Peter Dawson wants change in bad behaviour policy on golf tours – Golf News
Peter Dawson, Chief Executive of Royal and Ancient (R&A), has shown his interest in naming and shaming the players who behave poorly on the course in front of the general public.
He has also demanded not to provide the privacy given to them by the individual tours. Currently, all the disciplinary actions are taken without publicizing them in front of the ordinary people.
Whenever a player is found misbehaving, he is called for a hearing, which is done by the tour officials with closed doors.
Therefore, no one else, except the player himself, is informed about the penalties or the punishments given to him in order to maintain his privacy.
Dawson now believes that the time has come that the rules must be changed. He feels that the openness in the hearing process will discourage behaviour that brings shame to the game.
Early in this month, Tiger Woods intentionally dropped his club and then hit it hard after making a poor shot in the second round of the Masters Tournament.
The game followers were really shocked to watch their favourite player behaving in such a weird manner. Yet, no one knows what measures the tournament officials took against him, afterwards.
"The European Tour has published once or twice. Both tours know our view on that but it is a matter for them," said Dawson."I have gone on record as saying more public sanctioning would not be a bad thing".
He also committed that changing the policy in the United States is a difficult task and that the Tour officials have solid reasons behind that.
"One would have thought public sanctions would be more likely to lead to a correction of behaviour rather than private sanctions".
"We have always relied on the tours to put players through their disciplinary procedures or tour members if there is some kind of misbehavior".
Moreover, he accepted the fact that he cannot put a limited bad behaviour policy for the 2012 edition of the PGA Championship, as it will not be possible to apply a rule just for one week and discard for the rest of the year.
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