They cover ongoing and recent cases in rugby, football and other sports, and look at the potential for litigation. The courts are generally sympathetic to the reasons for delaying litigation, such as shame and stigma. They write that there is ‘a societal shift underpinning the way in which claimant lawyers are testing the present legal boundaries, even though the occurrence of index events is often far from current’.
Mayor, partner at Forbes Solicitors and member of FOIL’s Sports SFT, and Gillespie, partner at Horwich Farrelly and member of FOIL’s Abuse SFT, write: ‘So great has been the increase in disclosures of non-recent abuse in sport that it seems that hardly a day goes by without a dark, depressing headline, drawing the reader to yet another traumatic tale of verbal and physical assault, inappropriate sexual activity or other degrading behaviour inflicted on young people who endured abuse and humiliation because they felt they had to in order to continue pursuing their dreams.’
