CA offers equal remuneration to both male and female cricketers

In a bid to give more financial security to Australia women’s cricket team, Cricket Australia (CA) has given their nod to include women cricketers in a single Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for the first time. CA has been keen on breaking the fixed revenue-percentage model to which the Australian cricketers have strongly disagreed.

Australian Cricketers Association (ACA), who works as a bargaining agent for the cricketers since its formation in 1997, has voiced the players’ disagreement against CA’s proposal of breaking up the revenue model which has been around since 1998.

CA has submitted a proposed offer to the ACA which emphasizes equality and is hopeful that a completed agreement will be signed before June 30.

“We are pleased that the Australian Cricketer Association agrees with us that women, for the first time, should be part of the MOU, and we have proposed a financial model that has gender equity at its heart,” James Sutherland, the CA chief executive said.

According to this model, women’s wages will see an increase by 125% compared to their current deals. Sutherland also declared that the overall increase in player remuneration in the next MOU will be increased to A$ 419 million, giving the players an increase of 134% from their last MOU which expires in June.

“Under the proposal, women will receive an immediate average pay increase of more than 125%. As a result, our international women cricketers will see their average pay increase from A$79,000 to A$179,000, as of July 1 this year. By 2021, we expect to see our international women cricketers earning an average of A$210,000.”

Sutherland has reiterated that the revenue model which has been in place for 20 years has to change for the betterment of cricket in Australia. By scrapping the old model, CA will be in a better position to invest in the grass roots of the game.

“It was a means to an end, not something that has to hold us back from providing players with financial certainty, a fair deal for all players including women, and the flexibility to invest in the grassroots of the game.”

The CA chief executive has emphasized on equality in minimum wage rates of both male and female domestic cricketers but believes that a fixed revenue structure should be reserved for only the top male players as they provide most of the windfall from international games. But to provide financial stability to all the cricketers, Sutherland has proposed to offer a guaranteed minimum amount to all players.

“We have placed the emphasis on increasing the guaranteed amount that the men will receive, rather than rely on any projected increase in revenue,” Sutherland said.

“We understand that the ACA prefers the status quo, but CA believes that the model devised in the 1990s, which is based on a fixed percentage of revenue, has served its intended purpose – to make Australia’s cricketers some of the best paid sportspeople in the country.”

Steve Smith and Meg Lanning had co-signed a letter to CA that they have formally appointed ACA a collective-bargaining agent and had requested both parties to negotiate on the next MOU instead of speaking to the cricketers directly. CA and ACA have been in talks since then in regards to the wages of their country’s cricketers.

“This is a landmark agreement. We are now looking forward to sitting down with the ACA to work through the details and we are confident we will be able to announce a completed agreement before June 30.”

Both Sutherland and the ACA chief executive Alistair Nicholson have spent time with the Test team in India in recent days. Australia is in the middle of a grueling Test series and such discussions might cause distractions amongst the cricketers but   Sutherland believes it won’t affect the team’s focus at all. The players still stand against CA’s efforts of breaking up the revenue sharing model and are hopeful that the CA and ACA will be on the same page soon.

While Nicholson believes that the new proposal from CA looks promising but needs a more stringent examination before anything is finalized. “Like all such proposals the devil is always in the details. For the moment, what can be said is that this proposal shows a number of promising signs that indicate that CA has been taking the ACA’s lead on various key points from our MOU submission”. The cricketers will be further advised by the ACA after seeking necessary clarifications with the CA in regards to the proposed MOU.

The more imminent challenge for Australia at the moment lies ahead in Dharamsala where they face India in a series-deciding contest.

Written by Salman Khan