NO PROFESSIONALISM

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 144, 14 December 1935, Page 28

NO PROFESSIONALISM

STRICT AMATEUR RULING

SWIMMING COUNCIL'S REPLY

(By. "Beltman.")

According to a recent communication from the council of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association, it appears that the swimming authorities, will not tolerate professionalism in any form on-the part of members of the affiliated clubs who are also engaged in competitive life-saving. At the annual conference of delegates of the New Zealand Surf Lifesaving Association, it was decided that the permission of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association should be asked to have some of the swimming events now held at the life-saving championships classed as- purely lifesaving events, and to permit of professional life-savers taking part in these events. It was pointed out that life-saving, though organised on a competitive basis, was. a great deal more than merely a sport. The New Zealand Surf Council this week received a reply from the Swimming Council at Christchurch stating that its letter had come before the swimming executive. "... I am directed to inform you," writes Mr. Baxter O'NeiH, secretary of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association, "that the council regrets that nothing can be done to give effect to your wishes in this matter. The amateur status is a matter solely within the perview of the Federation

International de Natation Amateur, and this body has already ruled very definitely that professionals may not take part in life-saving events. "A .very strong effort was made at the last plenary session of the federation to 1 bring •about some modification of this attitude, but Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa were the only countries "from which any support was forthcoming. In these circumstances you will see that we have no option in the meantime but to restrict all forms of competitions strictly to amateurs. Adherence to this principle is all the more important since the federation has ruled that once a man has lost his amateur status he may not be granted reinstatement. It had been the practice in this country to grant reinstatement, but the federation has forbidden a continuance of this, and at the federation's behest this association has now removed the reinstatement rule from its handbook. As in New Zealand almost all the surf clubs are affiliated to the Swimming Association, this means that not only are professionals barred from competitive life-saving in all its forms, but that any life-saver ef an affiliated club taking ■ part in a contest against a professional is. liable to disqualification for life.