2016/14: Did Australia spend too much in preparation for the Rio Olympic Games?
Introduction to the media issue
Video clip at right:A televised report from August 24, 2016, of the Australian Olympic team being welcomed home in Sydney. If you cannot see this clip, it will be because video is blocked by your network. To view the clip, access from home or from a public library, or from another network which allows viewing of video clips.
What they said...
'The Olympic ideal was simply to compete in an open, friendly international atmosphere and...winning...was a secondary issue. Money and national ego have trumped this naive idea and left us with a scandal-ridden mess'
Tony Priestley, letter writer to The Age
'To be role models for so many, especially kids, who will be inspired to follow in your footsteps, these are magnificent achievements'
Australia's Governor General, Sir Peter Cosgrove, addressing Australia's returning Olympic athletes
The issue at a glance
By the fourth week of August, 2016, with the end of the Rio Olympics fast approaching, recriminations had already begun within Australia over the Olympic team's failure to achieve the results that had been anticipated from it.
A News.com.au report dated August 22, 2016, included the observation, 'There have been rivers of tears and dashed dreams from Australia's best in Rio as one after another, our greatest medal hopes have failed to reach the heights predicted for them.'
This relative disappointment translated into discussion as to whether the team's performance warranted the large investment in taxpayer money that had been directed toward it.
Though various of the Olympic team managers, and numerous prominent Australians, including the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, praised the athletes' and thanked them for their efforts, the debate over the value for money that Australia's Olympic funding represents continued after the athletes returned home.