SNP Plan for Scottish Olympic team

ALEX Salmond unveiled plans yesterday for Scotland to have its own Olympic team, whether or not the country is independent.

The SNP leader said that if he became First Minister next May, he would immediately start the process for Scotland to field its own team for the 2012 games.

Speaking on the first day of the SNP annual conference, Mr Salmond said there were already 13 states and territories which were not independent which had their own Olympic teams, so there was no reason Scotland could not join them.

Mr Salmond said the first step would be to convene a meeting of the governing bodies of Scotland's main sports to secure their support for the idea. If they gave their support, Mr Salmond would then approach the International Olympic Committee with a formal request for Scotland to have its own team in time for 2012 - whether or not Scotland had independence.

Mr Salmond acknowledged that there might be some athletes who preferred to compete in a British team but that is why he wanted to consult the sports administrators, to find a way through. And he argued that more Scots would have the chance to compete at the highest level with a Scottish team. He claimed that polls had shown that 78 per cent of the population backed a Scottish team.

Mr Salmond claimed that, at the last Olympics Scotland sent one athlete for every 210,000 citizens while New Zealand sent one for every 26,000 citizens.

He said: "The key thing in an Olympics is about participation and allowing a maximum amount of Scots to participate at the highest level."

Mr Salmond's plan amounts to a warning shot, fired across the bows of the BOA, showing that it that it might end up in a much worse position if it continues in its attempts to field a British football team in 2012.

"If we had a Scottish Olympic team, there would be no need for warfare between the BOA and the SFA and all athletes in all sports would have a better chance of being represented at a national level," he said.

Lesley McKenna, the British Olympic snowboarder from Aviemore, said athletes are happy to represent Scotland . "If there was a Scottish Olympic team, I would be very happy to be in it for sure" she said.