A REPORT on its way to the Minister for Sport, Bernard Alien, recommends that the Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) no longer be directly responsible for distributing State funding.

Instead, the strategy report, commissioned by the Minister in November of last year, advocates that a committee, nominated by his officials in the Department of Education, would act as the conduit for such funding. The committee would operate out of the National Coaching and Training Centre (NCTC) in Limerick.

The effect of the proposals, if implemented, would be to divest the OCI of one of its most jealously guarded powers.

The report is scheduled to be with the Minister on Friday, and should be published early in the New Year.

It is stressed, however, that the document is purely a consultative one and that the ultimate decision on whether it should be implemented, in full or in part, rests with the Minister.

If adopted, it would mean a return to the old system whereby each national sports federation made an individual submission to the Department which, in turn, acted on the advice of Cospoir, the forerunner of the Irish Sports Council.

The main recommendations of the report will touch raw nerves after the controversies which have brought the OCI and its ebullient president, Pat Hickey, into open conflict with some of its constituent bodies in recent years.

Some organisations, notably BLE, alleged that the Olympic Council was exploiting its position as a sort of paymaster general to intrude into the workings of autonomous bodies.

The OCI, in effect, determined the extent to which these organisations were funded by Government, and the practice, it was claimed, conferred unfair advantages.

Earlier this year, there were allegations that undue pressure had been put on delegates when several outgoing officers were opposed for reelection at the annual general meeting of the council.

The counter argument for the status quo is that the OCI, by virtue of its make up, is ideally placed to make informed judgments on organisations and individuals deserving of State support.

Further, it is claimed that to dismantle the system now would be to sacrifice the lobbying power which the OCI, as the umbrella organisation for sport, has effectively mobilised in recent years.

More pertinent still, the council can claim that Ireland has won more medals in the last two Olympic Games than in the previous 50 years and that it would be folly to scrap a successful formula.

That point is given additional credibility by the fact that Britain, reacting to its worst set of results of modern years in Atlanta, has relieved its Sports Council of the responsibility of funding the Olympic team and entrusted it, instead, to the British Olympic Council.

Pat Hickey declined to comment until he has seen the document, but said that he was aware of recommendations which, if acted on, could have repercussions for the OCI.

The choice of the NCTC as the proposed administrative base is interesting. The director of the centre, Pat Duffy, a former international cross country athlete, was a member of the strategy group and may well emerge as an influential personality in a revamped funding structure.

The method of distributing grants is just one of many issues addressed by the strategy group under the chairmanship of the former Olympian, John Treacy, who is also head of the ISC.

In the course of preparing its document, the Group considered more than 400 submissions and canvassed a wide spectrum of opinion in formulating coaching structures.

The end product, it is understood, is the most far-ranging paper so far on the need to establish a comprehensive infrastructure to take account of the development of sports people from under age competition right through to senior international status.

By far the more important issue, however, is whether the requisite funding, or at least part of it, will be made available to push Irish sport into the new millennium.

The Minister is unable to provide any cast-iron guarantees about that, but he believes that with the implementation of an agreed strategy, the first important step along that road will have been taken.

"For the first time, we will at least have a defined policy, indicating where we're at and where we're going, and that is something which will help us in our efforts to bring more money to sport," he said.

"In the short term, it will offer advice on how existing resources, which in the current year totalled £30 million for sport, recreation and youth, can best be utilised.