Bourke yesterday revealed the "novel idea", which he claims could heavily reduce registration fees and encourage children to play a variety of sports.

Bourke is alarmed at the dramatic reduction in the number of juniors participating in sport across the city, and yesterday admitted the outlook would remain bleak if something did not change.

He made a bold suggestion yesterday, outlining the possibility of instigating one governing body to look after the registration fees for all the major junior sports.

"I have floated the idea around before and I have even taken it to the state level of softball but it seems to fall on deaf ears," he said.

"They said it would need to be formed locally.

"The concept would involve having one umbrella governing body, made up of the different associations, that handles the fees collected from the different junior sports.

"Parents would pay, say, $100 to the umbrella body for the first sport their child pays and then nothing again for any other junior sport they participate in.

"The different associations could take their cut and the rest would cover insurance and ground cost with council."

He declared the idea would be "particularly effective for rugby league, soccer and Australian football".

"It would stop parents double dipping on insurance fees," he said.

"They would pay the insurance once and it would keep their child covered for a variety of sports.

"Instead of parents telling their children they have to choose which sport they want to play they might be able to play two or even three different team sports."

Bourke said the concept of a governing body stands to be effective in a city the size of Wagga.

"My gut-feeling is that a lot of what juniors are paying in insurance is covering the seniors," he said.

"In senior and elite sport injury is an expected part of playing but in junior sport it is really only accidents yet they pay upwards of $100 for some sports.

"Ten to 15 years ago junior sport was virtually free.

"When I look back at my hometown of Leeton there were hundreds more kids playing rugby league and now there is just one club.

"The governing body would help reduce fees and put more kids back in the game."

Bourke was adamant rising registration fees are reducing junior sport participation numbers.