Canada Hosts the World: An Examination of the First Federal Sport Hosting Policy (1967)

The Canadian federal government has a history of financing the hosting of large-scale international sport events, beginning with the 1930 Hamilton British Empire Games. Since the 1961 Fitness and Amateur Sport Act, the number, cost and impact of hosting these events has grown exponentially in an era of increasing efforts to showcase the nation on an international stage. Hosting events routinely results in a large infusion of government funding: the upshot is intensive bid competitions. Immediately following the act, the federal government furtively worked towards a hosting policy to guide its efforts in that regard. This paper tracks events and government processes influencing the development of a rational and planned approach for selecting those events (and cities) that benefited amateur sport and met other federal goals. A relatively obscure but key sport policy is uncovered and examined: the 1967 federal sport hosting policy.