Zero tolerance...or willful blindness?
Hockey Canada's parliamentary interrogators were aghast at how the organization let the players on the 2018 World Junior team off the hook in its investigation into an alleged gang rape
Hockey Canada’s outgoing chief executive officer Tom Renney was just 91 seconds into the longest two hours of a career that is due to end in 10 days when he went on the offensive with more vigor than he ever did when he coached. He talked about how so much of the commentary surrounding an alleged gang rape involving the 2018 World Junior Championship team was speculative. And he wanted to ensure that everyone was “starting with a common set of facts.” Seemed like an odd time to be suddenly overcome with a need for everyone to have the facts straight, but let’s go with it.
“Hockey Canada is aware of reports suggesting that we failed to investigate this incident, attempted to cover it up and generally swept this matter under the rug,” Renney said early in his testimony to the Canadian Heritage standing committee looking into the alleged incident and Hockey Canada’s handling of it. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”
And Renney is 100 percent right in his assessment of “the common set of facts.” Hockey Canada did not sweep this matter under the rug in any way, shape or form. Because things that get swept under a rug can resurface at some point, usually when the rug is pulled up later. But what the organization that governs minor hockey in Canada did, and it was largely through willful blindness, was take a Dyson V8 Animal Cordless Stick vacuum cleaner to this incident. The was this was (not) investigated (properly) ensured that everything, including the rug itself, got sucked up and disposed of in very quick time. This was not a shining moment for Hockey Canada, for Renney or incoming CEO Scott Smith. Not at all.
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