Tribute to a good sport (minister)

24 July 2026

ACT’s Ice Sports Federation today paid tribute to outgoing Minister for Sport and Deputy Chief Minister Yvette Berry who has announced her decision to leave the Cabinet and sit on the back bench.

Ms Berry’s decision came following ACT Integrity Commission findings that two of her staff had engaged in "serious corrupt conduct".

As Canberra’s longest serving Deputy Chief Minister, and Sports Minister since 2016, members of the ACT Ice Sports Federation (ACTISF) – ice skating, ice hockey and broomball – have worked closely with her and ACT Sport and Recreation officials to advance its mission securing government support to build a new twin-sheet ice sports centre in the national capital.

“In many respects, Yvette Berry was a true champion of the ice sports – and more widely, of the communities of sport, education, housing, women and early childhood development,” ACTISF spokesman Sandi Logan said today. “But the new ice sports facility developer’s vacillation over progressing the twin-sheet ice sports facility will be a key challenge for the incoming minister to resolve.”

The federation says the new ice sports centre project is a matter of urgency requiring a clear answer.

“It now has been more than six months since the minister and ACT Sport and Recreation demanded of Pelligra Group and Cruachan Investments specific details addressing the proponents’ concerns and their failure to progress the project,” Logan said. “The new minster would be aware this latest hold-up has been anything but ‘timely decision-making’ on the future of this important community infrastructure.

“We respect that negotiations are commercial-in-confidence and cannot be disclosed in detail, but there is a limit to our and the wider ACT community’s patience,” he added.

The federation said it genuinely appreciated Ms Berry’s support from the outset in 2016 when she engaged with the grassroots to interrogate the business case, establish the viability, and then secure Cabinet support to establish a public-private partnership with $16.2M of funding and land in Tuggeranong for the dream to progress.

“Yvette Berry will be sorely missed in Cabinet, and we want to record our appreciation for her backing of our mission, and her steadfast commitment to it ever since,” the spokesman said.

“Yvette Berry’s ministerial career boasted many highlights including new and upgraded public schools, substantial investment in public housing, free preschool for three-year-olds, and extensive upgrades at local sporting fields and facilities,” he added.