my life significantly because I went into hospital with a manic episode and I came out of hospital with a diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder and therefore had been diagnosed at that point with a mental illness,” Craig says.

“It changed the way I had to live my life and the choices I made, the decisions I made and my lifestyle.”

Mental health does not discriminate, he says, and has impacted high-profile sports stars including Wally Lewis, Andrew Johns, Nathan Thompson and Wayne Schwass.

“It doesn't matter how good you are, your ability has got nothing to do with it.”

He also talks about the release of his documentary The Promise that aims to spark a conversation, an action and a solution for mental health and suicide prevention. Among those featured are sporting legends Wayne Bennett, Tim Tszyu, Paul Harragon and Joe Williams and media personality Jessica Rowe.

We also speak to Georgia Ridler, Sport Integrity Australia’s consulting Mental Health Advisor.

Georgia has been a leader in mental health and sport over the past 20 years and was the Olympic Psychologist for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

She says the conversation around mental health in a sporting context is changing.

“I think the conversation is certainly open and people may not be getting it perfect yet. We're all human, but I think it's a more open conversation for athletes and staff, which is fantastic, and I think it will only become more open,” she says.

She discusses the triggers for athletes, whether it being anxiety from being away from home, travelling, expectations, injuries, as well as the conflicting values in an elite sporting environment, the added distractions an athlete today faces and how to build resilience.

Ridler says if a high-performance culture is engrained in the sport, it has benefits in the field of play.

“If culture is built well and there is a strong focus on wellbeing, then typically the work is done, particularly if we're focusing on an athlete,” she says. “Typically … if the person feels very supported, that means that then when they go into those high-performance environments, high pressure moments, they can actually just focus on performing in the moment and that's the ideal situation.

“That's always the trick of being a high performing athlete at the top. It's a matter of being able to put all of the things into place before that moment of performance and then be able to just focus on what's necessary.”

 It is important to look after your mental health and wellbeing and seek support if you need it.

If this podcast has triggered you in any way, or if you, or someone you know, is in immediate danger, please call 000, visit your nearest hospital emergency, or call a crisis helpline.

You can call: LIFELINE on 13 11 14 or BEYOND BLUE on 1300 224 636.

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Former Matilda Michelle Heyman is featured in the latest episode of our podcast On Side.

Michelle played for Australia 61 times between 2010-2018, booting 20 goals before a series of injuries forced her to retire from international duties in 2019.

When Cortnee Vine’s penalty kick hit the back of the net against France, the whole of Australia roared as one. The recognition and support was a long time coming, says the former Australian striker.

“This is something that I think every single Matilda or every single female athlete has wanted for such a long time, she says. “To see something so special like our World Cup, to see those numbers, to see the amount of people in the stands on home soil is incredible. We've pushed for this. We've tried to sell our brand for a very long time.”

She says the support the team received from other sporting teams – men and women - was incredible.

“Seeing the Boomers with all their jerseys on and changing the time of their game just so they could watch the girls, that's something special.”

The W-League all-time record goal-scorer also talks about the Matildas' inspiring run to the semis, the growth of female sport and what keeps driving her on the pitch.

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The latest episode of our podcast On Side explores the evolution of Paralympic sport in Australia. It also discusses the need to include Paralympic voices in the decision making, along with the role Paralympic sport can play as a vehicle for greater social inclusion and to understanding disability.

It features Paralympians:

Ella Sabljak, an Australian wheelchair basketball and rugby player, and a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Athlete Council and Sport Integrity Australia’s Athlete Advisory Group, and

Richard Nicholson, a two-time Paralympic silver medallist and part of Sport Integrity Australia’s Sports Partnerships team.

What began as a simple “rallying of the troops” as a team captain has led to multiple roles as an advocate for athletes for Ella, including as a member of Paralympics Australia’s Athlete Commission.

“I’ve always fought for the underdog and love helping athletes have their own voice,” she says. “You don’t really realise that athletes’ voices aren’t heard. It’s not until you’re sitting back at home after the fact and you really wish you could have made an impact or you’re seeing things differently, so I think that reflection piece as an athlete moving forward has really shaped how I carry myself and how I approach situations now.”

Her appointment on the WADA Athlete Council is testament to her efforts in standing up for athletes, however she urges us all to be a “champion of change, so no one is left behind”.

She also discusses the Paralympic classification system, doping in Paralympic sport, discrimination and the need for education.

Richard, a two-time Paralympic medallist across two sports, discusses the evolution of Paralympics and disability sport in Australia.

When he first began competing in disability sports he says he “didn’t know where” he fitted in among a “confusing” number of competing agencies.

He says his first Paralympics experience in Atlanta was disappointing, in terms of the experience and his results.

“Like all athletes, I was excited to get inside the village and when we arrived there was a swarm of tradies tearing down various events and various things inside the village and dismantling it and I thought ‘what’s going on here, we haven’t even started yet?’ The Paralympics in 1996 were literally saved by a philanthropic donation … or those Games would have been cancelled all together.”

However, there was one incident at the Sydney Paralympic Games that changed his feelings about sport and his role within it. While he on his way to watch an event he came across a young boy with his mum, who asked her: “I wonder what sport that man plays?”

The Games was a “watershed moment” for disability sport in Australia, he adds.

“That’s when I started looking at the bigger picture and how I could be involved in changing that for the better.”

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The latest episode of our podcast On Side looks at the issue of safeguarding participants of sport. It discusses the findings of the Australian Child Maltreatment Study and what it means for sport, and the work done as a result of Sport Integrity Australia’s review of the Western Australian Institute of Sport’s Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Program.

The interview features:

Professor Daryl Higgins Director, Institute of Child Protection Studies, Australian Catholic University

Kait McNamara Director, Child Safeguarding, Department of Local Sport and Cultural Industries (Western Australia)

Emma Gardner A/g Director Safeguarding, Sport Integrity Australia.

