NPR

'Not fit for purpose': New Zealand Rugby urged to change dramatically after scathing review


New Zealand Rugby needs to change “urgently” after a highly critical review found that it was effectively a broken model, and “unfit for purpose”.

The review, which was released on Thursday morning, paints an alarming picture of a dysfunctional organisation that is effectively hamstrung by its own structure, leading to crisis points through the rugby system.

In the panel’s view, New Zealand rugby has too many professional players with the NPC seen as unsustainable in its current format, while Super Rugby clubs are also struggling financially.

Yet, hard decisions to address these challenges are effectively being kicked down the road because NZ Rugby is afraid of antagonise the provincial unions, or even effectively hold them to account for their own spending decisions.

“We question not only whether New Zealand can support so many fully professional rugby players but whether it can afford the overhead costs of 26 different Provincial Unions,” it noted in one segment.

“The NPC competition can only continue in its present form as a fully professional competition with extensive NZR financial support but Super Rugby clubs, supposedly commercial entities, are all struggling to make money as well.

“The member Unions are financially dependent on NZR. We would expect the national body to use this point of leverage to resolve these kinds of problems. We were told by many, however, that the NZR board and NZR staff are constantly mindful of upsetting the member Unions and the threat of member Unions calling a special general meeting to remove the NZR board is ever present.”

In a statement that will reverberate strongly at NZ Rugby headquarters, the review also concluded “that there is an urgent need for change is an almost universal sentiment across the sport.

“There have been multiple recent reviews of rugby in recent years. The problem definition is clear, broadly agreed upon within the sport, and laid out in detail in this review. Solutions appear elusive. In the Panel’s opinion this largely a leadership issue. “

The review put forward two key recommendations.

First, “the creation of an independent professional process to ensure the appointment of an appropriately skilled, high-performing, independent board to govern the organisation,” and second ”the creation of a Stakeholder Council (The Council) to ensure all key voices across rugby are heard and their interests represented in a collaborative forum.”

The panel was led by chair David Pilkington and also involved Anne Urlwin, Whaimutu Dewes and former All Blacks captain Graham Mourie, and steered clear of criticising individuals at the either NZ Rugby board level or on the executive.

Indeed, while it did not spare NZ Rugby from general criticism after some turbulent years, it said this was a reflection of broader issues at play.

“In recent years, even allowing for the impact of the global pandemic, NZR has suffered a series of highly publicised missteps and, with those, a loss of wider public confidence and respect,” it said.

“Given honest self-reflection, NZR’s member Unions might understand and accept that in being critical of the board they are being implicitly critical of themselves. The board they have is an outcome of the constitutional arrangements they have developed over time.”

Ymx wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 6:52 am I was actually wondering if it was Silverlake behind it.

But it was the players ?!! Talk about turkeys voting for Xmas

“In the panel’s view, New Zealand rugby has too many professional players with the NPC seen as unsustainable in its current format, while Super Rugby clubs are also struggling financially.”

I really hope they don’t fvck the NPC. It’s the best competition we have. It nurtures our players. Grass roots stuff

But is clearly just seen as a cost centre to Silverlake, who don’t profit from it.

Ymx wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 6:52 am I was actually wondering if it was Silverlake behind it.

But it was the players ?!! Talk about turkeys voting for Xmas

“In the panel’s view, New Zealand rugby has too many professional players with the NPC seen as unsustainable in its current format, while Super Rugby clubs are also struggling financially.”

I really hope they don’t fvck the NPC. It’s the best competition we have. It nurtures our players. Grass roots stuff

But is clearly just seen as a cost centre to Silverlake, who don’t profit from it.

Ymx wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 6:52 am I was actually wondering if it was Silverlake behind it.

But it was the players ?!! Talk about turkeys voting for Xmas

“In the panel’s view, New Zealand rugby has too many professional players with the NPC seen as unsustainable in its current format, while Super Rugby clubs are also struggling financially.”

I really hope they don’t fvck the NPC. It’s the best competition we have. It nurtures our players. Grass roots stuff

But is clearly just seen as a cost centre to Silverlake, who don’t profit from it.

Guy Smiley wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 1:54 pm

Ymx wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 6:52 am I was actually wondering if it was Silverlake behind it.

But it was the players ?!! Talk about turkeys voting for Xmas

“In the panel’s view, New Zealand rugby has too many professional players with the NPC seen as unsustainable in its current format, while Super Rugby clubs are also struggling financially.”

I really hope they don’t fvck the NPC. It’s the best competition we have. It nurtures our players. Grass roots stuff

But is clearly just seen as a cost centre to Silverlake, who don’t profit from it.

How do you manage to misinterpret nearly every piece of written communication you’re presented with?

