I’m not sure what to think about the review into the Black Stick’s women’s hockey team. Lawyer Maria Dew found 24 of the 33 current and past players she interviewed had serious concerns about what she called a “negative environment”. She also found Hockey NZ had not done enough to respond to players’ concerns and to promote players’ welfare. Dew made five principal recommendations. These are shown in the table below.

The reason for my confused attitude towards the Dew Report is because on the one hand I believe there has been a precious wallflower attitude in hockey towards a tough and successful coach. Player power has been allowed to run riot. On the other hand I support Maria Dew’s criticism of the head office of hockey and especially its attitude to health and safety, well-being, discrimination, bullying and harassment. Let’s look at each of these separately.

First – the accusation that players are wimps; too soft to hack the tough side of good international coaching. There is evidence that this is certainly true. Financial supporter Sir Owen Glenn seems to think so. Radio DJ Mike Hosking thinks the sport has gone soft.The Chairman of Hockey, Mike Bignell, couldn’t even define “negative environment”. I have little doubt Mark Hager was a tough coach from the old school. But then so was or are Arthur Lydiard, Rusty Robertson, Dick Tonks, Arch Jelley, Duncan Laing, Steve Hansen and hopefully me.

Have I occasionally told an adult swimmer that their training effort was not good enough? I have even suggested that playing marbles would be a better use of their time. I have told Eyad and a dozen other senior swimmers that my Grandmother could swim better than them. Representing your country does not come easy. It is an awesome responsibility that requires the highest standards of application, discipline and performance. If, as they say, the fire is too hot in the kitchen, leave and do something else.

In this instance NZ Hockey and Maria Dew have failed to communicate that message. Hockey NZ Chairman is “deeply sorry” and begging for forgiveness. The players are running the asylum. There has been a mutiny. Captain Hager has been executed and the mutineers are sailing around the world on their personal “Bounty” at our expense. Two or three mutineers blamed a “toxic environment” when I suspect the only thing toxic was the player’s attitude to hard work and good old fashioned discipline.

And then on the other hand the Dew Report takes a shot at the administration of Hockey. If my experience in swimming is anything to go by these accusations and recommendations could well be true. How did Maria Dew put it? That’s right, she said – “Schedule opportunities for players to educate themselves on a HR policies, among them health and safety, well-being, discrimination, bullying and harassment.”

Swimming New Zealand (SNZ) could well take that recommendation to heart. Oh, SNZ say all the right things in the sport’s Code of Conduct but Cotterill and Johns act as though the rules do not exist. I have no doubt they will continue to act as petty dictators, above the law, until it is too late and swimming looks as ridiculous as hockey. When that does happen – and it will – it will do none of us any good to say we told you so. In my opinion those two guys are as dumb as a post. And a post has the advantage of modesty.

I guess making the accusation that swimming ignores the Dew Report’s recommendation requires me to give examples.

Well here is example one. There is a coaching member of SNZ. Two years ago SNZ received a complaint about his coaching. The accusations were outrageous. They included claims that the coach had recommended senior female swimmers get pregnant so that they could take advantage of an early pregnancy boost in blood levels to train harder. The coach then said, according to the complaint, that the pregnancy should be terminated before the additional blood was required by the foetus. The coach was also charged with forcing senior female swimmers to attend an Auckland strip club.

SNZ took the complaint seriously and hired a senior criminal psychoanalyst to investigate and report on the complaint. SNZ assured the coach he would be given a full copy of the final report. The coach spent three days being grilled on the charges. It was a chilling experience. He said, she said, situations are always troubling. A report was prepared and the coach waited for his copy. It never arrived. He asked SNZ to honour their promise and send him the report. They refused. SNZ had lied. They were in breach of several of their Code of Conduct rules. Their behaviour made the problems in Hockey look like a Sunday school picnic.

The coach complained to the Privacy Commissioner. That organization is currently deciding on the legality of the SNZ refusal to provide the coach with the report. I suspect the conclusion will be that SNZ has acted with no regard for the “health and safety and well-being” of the coaching member. SNZ’s actions have shown the worst aspects of “discrimination, bullying and harassment”.

You may be wondering how does David Wright know this is a true story? I know because I am the coach. I will let you know what the Privacy Commissioner decides.

My second example involves a swimming member of SNZ. He had a difficult start to his swimming career. His home in Syria was bombed into a pile of rubble and family members were murdered by – we don’t actually know who pushed the button or pulled the trigger. It might have been an American or a Russian or a member of the Syrian army. I guess it doesn’t matter who. A pile of rubble and dead bodies don’t change because of where the bullets were made.

The swimmers family escaped to Saudi Arabia. Swimming was a struggle there as well. The Saudi government would not let him swim in their public swimming pools. The reason? He was Syrian and in apartheid Saudi Arabia, that’s enough.

Eventually he applied for refugee status in New Zealand and was accepted. His swimming began to improve. After one year in New Zealand he had best times of 51.71 for 100m SC freestyle and 23.64 for 50m SC freestyle. He was faster than the Syrian who had swum for the International Olympic Committees (IOC) refugee team at the Rio Olympic Games. Perhaps he too could join the IOC’s team and receive assistance to compensate for the impossibly difficult start to his swimming life.

But there was a problem. His IOC application had to be approved by the NZ Olympic Committee (NZOC) and they turned him down. Acting on information they received from SNZ, they said he wasn’t fast enough. He didn’t meet their standards. When he was faster than any other swimmer on the IOC refugee team why did SNZ and the NZOC have a problem? What was the real reason for refusing to progress his application?

Like the bullets that murdered his family members I guess the real source of the IOC and SNZ “discrimination, bullying and harassment” doesn’t matter. Its effect is just as devastating as the Saudi apartheid. New Zealand is a better place than that. The NZOC and SNZ deserve to be held to account and they will be. How do I know? I coach the swimmer. His name is Eyad Mosoud.

New Zealand sport is not being well led. On that Maria Dew and I appear to most certainly agree.