The Whyte Review covered a 12-year period up to August 2020
Warning: This article contains some description of graphic injuries and abuse.
Issues of physical and emotional abuse within British gymnastics were “systemic”, an independent investigation has found.
The Whyte Review, co-commissioned by UK Sport and Sport England, was released on Thursday and found gymnast wellbeing and welfare “has not been at the centre of British Gymnastics’ culture”.
It said the difficulties now facing British Gymnastics are “borne of inadequate practice and procedure”, and reflect a culture which was the product of “the way in which people behaved and were allowed to behave”.
There was a sense, it added, that British Gymnastics had “not only failed to prevent or limit such behaviours but had condoned some of them in the pursuit of national and international competitive success”.
The Whyte Review was commissioned in 2020 following allegations of abuse and mistreatment within gymnastics in Britain.
UK Sport and Sport England said they “welcomed” the report and “accepted and endorsed” its recommendations – adding gymnastics’ continued funding will “depend on its new leadership teams making significant changes to the sport” in the timeline set out in the Whyte Review.
British Gymnastics said it wanted to “wholeheartedly apologise” to gymnasts who had suffered and that it would “not shy away from doing what is needed”.
In addition to her 17 recommendations, Anne Whyte QC said a sports ombudsman would be “an obvious step in the right direction”.
She also stipulated that the British Gymnastics board publish details of its progress in complying with her recommendations at six, 12 and 24-month intervals, with the expectation that “most if not all of them” are implemented within two years.
In the report, Whyte said: “I hope that the findings in this report will allow the gymnast community to feel that the failures of the past have been publicly recognised and enable the sport to move forward and make positive changes.”
She added: “I am confident that the sport of gymnastics is already undergoing change for the good.”
What did the review find?
The review, which focused on the period from August 2008 to August 2020, received more than 400 submissions, including 133 from current and former gymnasts, and conducted 190 interviews.
Of those 400-plus submissions:
More than 40% described physically abusive behaviour towards gymnasts by coaches, including physical chastisement, inappropriate training on injury, overstretching to the point of distress and withholding food, water and access to the toilet.
More than 50% reported an element of emotional abuse by coaches, such as swearing, name calling, use of belittling language and gaslighting.
Some 30 submissions included allegations of sexual abuse.
More than 25% included reference to excessive weight management.
The review states the “vast majority” of reports about physically and emotionally abusive behaviour related to female gymnasts, and such behaviour was more prevalent at the elite end of the sport.
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On weight management, it said “the tyranny of the scales was coach-led and quite unnecessary”.
No individual coaches were named in the report, in which Whyte said the scale of emotional abuse was “far larger than British Gymnastics had appreciated”.