Or is it a matter of ‘why’?


This has nothing to do with SL. As a condition of accepting the SL deal, the Players Association demanded the review.

Torquemada 1420 wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 7:08 am
I went to more football matches last season than rugby............

Sandstorm wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 9:22 am

Torquemada 1420 wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 7:08 am
I went to more football matches last season than rugby............

I hope that's because your kids play football at school.

OomStruisbaai wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 4:29 pm The NPC and CC is nothing more then a rugby developer since Soup started way back. At least in the CC nowadays some of the top players play. Jake White use the same players for all the competitions.

Jethro wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 12:19 am

OomStruisbaai wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 4:29 pm The NPC and CC is nothing more then a rugby developer since Soup started way back. At least in the CC nowadays some of the top players play. Jake White use the same players for all the competitions.

Not sure what is happening with the CC, but New Zealand rugby seem to go out of their way to tinker with the NPC till the fans find something better to do over the weekends. Hawke's Bay is declaring a profit year in and year out by not overly spending above their means, doesn't lead to a winning team, but hey its sustainable.

Torquemada 1420 wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 7:08 am Where to start with this? The conclusion is the game, worldwide, is in the deepest of sh*t on the eve of its show piece. Over 1/4 century now of posting on forums (inc PR variants), I've been a voice of doom on many issues (and taken serious flack for it!).

"Told you so" ? if I could foresee these problems and the massed ranks of over paid officials could not, then we are evidently run by morons and now paying the price.

Summary:

1) Professionalism.
Questioned whether rugby really could be professional. That remains doubtful in absentia of either subsidies from wealthy benefactors or a reality check from all concerned, including players, as to whether the game really is closer to football than cricket.

2) Soup.
I warned that Soup was a very clever way to benefit the Aussies who had no credible domestic comp but would eventually kill NPC and Currie and that SA would be better (from their perspective) aligning with Europe: because the Soup travel put them at a huge disadvantage whereas they were the biggest money draw. A schism was inevitable.

When Soup expanded to joke proportions, I pointed out that Aus could never support that many teams and the whole structure was becoming a bore and would implode.

3) Wales.
The regions. Yeah, Wales is a complex, clustef**k of infighting but the regions were always going to fail. Creating artificial teams that not enough real fans identified with was a bad solution. The Warriors were dead almost before playing a game and Dragons starved. Further culling looks imminent.

4) England.
Short version: a game only watched by the well heeled needed to make real efforts to engage working classes. It didn't. And meantime tried to live many times beyond its means.

5) Global.
IRB/WR has continuously
- screwed the smaller nations to the exclusion of the big boys and now even the big boys are under the cosh. We need look no further than Romania to see the effects of disparity.
- d*cked with the laws so that even us diehards don't understand or can't agree on key decisions. How TF does anyone think new fans will transfer to a game nobody can understand.

6) HEC.
FM. Talk about killing the goose that laid the golden egg. Even when an authority gets the gift horse (even if more by accident than design), the morons in charge cannot help themselves but to break it.

So, here we are.
> Wales is f**ked. Probably beyond repair.
> England is in crisis.
> NZ is unsustainable.
> Romania is f**ked. Canada and USA going backwards.
> Aus having to go through a major reset.
> Numbers are declining everywhere. Laurent and I can't even be sure what's going on in Fra where Laporte is clearly lying about the state of the game: numbers are definitely falling in many areas but rising in others and who knows what the net position is?

In many ways, it's a surprise the thing has stumbled along as far as it has.

I went to more football matches last season than rugby............

OomStruisbaai wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 8:45 am

Jethro wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 12:19 am

OomStruisbaai wrote: Thu Aug 31, 2023 4:29 pm The NPC and CC is nothing more then a rugby developer since Soup started way back. At least in the CC nowadays some of the top players play. Jake White use the same players for all the competitions.

Not sure what is happening with the CC, but New Zealand rugby seem to go out of their way to tinker with the NPC till the fans find something better to do over the weekends. Hawke's Bay is declaring a profit year in and year out by not overly spending above their means, doesn't lead to a winning team, but hey its sustainable.

Our CC is very important in developing rugby talent. Its just below URC level. But then we also have the u21/20/19 CC to fill in between schoolboy (Craven Week) and senior level. They just need to find the right calendar time for it. Our URC break is from June - Sept.

Jethro wrote: Wed Sep 06, 2023 1:36 am

OomStruisbaai wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 8:45 am

Jethro wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 12:19 am

Not sure what is happening with the CC, but New Zealand rugby seem to go out of their way to tinker with the NPC till the fans find something better to do over the weekends. Hawke's Bay is declaring a profit year in and year out by not overly spending above their means, doesn't lead to a winning team, but hey its sustainable.

