CANBERRA’S diving community faces an anxious wait with the city’s only springboard facility in danger of permanent closure.

The diving pool is losing a staggering 46,000 litres of water a day; that’s about 19 million litres a year; or the equivalent of an Olympic swimming pool every two weeks over summer.

It will be closed shortly in a bid to find the source of the leak and, if it’s deemed to be too expensive to repair, it will be closed permanently.

The facility has been on borrowed time since the ACT government announced plans to build the proposed indoor sports stadium on the site.

The much-needed new aquatic facility slated as part of the City to Lake plans seems light years away.

The Molonglo pool is part of the ACT’s plan for swimming facilities and it is likely to be built at Stromlo before the City to Lake project is up and running.

With the ACT government intent on City to Lake, I find it hard to accept that it would spend a lot of money on fixing the leak at Civic Olympic Pool if it is planning to knock it down in the future anyway.

In the meantime Canberra’s divers face the prospect of being without a facility for the foreseeable future.

Canberra used to host a round of the Southern Cross series but the facility has become antiquated and can’t be used in winter. This means Canberra’s top divers have to travel to Sydney or Lightning Ridge to train and compete in the winter.

Can you imagine many other sports that have to do this in the nation’s capital?

Track cyclists have had to do it over the years because of the state of the Narrabundah velodrome before major repairs.

It’s time to bite the bullet and build a major indoor aquatic facility similar to the one in Adelaide with a separate diving pool, a water polo facility, and an Olympic-sized and 25-metre pool, complete with the ability to host major competitions.

We had the chance to do it at Gungahlin but opted for a scaled-down version. It was the same with CISAC at Belconnen. Being involved in the swimming community, I can tell you first hand we don’t have a facility capable of hosting major swimming meets. The AIS is adequate for medium sized meets but struggles to respond to major events.

We need to get all stakeholders involved in swimming, diving and water polo meeting with the ACT government to decide on the best course of action.

There will be plenty of room to build it at Molonglo with the capability of catering for the size of the facility and parking. We can’t afford to again let an opportunity pass.

Cost will be a major factor, but if it can be proven that Canberra will attract major meets in diving, swimming and water polo, it should be a no brainer.

Pocock was right

I CAN’T believe the adverse reaction from many on social media to David Pocock’s stance on homophobia in the game against the Waratahs.

Perhaps we have become used to sportspeople being a stereotype where they don’t have an original thought. We crave for somebody to speak their mind on an issue they are passionate about, and then we jump on them as soon as they speak about anything other than their chosen sport.

Sport needs personalities such as David Pocock; good on him for the stance he took. It wasn’t acceptable, Pocock wasn’t grandstanding for the sake of it, and it has been something he has been passionate about for many years.

As a community we should be proud that we have the likes of Pocock representing one of our leading sporting teams.