Cricket’s gender gap alarms
Domestic women’s cricketers are playing in potentially illegal conditions, reports Zoe¨ George.
On the eve of the Super Smash
Twenty20 finals at the Basin Reserve hosted by the Wellington Blaze and Firebirds, male domestic players are earning substantially more than their female counterparts.
Male domestic players receive a contract with a base retainer of $27,000 to
$54,000 plus match fees for the season, which has a minimum of 52 playing days. For tomorrow’s final they’ll receive a $575 match fee.
Female players, for the first time, were offered a contract with a $3250 ‘‘compensation’’ payment to be available for a minimum of 20 playing days for the
2019-2020 season.
Male players do spend more time on the field as they play three formats consisting of four-day, 50-over and T20 cricket. This weekend, however, both men and women will play the shortest format.
Wellington-based employment lawyer Chloe Luscombe of Dundas St law firm said under the Human Rights Act introduced in 1993 people should not be offered different, or less favourable terms and conditions for work, based on sex.
‘‘If New Zealand Cricket is offering the men paid work, and women are doing the same work at the same level, they should be offered the same terms – that includes the right to be paid and to enjoy the same legal status as the men,’’ she said.
‘‘While it is legal to exclude an adult from a competitive sport based on sex, that does not mean it is legal to pay people playing the same sport at the same level, differently where this constitutes work,’’ she said.
New Zealand
Cricket (NZC) classes female domestic players as ‘‘amateur’’, with their participation in cricket considered secondary to other fulltime employment.
‘‘Whether you call them amateur or professional is not likely to matter if that is just a mechanism to avoid legal liability for paying women and men equally,’’ Luscombe said.
NZC’s general manager of high performance Bryan Stronach said there were good reasons behind why the men’s and women’s contracts and payments were different. ‘‘It’s based around retaining player numbers and keeping the girls in the game,’’ he said. ‘‘And if we take too giant a [monetary] leap too quickly, we can actually have a detrimental effect.
‘‘We can actually wipe out a lot of players from playing the game . . . because they get stuck between their careers and trying to be a professional cricketer, where we can’t pay them enough.’’
In 2018 Sport New Zealand launched its Women and Girls in Sport and Active Recreation Strategy which outlined its desire to close the gender pay gap in sport. New Zealand Cricket does not have solid plans in place to close the gap.
But NZC is working towards giving more women the option of becoming professional cricketers.
Currently 17 White Ferns have professional contracts, with a base salary of $44,000 to $64,000 plus match fees. This is up from 15 contracts in previous years.
The Black Caps’ retainers start at $100,000 plus match fees.
‘‘We’ve made giant leaps around the White Ferns around [pay],’’ Stronach said. ‘‘I don’t think we can just get to this place where we can do everything at once around that, but we’re definitely working to improve it and increase the funding and the resources.’’
The contracts for female cricketers were signed off by NZC and the Cricket Players Association in August 2019, with more than $4 million put into the women player payment pool for the next three years. That amount is to cover international cricketers, development contracts and domestic contracts.
New Zealand Cricket Players Association CEO Heath Mills, who was part of the ‘‘robust’’ women’s master agreement negotiations with NZC, said the introduction of contracts for domestic female players was a step in the right direction. ‘‘We were really proud of the deal,’’ Mills said. ‘‘Hopefully next time we negotiate the [women’s] game is in the position where we can grow it again.’’
Mills said that it’s hard to compare the men’s and women’s games. Men play more cricket with the domestic season starting in September and finishing in April.
The men’s game is also more commercialised. ‘‘It’s not straightforward,’’ he said. ‘‘They are different environments. Women are contracted to play 20 days of cricket . . . with no obligation to turn up outside of playing [days] to train.’’
But women do put in the hard yards to prepare for the season. The unbeaten Blaze first started training in July, with players expected to attend two two-hour team sessions per week, individual training sessions with a conditioning coach and work on their fitness in their own time.
Players are also expected to arrive at the ground two or three hours before a match, and stay another hour following the conclusion of the game.
Blaze coach Ivan Tissera said many of the players did all of this while holding down fulltime jobs. ‘‘It’s a massive commitment,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s tough on the players. [But] it comes down to how much they want it.’’
Luscombe suggests the domestic female players could go to the Human Rights Commission, and ultimately pursue their claim in the Human Rights Review Tribunal. ‘‘If they can prove their claim, they would be entitled to compensation,’’ she said.
‘‘If New Zealand Cricket is offering the men paid work, and women are doing the same work at the same level, they should be offered the same terms – that includes the right to be paid and to enjoy the same legal status as the men.’’ Employment lawyer Chloe Luscombe