Our CC is very important in developing rugby talent. Its just below URC level. But then we also have the u21/20/19 CC to fill in between schoolboy (Craven Week) and senior level. They just need to find the right calendar time for it. Our URC break is from June - Sept.

Thanks Oom, had an idea the CC was as important to SA rugby as NPC is to New Zealand rugby for offering pathways for players.

For mine, Supe rugby is seriously flawed and will continue to drain resources from the NZRU without offering anything tangible in return.

Good luck to your team at the World Cup, have a sneaky feeling they won't need it.

The New Zealand Rugby Players’ Association has threatened to break away from NZ Rugby in a dramatic escalation of their fight over the current governance model of the game in this country.

An independent report paid for by NZ Rugby last year called for major changes to the organisation’s governance, noting the constitution and the governance structures were "not fit for purpose in the modern era'', and calling for NZ Rugby's current board to resign and be replaced by an independent one.

However, the provincial unions (PUs) have dug in and are reluctant to implement the findings, which include the resignation of the 26 provincial union representatives on the board ahead of a new independent model.

The PUs effectively have proposed an alternative – that they will see out their roles and retain their influence, a bid described as “proposal 2” by the NZRPA which the organisation has found unacceptable. The 26 PUs and Māori Rugby Board will vote on their new governance model at a special general meeting a week on Thursday.

Last month, New Zealand Rugby Players’ Association head Rob Nichol described New Zealand Rugby’s current governance model as being in a state of “chaos” and said the game here was “impotent”, “disorganised” and operating in a “leadership vacuum”.

In a statement this afternoon, the organisation added: “The Adoption of Proposal 2 will result in the NZRPA being forced to establish a new governance arrangement for professional rugby in New Zealand.

“The professional rugby players of New Zealand will not be governed by the failed governance processes and outcomes currently in place in New Zealand.

“The adoption of Proposal 2 (or the status quo) entrenches these failed processes and leaves the professional players with no option but to establish alternative governance arrangements for the professional game in New Zealand.

“The adoption of Proposal 2 will be a clear sign to the professional players that PUs believe rugby in New Zealand should be governed by PUs for PUs.

“The adoption of Proposal 2 is a rejection of our wish that together we seek an NZRU Board with a mandate to govern the game for the entire rugby community and, indeed, all New Zealanders. You will be aware that the professional players and NZRU share the assets needed to operate professional rugby.

“For instance, NZRU owns the silver fern logo, the names of our great teams and the right to enter competitions such as the Rugby Championship, Bledisloe Cup and Rugby World Cup. The combination of these assets with the players creates the opportunity for professional rugby in New Zealand.

“Should Proposal 2 be adopted, or the status quo prevail, the professional players will no longer pass to NZRU, via a collective employment agreement, the right to govern the professional game.”

NZ Rugby's report, called the Pilkington Report, was demanded by the NZRPA as part of their negotiations with NZ Rugby over the Silver Lake deal.

There were questions about whether NZ Rugby would ask the board to vote on that governance model, or a watered down version of it, but in the end the organisation agreed to put make that their "Proposal 1" for next week's vote.

The NZRPA added that their break away from the establishment would include a new body to govern the professional game in New Zealand. Directors would be appointed by the professional players.

NZ Rugby would make appointments to this new body, as will, likely it's new commercial arm NZRC.

Super Rugby Clubs will be represented and "tangata whenua will of course be inherent".

"This new body, for example called ‘The Professional Rugby Tribunal’, will govern, in some sort of partnership with NZRU, the sale of media rights, the contracting of sponsors, the revenue share model, international and national competitions, the high-performance programmes and development pathways and any other activity that impacts the careers, safety, remuneration, workplace and development of professional players. NZRU will continue to govern alone the community and amateur game including provincial rugby, club rugby and other non-professional rugby activities."

Wellington Rugby chair Russell Poole, who represents the NZRU PUs on the board said Nichol's statement was a "misrepresentation" of the facts.

Asked how concerned he was about the Players' Association threat, Poole said: "It's not how serious I take their threat, I'm much more concerned around the misinformation that has gone out in the paper and the perception that puts out in the wider rugby community.

"Rob and his team, you know they are free to make their own decision around how they want to behave and react or whatever - It's purely up to them, but it's the misrepresentation in their proposal or their document today is what concerns me more."

Sandstorm wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 9:22 am

Torquemada 1420 wrote: Fri Sep 01, 2023 7:08 am
I went to more football matches last season than rugby............

I hope that's because your kids play football at school.

Enzedder wrote: Tue Jun 25, 2024 6:19 am Financial results released today - the downward slide continues but not at such a steep rate.

