The Australian Olympic Committee is saddened to learn of the passing of Pat Geraghty following complications with a heart problem. Our thoughts are with his family, friends and colleagues.
Pat was the former Federal Secretary of the Seamen’s Union of Australia (SUA) and instrumental in ensuring that Australian athletes were able to compete at the Moscow Olympic Games in 1980.
The SUA, now known as the Maritime Union of Australia, raised $50,000 to send the Australian Olympic Team to Moscow in 1980, defying demands for a Games boycott by the Fraser Government.
“Pat Geraghty's support and encouragement was critical for those of us who believed in the rights of our athletes to compete in the 1980 Moscow Olympics,” AOC President Jon Coates said.
“Pat had a genuine affection for the Olympics and the role of the Olympic movement in promoting peace and mutual understanding. He was always keen to hear how our next generation of athletes were going. Only yesterday I had planned with Pat's son Matt to visit him in hospital this morning. I am so very sad that I did not have the opportunity to tell Pat just how confident we are about our Team's prospects for Rio.”
At the AOC Annual General Meeting in May 2010, President Coates honoured Pat Geraghty and the Union. It was timely as it coincided with the release of the Federal Government’s “Cabinet-in-Confidence” documents from 1980, following Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.
“It is important to remember the bitter struggle the Australian Olympic Committee and our athletes went through to participate in the Moscow Olympics of that year,” Coates said in 2010.
The Team size dwindled from 273 athletes to 123 and corporate sponsors withdrew financial support leaving the team desperately short of funds.
The rank and file members of the SUA stepped in donating $10 each in a drive to raise $20,000. By July 1980 SUA members nationwide had donated $25,000 and money was still coming in. By the time fundraising finished the SUA handed over a cheque for $50,000.
Athletes from 17 sports were helped by the unions.
“It was only through the generosity of the Labour movement which stepped in to raise the necessary funds that enabled the Team to compete in Moscow,” said John Coates, who at that time was Honorary Secretary of the Australian Amateur Rowing Council and Olympic Fundraising Director in NSW.
“We may have appeared like strange bedfellows but the SUA and the Olympic movement shared a common goal of world peace,” Coates said.
Coates says “it instilled in him the need for the AOC to be independent of Government and the AOC would no longer accept Government funding. It made me realise that you’re not really independent unless you’re financially independent.”
In a Vale to Pat Geraghty, MUA National Secretary Paddy Crumlin wrote today, “Pat was a remarkable person and, of course, will be greatly missed. We are reassured in, our grief at his passing, that he lived a life that brought hope, opportunity, peace, support and decency to maritime and other workers in this country and across the world.”
