There is no doubt about it – London’s Olympic Games are under threat from all angles.
There are the usual suspects that will cause headaches to legal counsel, such as sponsorship rows, broadcasting rights issues and doping controversies. But London is seeing a new wave of potential problems sweep in to make organisers for this summer’s event more anxious than the athletes who will have to line up alongside Usain Bolt at the start of the 100 metres.
One major problem that has been gathering pace in recent months was explored several weeks ago in this magazine – two leading sports law experts warned that the games present a lucrative potential opportunity for fraud and corruption (see 16 March 2012, p12).
There is also the potential for huge sponsorship clashes, not just between athletes who may have different sponsors to those of their national associations, but also from businesses that may take a chance on ambush marketing to boost their own profits.
Howard Stupp, the director of legal affairs at the Lausanne-based International Olympic Committee, is well prepared for any potential legal brawl that may challenge him – which is no surprise considering that he is a former Olympic wrestler.
Stupp represented Canada in the 1976 Montreal games and has been with the IOC since 1984 (he says the evolution of the organisation has been ‘incredible’ during his time there). He is confident that it and the individual national Olympic committees have a viable game-plan to ensure the smooth running of what is set to be the biggest sporting event in UK history.

How is the IOC legal team structured to cope with the demands of an Olympic Games? Does the size of the team fluctuate to accommodate the difference in workload between Games?
It doesn’t go up and down; it’s not like an accordion – if anything it slowly increases.
The way the world is progressing, the way the world is evolving, the workload is always getting bigger. We’re always busy. It’s not just because the London games are taking place in a few months that we’re busy now and then we’re not going to be busy after the games. We’re always busy.
Right now we’re working on the London games, we’re working on the Sochi [in Russia] 2014 winter games, the Rio 2016 summer games, Pyeongchang [in South Korea] 2018 winter games and we’re even now preparing the host city contract for the 2020 games, with the election being held in 2013. So there’s never really any downtime.

How often do you turn to external counsel to assist with specialist issues?
We do the large majority of the work in-house. As in-house lawyers we’re a lot cheaper than external council. We nonetheless have some excellent help in the form of external council.
To give some examples, with intellectual property we work with Tradamarca [a specialist law firm based in Lausanne], with whom we have been working for many years. They help us with registrations – they have a network of agents around the world, which can help us greatly as these guys are experts.
Of course, we also have people working in-house on IP. We have one lawyer who is responsible for trademarks, another who is responsible for copyright.
Another area where we use outside council is with respect to some of our broadcast agreements, when we work with O’Melveny & Myers [a Los Angeles-based global firm]. With respect to issues concerning the EU, we work with Romano Subiotto QC [from the Brussels and London offices of US firm Clearly Gottlieb] as these are select areas in which we need expertise. Say in areas with issues concerning tax or insurance, we would then sometimes get an outside expert because we don’t have enough legal work in those areas to hire someone with just that expertise, because they are really specialised areas.

How do you approach such complex issues with a relatively small team, and what are the main challenges facing
your department?
We try to break issues down in a logical manner, and there are often big overlaps. There’s an element of intellectual property in many of the agreements, so someone might be in charge outside the IP area, but for the IP clause they will check with the IP lawyer. We try and break down the workload in the most logical manner possible, but certain areas cut across many other areas so we do our best to avoid double work.
The main challenge is just keeping up with the workload. You turn your head and you have another 20 emails in your in-box. Another challenge is just keeping up with the evolution of technology and social media; it’s creating more work and new issues.
For example, it becomes a little more difficult to protect our rights-holding broadcasters and sponsors, because through social media it’s possible that there will be more piracy and more opportunities for ambush marketing, so we really have to keep on our toes and keep educated to try and anticipate any problems and be proactive.

You mention ambush marketing, what would you say to the suggestion that while organisers have the authority to crack down on small businesses that use Olympic material without consent, the negative publicity it attracts outweighs the legal good it achieves?
We’re less concerned with small businesses; we are mainly concerned with the competitors to our Olympic sponsors. But even with the small businesses, we can’t allow small abuses to get out of hand and lead to bigger abuses. It’s important to keep a handle on it.
That said, if there is a corner store that has been using the word ‘Olympic’ for 50 years, we obviously tread in a reasonable way to address the issue. Some people are innocent and come to us in good faith, but the majority are not innocent.
There are some people who will say ‘the big bad IOC is being heavy-handed’, but we have to protect our rights, otherwise we will be legally exposed and could face damages. But I stress that we approach these issues in a reasonable manner.

Betting has been suggested as one of the biggest problems for the Olympic organisers, with in-play betting singled out as a potential hazard. What is being done to combat this threat?
We’re not against betting per se, and illegal betting is not within our remit – it is within the remit of the various countries involved – but our concern is with respect to manipulation. Sometimes that doesn’t come out clearly enough.
We have a clause in our entry forms that prohibits athletes from betting directly or indirectly, because that leads to a conflict of interest. Part of our concern comes from the fact that it is now possible to make bets that don’t have much to do with the final result. There are also people who say they are concerned about betting because now people cheat to lose. With doping, people cheat to win.
But I don’t think that betting is a problem at the level of the Olympic Games. I think betting is a problem more in the lower levels of sport where athletes may bet. But in higher levels of sport I think there is very little manipulation.

Some athletes will receive minimal backing from their national organisations and have little chance of winning a competition. Do you not feel that the temptation to manipulate results may be too great?
At this level, I think athletes genuinely try their best to win. If they win, they may be rewarded by their national committees. Also, lucrative deals may be available to those who perform well. Of course, we are still monitoring betting for suspicious activity and working closely with betting companies.

British athletes have suggested they may be forced to receive medals barefoot to avoid sponsorship clashes, following measures taken by the British Olympic Association (BOA). Was the IOC consulted on this decision?
We have a very good rapport with the BOA and its legal department. We were not directly involved [in the BOA ‘team members’ agreement’] but were aware of the issues being addressed.
Again, the key is finding the right balance. I think it makes sense that national Olympic committees have their athletes sign an agreement because the athletes are getting something, and in return they follow certain appropriate conduct as part of the team and respect certain rules.
The BOA is not preventing athletes from having their own sponsors, but the BOA would not want athletes to act in a way – especially during the games – which would ambush the BOA sponsors as they are footing the bill. Again, there are good reasons and the key thing is to act reasonably. There are a lot of people sharing the pie and we have to find a good balance so the various interests can be appropriately protected.
In the charter for specialised clothing and equipment the athlete is allowed to wear whatever he or she wants. As for when they get onto the podium, the BOA is supporting the cost to maintain the team, train the athletes and so on, so it’s up to the athletes and the NOCs to find some sort of compromise.
As to what that compromise should be, it depends on the sport and what’s at stake. Each side has legitimate interests and you have to find the right balance. It may sound obvious, but if people acknowledge that a balance must be found we have already made an excellent step forward. Now we can sit around the table and find the right balance.
Finding out about these issues early was important. Neither the BOA nor the athlete want to enter into an agreement that is unrealistic and therefore puts them in a position where they can’t deliver to their respective sponsors.

CV -- Howard Stupp

1984 – present: Has been director of legal affairs at the IOC since 1985. Now leads a team of eight lawyers at the IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Career background: A former Olympic wrestler who represented Canada at Montreal’s 1976 games, he took an electrical engineering degree at Montreal’s McGill University in 1978 before going on to study law at McGill in 1983. Using his links with the Olympic movement in Canada, Mr Stupp was snapped up by the IOC and now has a central role in the organisation of the Olympic Games.