Always excuses, no corrections.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/350322899 ... -cup-hurts

As the All Blacks’ bruising first encounter with England last weekend showed, rugby is not a game for the faint-hearted. The same can apply off the field as well.

At the end of May, a special general meeting of NZ Rugby, the game’s national organisation, decided on a future governance structure. It marked the culmination of an arm wrestle between the national board and key provincial unions, with the latter prevailing.

Media coverage captured the depth of feeling attached to the outcome: NZ Rugby chair, Dame Patsy Ready, was reportedly prepared to resign, and the Players Association threatened a breakaway organisation for the professional game.

Behind the substantive issues of funding and board appointment models, deeper forces were at work.

Since the game went professional in 1995, there has been a longstanding tension between two institutional “logics”. One is corporate, about commercialisation, professionalisation and efficiency. The other is community oriented, about the “grassroots” voice and member representation.

Making that dual remit workable now falls to NZ Rugby and the provincial unions to progress at tomorrow’s annual general meeting. Some commentators are suggesting the future stability of the game is at stake.

Finding common ground

The challenges to the game are commonly accepted: static or declining participation rates, the financial sustainability of the professional game in a small domestic market, disrupted spectator engagement, low Māori and Pasifika presence in leadership, and questions about maximising opportunities for the women’s game.

What is contested is how the game should be funded, and how NZ Rugby should be structured to address these challenges.

The tensions that came to head in May were sparked by the investment agreement NZ Rugby made with US private equity firm Silver Lake in 2022.

Part of the deal involved NZ Rugby commissioning and publishing an independent governance review. This resulted in the Pilkington Report (named after the review panel chair David Pilkington). Published last year, the report found the NZ Rugby model no longer “fit for purpose”:

The structure it sits within was not designed for a business of this size and complexity.

The report contained two key recommendations: the selection of independent board members through an independent process, and the creation of a “stakeholder council” to ensure broad representation.

Two proposals were presented at the special general meeting. The first, supported by the NZ Rugby Board, the Māori Rugby Board and the Players Association, was rejected in favour of the second, backed by key provincial unions.

Competing proposals

At the core of the debate is a complex disagreement over achieving “independence” of board members. NZ Rugby wanted to move away from an “independence of office” model, which risked undue influence by provincial union interests, to a more corporate “independence of thought” model.

Under the previous NZ Rugby model, board members could not also sit on the board of a provincial union or similar rugby organisation (“independence of office”).

In practice, the board selection process saw candidates campaigning for nomination by provincial unions. The fear was that they may then feel obliged to promote those unions’ interests, potentially influencing an elected board member’s decisions.

However, the new Incorporated Societies Act requires board members to “act in good faith” and in the “best interests” of the organisation as a whole (“independence of thought”).

Both proposals presented at the special general meeting allow for an “open” application process, meaning candidates no longer need to be nominated by a provincial union. Both proposals also include a stakeholder council and an appointments panel in the board selection process.

However, the provincial union proposal requires three of the nine board members to have previously been on a provincial union board. This potentially narrows the candidate pool, and could see pro-provincial union members back on the board.

Given there would still be six other board members, this may not be a problem. More telling, perhaps, would be the provincial union proposal effectively giving the stakeholder council more power over the board appointments panel than recommended in the Pilkington report.

Importantly, this would give the stakeholder council the power to “sign off” on some board selection criteria and processes.

But the stakeholder council (now called a governance advisory panel) is a broad church. It provides for representation of the Māori Rugby Board, Pasifika Advisory Group, NZ Super Rugby clubs and the Players Association. Combined with an independent chair and three provincial union representatives, it can represent a range of community and professional perspectives.

All on the same team

Our research shows appointment panels have been used by New Zealand sports organisations for over 25 years. The NZ Rugby model, with a mix of independent and stakeholder perspectives on the appointments panel, is not new.

The research also suggests the two competing logics within NZ Rugby – professional/elite and amateur/grassroots – can be resolved. Both coexist in various forms within other New Zealand sporting codes.

As NZ Rugby prepares for tomorrow’s AGM and the staged implementation of the provincial union proposal, all involved will need to act in the best interests of the whole game and the NZ Rugby organisation.

Ultimately, the game’s top administration needs well-chosen representatives who can bring their individual experience and perspective to the table, but be capable of thinking and acting independently, without favouring any particular interests.

Rugby has been described as a “game for everybody and every body”. The same applies to the NZ Rugby board, the stakeholder council and the appointments panel. They’re all on the same team, contributing their respective skill sets.

Now they just need to get the ball over the line at the AGM, and then convert it between the goal posts of good governance.