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Tory leader David Cameron has scored a major coup by signing up Dame Kelly Holmes to help deliver a sports legacy from the Olympics.
The double Olympic champion, who has been a high-profile adviser to Gordon Brown's government, will be introduced at the Conservative conference in Manchester today.
She will take centre stage as the chairwoman of an "Olympic legacy taskforce" which will work to use the 2012 Games to boost sport.
The retired middle-distance runner, a former Army physical education instructor from Kent, will act as the Tories figurehead on sport.
Sources said she had not "defected" to the Tories but her appointment just months ahead of the election will be an embarrassment to Labour.
Dame Kelly will head a team including Olympic sailing champion Ben Ainslie, chairman of UK Athletics Ed Warner and Simon Greenberg, the outgoing communications chief at Chelsea.
Dame Kelly will appear with shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt as the Tories unveil plans for a "School Olympics" competition to be staged in the Olympic stadium after the Games.
The £10million annual event is one of a raft of measures intended to curb the "medals-for-all" culture which the Tories blame on Labour-run councils.
Figures provided by the Tories showed that just 41 per cent of primary and 36 per cent of secondary schools take part in inter-school competitions.
Under Dame Kelly's plan, schools will field teams in up to 10 Olympic sports, including athletics, swimming and table tennis. Schools will have to battle through several heats to make it to the finals. Other sports likely to feature in later years include football, rugby, netball, golf, cricket and tennis.
Tories say the annual £10million cost of the event would come from its reforms of the Lottery which would provide an extra £30million a year to sport.
The Schools Olympics overhauls the Government's "UK School Games", introduced three years ago, which features the best athletes competing for their region in the final.
But the Tories say the event cherry-picks elite athletes for regional teams and does little to promote inter-school sport. Data about schools' sports facilities will also be published under a Tory government.
Reader views (7)
Steve - What a shame you have to knock a British WINNER eh?
Suppsoe that is the British weay though..to only like good losers.
HOWEVER what we really need as Sally says is somebody like Kelly to encourage youngsters to get invovled in athletics full stop..let alone wait till 2012 when people will take some interest before going back to their football/cricket and rugby..
- Mark, Watford
Ever since this irritating woman won a couple of races a while back we've never seen the back of her.
- Steve, London
Dear Kelly
Maybe you could do something to stop the closure of swimming pools and other sports facilities which continue unabated as we head towards the Olympics.
Open air swimming in this country has been particularly badly affected, because Sport England took a policy decision over 13 years ago, not to give any more grants to open air pools. Local authorities have taken their cue from this and see lidos and outdoor pools as easy sources of "savings". Currently Holywell Mead campaigners are trying to save their pool - Wycombe District Council want to close it permanently. Our fight to save Broomhill Pool in Ipswich has just entered its eighth year.
There is no statutory protection for leisure facilities in this country and no "cap" on the length of time that a place can be without access to a decent sports centre. Councils can close centres down without warning or consultation, sometimes promising that a new centre just might be available in three or four years time! This happened, for instance, in Matlock, where their only sports centre, Sherwood Hall, was closed in 2007 with a promise that the new one might be open in 2011
This has got to change.
This has got to be part of the real legacy of the Olympics. We can't have children who are currently, say, seven years old being told that a new centre will be available to them when they are eleven or twelve.
- Sally Wainman, Ipswich
It is not a PR sleazebag we need - we need an honest accountant to name and shame those who are misappropriating the funds - and to establish those responsible for the missing millions in this the worst debacle ever. Whilst she was once able to run around a track this does not qualify Kelly Holmes as an accountant or forensic auditor.
- R.F.York, Yorks, UK
Great, by all means don't get somebody with some academic ability to sort things out. Instead play the PC card, that will help.
Seems there will be no real change in our society after the election then.
- Frank, Home Counties, England.
Surely a qualified accountant would be best to help with the 2012 legacy or are they not referring to the huge amount of debt it will leave behind?
- Bob, Cheam
It all makes sense apart from the appointment of Simon Greenberg. If the Olympic legacy taskforce needs a spin doctor/PR sleazebag to explain it then the whole thing must be bogus.
- Wally Peyton, Acton, UK
