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inlineAudioData.push([ {'url': 'rtsp://media1.abc.net.au/reallibrary/audio/pm/201304/20130422-pm02-swimming-cuts.rm', 'contentType': 'application/vnd.rn-realmedia', 'codec': '', 'bitrate': '40', 'fileSize': '1616268'} ,{'url': 'mms://media4.abc.net.au/winlibrary/audio/pm/201304/20130422-pm02-swimming-cuts.wma', 'contentType': 'audio/x-ms-wma', 'codec': '', 'bitrate': '40', 'fileSize': '1744921'} ,{'url': 'http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/news/audio/pm/201304/20130422-pm02-swimming-cuts.mp3', 'contentType': 'audio/mp3', 'codec': '', 'bitrate': '64', 'fileSize': '1552091'} ]); </script> </div> </div> </div>  <div class="page section"> <div class="subcolumns"> <div class="c75l">  <div class="article section"> <div class="tools"> <a class="button" href="http://www2b.abc.net.au/EAF/View/MailToQuery.aspx?http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-22/swimming-greats-say-cuts-a-shame/4644544"><span>Email</span></a> </div> <h1>Swimming greats say cuts a shame</h1> <p class="published"> Updated <span class="timestamp"> April 22, 2013 18:58:00 </span> </p> <p>The decision to cut funding for swimming has drawn negative comments from Australia's swimming greats. They see it as a possible punishment for the disappointing team performance at the London Olympics.</p><div class="byline"> Ellesa Throwden</div> <p class="source"> Source: <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/pm">PM</a> | Duration: 3min 13sec</p> <p class="topics"> <strong>Topics:</strong> <a href="/news/topic/olympics-summer">olympics-summer</a>, <a href="/news/topic/swimming">swimming</a>, <a href="/news/topic/australia">australia</a> </p><p class="media-transcript-toggle"><a href="#" class="button"><span>Transcript</span></a></p> <div class="media-transcript"> <p>MARK BANNERMAN: Perhaps not surprisingly, the decision to cut funding for swimming has drawn some comment. Former swimming greats don't like it and see it as a possible punishment for the disappointing team performance at the London Olympics.</p><p>While swimming remains the top funded individual sport, the Australian Sports Commission has cut about half a million dollars from its budget for the next year.</p><p>Ellesa Throwden reports.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: It's been a tough time for the sport of swimming in Australia ever since the poor showing in the London Olympics.</p><p>Soul searching was replaced by a public shaming of damning reports, the resignation of the head coach Leigh Nugent, and the airing of the infamous bonding session of the men's relay team.</p><p>Now former swimming greats like Jon Sieben says today's announcement of a funding cut of about half a million dollars for the next year has dealt a further blow.</p><p>JON SIEBEN: It is a shame that funding has been cut, but I don't think it's the end of the world for Australian swimming.</p><p>I think they can still produce many, many champions, and there's been probably many a year where we have produced some great swimming moments with a lot less funding.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: Do you think this is punishment for what occurred in London?</p><p>JON SIEBEN: Look, reading between the lines, I guess you could come to that opinion without them obviously stating it as a matter of fact, but it certainly would seem that way.</p><p>Otherwise it could be seen - the performance wasn't that good, so therefore they may have dropped back in the pecking order as a sport.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: Despite the funding cut, Jon Sieben - who won gold in butterfly in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics - doesn't believe it will affect swimmers' performance at the upcoming world titles in Barcelona or the 2016 Olympics in Rio.</p><p>JON SIEBEN: I don't think it should. You know, if you want to become the best swimmer in the world, it's not the money that's going to make it for you. It's about dedicating yourself putting in the hard work in the pool.</p><p>It's not about how many dollars are in the bank account.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: Some might say out there, Jon that given their poor showing in London that that's every reason to give them more funding.</p><p>JON SIEBEN: I mean there's certainly an argument for that, to say that "yes, OK, well maybe they do need some more help". Certainly, you look at the London Olympics - the London Olympic movement put a lot of funding towards their program, and they had a massive improvement, but by the same token there's also, you could say there's some wasted money put towards it.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: Wasted money is a shared concern of Olympian Bill Kirby, who won gold in the men's 400 metre relay at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney.</p><p>These days, he coaches in Western Australia.</p><p>He's disappointed but not surprised by the cut to funding and says the sport needs to reorganise the way money is spent.</p><p>BILL KIRBY: I just can't get my head around the fact that we seem to have so many different organisations shooting for the same goals.</p><p>The current model or the current structures of having so many organisations that all have administrators being paid what is these days fairly good money that could be spent elsewhere - I think that model needs to be the first thing that needs to be looked at.</p><p>ELLESA THROWDEN: According to Bill Kirby, it's a wakeup call for the sport.</p><p>BILL KIRBY: Swimming needs to lift its game. It's already been trying hard to do that, and now with a cut in funds, it's going to have to be very smart in how those dollars are actually spent.</p><p>MARK BANNERMAN: Olympian Bill Kirby ending that report from Ellesa Throwden.</p></div>  </div>  </div> <div class="c25r sidebar"> <div class="section search-simple"> <div class="inner"> <h2>Search ABC News</h2> <form action="/news/search/" method="get"> <div> <input type="text" class="text" name="query" value="" size="15"/> <input type="image" class="image" src="/news/contentblob/46178/search-button/data.png" alt="Search" title="Search"/> </div> </form> </div> </div>  <div class="section"> <div class="inner"> <h2>Top Stories</h2> <ul class="headlines"> <li> <a href="/news/2013-08-03/rudd-announces-asylum-policy/4863226">Rudd unveils new asylum seeker deal with Nauru</a> <span class="media"> <span class="video" title="Video">(video)</span> </span> </li> <li> <a 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