The Olympic Council of Ireland yesterday strongly rejected Dail comments made on Wednesday by the Minister for Sport and Tourism, Dr Jim McDaid, and the Fine Gael spokesman on sport, Bernard Allen. In a statement released yesterday, the Olympic Council said that the Minister was "poorly briefed" on a range of issues and that a large proportion of his Dail comments were "inaccurate, misleading and damaging" to Olympic sport in Ireland. It went on to "express amazement" at Deputy Allen's lack of knowledge of the medical care situation for elite athletes.

The Minister had said he was shocked at statements made by OCI president Pat Hickey regarding job lay-offs and referred also to OCI failure to give him accounts so that he could allocate grants. Deputy Allen requested the Minister to carry out an inquiry into $100,000 presented by a an American fund raising group.

The OCI said that it had never at any stage refused to produce accounts to the Minister and that the approved accounts would be on his desk on Monday night (December 8th) after the AGM in Dublin.

They go on to state that their accounts comply with international standards of accounting and that only after clarification of a number of issues will they supply relevant cash-flow information to the Minister. The OCI add that they have supplied full information to the Minister regarding the funding of the World Student Games and the Winter Olympics in Japan next year and express "astonishment" at Deputy Allen's comments on the $100,000 fund which they say was disbursed in 1996.

"We would be delighted and pleased to meet the Minister and his officials at any time," said Hickey. "Both funding applications (for the Student Games and Nagano) are in the Minister's court and have absolutely nothing to do with OCI cash-flow projections."