It’s simple: rugby must change
Rugby is a unique and vital part of New Zealand culture. That is why those who run the game must find a way to change. Even as the top teams have played astoundingly well this year, rugby’s run of scandals has provoked deep unease in many Kiwis. The sport’s responses have revived the stereotype of a macho, reactionary institution that should have been banished to history.
Rugby’s administrators are adamant that this is not really the case, and that there is a huge well of energy behind making the sport more tolerant and progressive. The talk sounds good. But they need to do much more to show that it means something.
Observers also point out that rugby’s structure makes change difficult. Provincial unions, with ancient traditions of sending their own time-serving male leaders to the top table, are especially resistant. That is no excuse. Our advice is simple: find a way. Specifically, New Zealand Rugby’s failure to include a single woman on its board – the body that sets the strategy and direction for the game – is a disgrace. It must find a way to fix this, by constitutional change, by appointments or by local unions seeing the light.
While it is at it, it might do something about the ethnic balance of the board too. Where are the Pacific Island leaders in a sport that derives such huge benefit from Pasifika players?
Changing the board is not enough either. Rugby must make concrete change at every level. The sport embraces its role as the national game, with all the attention, expectation and riches that come with that. But it should therefore understand that the country has a strong interest in knowing that it will handle terrible behaviour appropriately.
When its stars are in the gun, it must be willing to use independent reviewers to establish the facts. It has contractual obligations to its players, but it also has powerful obligations to its broader community. If contracts need to be altered to allow this sort of interrogation, then the union must find a way to do it. The players, too, should understand that they suffer when the public loses faith in their minders.
Equally, the union must tackle troubling cases long before public outrage forces action. It needs crystal clear policies around all violence cases, for instance. They are not new, and they will happen again. The union needs to red-flag them and move on them proactively. The public will only revolt if players are seen to be escaping censure.
Finally, New Zealand Rugby ought to commit to more transparency – its controlling, precious style with everyone from journalists to historians is misguided.
Yes, there are barriers. And yes, rugby’s history means it invites suspicion. Some critics will attack the game, no matter what it does.This newspaper is not among those. The sport deserves credit for its magnificent on-field success, some of which derives from astute management. Its recent panels on diversity and player integrity are promising signs.
Yet for now, that is all they are. Too much of what has happened this year suggests a sport with a culture problem. What comes next is crucial.
Rugby has obligations to players – and to the country.