Kayaking: Legal moves in canoe feud

Ben Fouhy. Photo / Kenny Rodger

The former Olympic canoeists battling with their national body say they have now served legal papers on Canoe Racing New Zealand.

Alan Thompson, a former Olympic gold medalist and former board member of CRNZ until his recent resignation over the axing of Olympic heroes Ian Ferguson and Paul MacDonald as coaches, says CRNZ has until tomorrow to respond - or they will take the matter to the Sports Disputes Tribunal.

MacDonald has also initiated a personal grievance against CRNZ surrounding his axing - which could end up in the Employment Court.

At the heart of the move against CRNZ by all three is the selection policy allowing controversial paddler Ben Fouhy to race in Europe without attending selection trials.

In addition to fighting the loss of their jobs, Ferguson, MacDonald and Thompson are trying to have the selection policy overturned as they say it will damage the sport here.

"We don't believe that is fair; it's not sport," said Thompson. "There are other paddlers who deserve the chance to contest those spots and are not getting it. Ferguson and MacDonald have not had contracts renewed by CRNZ and spoke out last month against what they considered a campaign to oust them by CRNZ's Sparc-appointed executive.

On one side of the divide is Ferguson, MacDonald and Thompson; on the other CEO Paula Kearns, high performance manager Wayne Maher and new coach Gordon Walker.

In the backdrop is the Fouhy saga. He had a highly public spat with Ferguson, leading Fouhy to walk away from the sport before striking a deal with Sparc and CRNZ to compete at this year's world championships - but only after training apart from Ferguson and MacDonald and the rest of the team.

The canoeists say their axing was a Sparc-led strike against them; they say CRNZ CEO Paula Kearns told them the team should not protest about Fouhy's admission to the world championships in Poland earlier this year, even though he was not physically part of the team and had not been through the steps required to qualify.

MacDonald said: "We were told that legal advice suggested that, if a challenge was made, Fouhy would probably lose the legal case. So we all had to accept him on the team and Paula Kearns told us if an athlete challenged him, the Minister [of Sport, Murray McCully] would cut off funding."

They said they were also told by Kearns that McCully found it "unconscionable" that Ferguson should be coaching his son in the national team.

Kearns has denied saying any of that and, in an article in the Saturday edition of the New Zealand Herald, the minister said any suggestions of a conspiracy were "fantasy" and the idea that he directed changes was "sheer nonsense".