Professor Higgins revealed the findings of the Australian Child Maltreatment Study which showed 62% of Australians had experienced 1 or more types of maltreatment.

Concerningly, maltreatment is chronic, not isolated, according to the study, with 2 in 5 experiencing maltreatment.

“We're just scratching the surface,” he said.  “We know that many forms of abuse and neglect are more prevalent for women compared to men and … looked at changes over time, gender differences, age cohort differences and that's really the power of a study as comprehensive as ours is.”

He said the response to the study was positive.

“We're already seeing that in terms of different sectors saying how valuable the data is to them, both in terms of prevention, knowing how extensive it is and therefore what are some of the drivers that we need to be addressing in our community, but also in terms of responses.

“We know now that one of the really significant drivers of the scourge that we have in Australia of mental ill health is childhood experiences of abuse and neglect.”

McNamara said the findings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse showed there was no type of institution that escaped this type of abuse and harm of children.

However, that the response from sport is crucial.

“It’s crucial for them being just aware of who can support them if something does happen at their club, who do they need to contact in the police, who do they need to contact … So I think it's around not putting our heads in the sand and making sure we just accept the fact these things could happen.

“We prevent them where we can, but if they do occur, how do we support that young person in a very, very critical moment because that can really shape how they then move forward from their journey.”

The key risk areas identified by the Royal Commission – such as transporting children and overnight stays – are still the same key increased risk areas that Sport Integrity Australia was seeing, according to Gardner, from Sport Integrity Australia.

“Overwhelmingly the largest proportion of complaints [Sport Integrity Australia receives] involve children,” she said.

Those complaints snowballed after the release of the documentary Athlete A, but “gymnastics is not an island”, she said.

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Former Olympic sprinter Patrick Johnson has joined Sport Integrity Australia as a Culture and Safety Advisor to ensure our responses are appropriate and informed.

In this edition of On Side, Patrick talks about his role in helping to develop an agency and a sporting landscape that is culturally capable, respectful and engaging.

“I think there's a shift to understanding sport as a vehicle for health, for education, to awareness, but also know what it means around reconciliation,” he says. “And I think that there's a sense of the next nine years until Brisbane 2032 that we want to ensure that all Australians are part of the Olympic Games and part of sport and that's probably a bigger picture that we've looked at.”

He says the shift is even more important with the 2032 Olympics on the horizon.

“You can see the shift around real respect, real acknowledgment and real understanding. There has to be a pathway regardless of where you live in this country. If you want to be a great sports person then let's make sure you have the opportunity ... It should be not just for the rich, it should be for every single person in this country to aspire, believe and could be part of.”

He says the great thing about many athletes is that they are driving the change themselves because they see Australia and sport as diverse and multicultural.

“But how do we ensure that it's for everyone? And I think the great thing that we've got in Australia, there's a real movement within athletes in this country that are really the game changers.”

Best known for being the only Australian man to smash the 10-second barrier for the 100m, Patrick also discusses his career path, the importance of language, the role of the media, and his hopes for the future of sport.

We also talk to former Australian Diamond captain and world champion Caitlin Bassett who, too, has recently taken up a role at Sport Integrity Australia as an Athlete Educator.

Education has come a long way since she began her career, she says.

“The information that I was getting at the start of my career and the information I was getting at the end was vastly different,” she says. “I was always learning every time we came together to do an education session, whether it being around drugs and sport, whether it be around integrity issues, around wagering and betting in sport and things like that, it was always something new and something learning because sport was evolving at such a rapid rate.”

For many years the poster girl for Australian netball, she says the profile also came at a price, particularly when social media came along.

“By opening up your life and sharing your life to them “[fans] is a great way, I guess, to bring them along on the ride with you,” she says, “but you are also opening yourself up to the negative side and that is obviously abuse and some of the unkind comments that come along with it.”

Those comments were not only from “fans” ready to critique her performance, but from disgruntled gamblers, she says.

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In the latest episode of our podcast On Side, esteemed lawyers Richard Young and Adair Donaldson provide incredible insights into their roles, including on anti-doping and abuse cases.

Young, a leader in anti-doping litigation, has worked on the cases against Tour de France winners Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis, Marion Jones, and the BALCO doping scandal. He also worked on the Essendon supplements case.

He says he lost sleep over “all of them” and admits there has been push back as a result of his work.

“I'm not real welcome in China because of Sun Yang,” Young admits. “I'm not going back to Russia because of my role in the Russian investigation. After the Essendon case I sure got a lot of letters from Melbourne … I’ve been back to Melbourne, but I don't think I'd run for political office there.”

Adair Donaldson, who specialises in assisting survivors of trauma, says the independence offered by National Integrity Framework gives sports a lot of comfort.

“That's really very important,” he says.

He admits, however, that the Framework will not always satisfy everybody.

“And that's going to be the case no matter what … [it’s] a lot better than what we've had in the past, so that to me, is a really good step in the right direction.”

Donaldson, who works closely with sporting bodies addressing cultural issues with respect to harassment, abuse, violence, and alcohol-related issues, suspects the reason why athletes are coming forward now is that “they feel confident that they will be listened to. Isn't that good? Because in the past these people have just suffered in silence.”

Young admits prosecuting abuse, particularly emotional abuse, is difficult.

“That will be one of the issues for Sport Integrity Australia. Is it emotional abuse? Is it motivational coaching? Is it what good coaches do? Or is it emotional abuse? And you know they’re egregious examples like coaches beating their athletes, physical abuse, but the emotional abuse gets tough, but you gotta deal with the cases and bring them if you want kids to be safe in sport or you want any athlete to be safe in sport.”

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