From the Daily Telegraph,
NRL 2023: Peter V’landys tables $1.32 billion pay deal to players, RPLA to end CBA negotiations
After months of fiery negotiations, the NRL have tabled a historic deal to make its star players the highest-paid generation in rugby league’s 114-year history.
Peter Badel and
Brent Read
The ARL Commission has tabled a landmark $1 billion deal that will make NRL stars the highest-paid generation of players in rugby league’s 114-year history.
And rugby league’s
female players have also been offered a groundbreaking package with the NRLW’s elite to share in a $115 million salary bonanza.
After months of
fiery negotiations between the NRL, clubs and the Rugby League Players Association, News Corp can today lift the lid on the extraordinary pay deal to make the code’s stars richer than ever.
Incredibly, the seven-figure deal - which was tabled in late September and would finally seal rugby league’s most lucrative Collective Bargaining Agreement - has been rejected by the RLPA.
Top-secret documents obtained by News Corp show the NRL has offered a record $1.32 billion deal to the code’s 510 full-time stars over the next five years - the first $1b pay deal for players in the sport’s history.
The previous five-year deal was worth $980 million. The NRL’s latest offer represents a 34 per cent funding increase and would lift the average men’s salary from $325,000 to $400,000 next season.
That’s a pay rise of 23 per cent.
At a time when the nation’s wage growth is 2.7 per cent, NRL players stand to receive a pay rise 10 times that of the average Australian.
The average NRL player’s proposed $400,000 salary is more than four times the national average wage of $92,000.
The NRL have been accused of “lowballing” the players, but these figures are emphatic evidence the code’s professionals are in line for record pay days.
Contacted by News Corp, ARLC boss Peter V’landys was tight-lipped, saying: “The negotiations are at a sensitive stage. We are comfortable with the offer we have made to the players, but we won’t be negotiating in the media.”
It can also be revealed:
• The NRL has proposed a 2023 salary-cap figure of $12.5 million from $10.2m _ an increase of 22.5 per cent;
• NRL players have been offered an extra $222 million over the next five years;
• NRL Women are set to celebrate record salaries as part of a $115m funding injection over the next five years;
• The NRLW salary cap is slated to rise from $350,000 to $800,000 next season - a whopping 146 per cent pay rise for females; and
• V’landys wants the minimum wage for NRL development players to be lifted from $80,000 this season to $125,000 next season - a 56 per cent increase for rookies.
V’landys and NRL CEO Andrew Abdo hope to finalise
a $300 million funding deal to the 17 clubs this month.
Then the NRL duo will attempt to convince the RLPA to accept the $1.32 billion pay bonanza for players, a scenario that would finally deliver the code’s CBA ahead of the 2023 premiership.
The NRL has been accused of hiding the code’s finances, but these proposed pay figures are in the hands of RLPA boss Clint Newton, who has previously warned V’landys and Abdo of the dangers of acting like a “dictatorship”.
Newton is as frustrated as anyone by the delay in CBA talks, which were originally planned to be concluded mid-season but have now dragged on beyond October 31, when the existing agreement expired.
The RLPA boss insists he is not looking to have V’landys dethroned as ARLC chairman, but vowed to continue to fight for player rights.
RLPA boss Clint Newton has rejected the deal, and says he will continue to fight for the players.
“Do we want players to be pot plants where it’s this ‘shut up and play’ type attitude?” Newton said.
“The fact is, by players advocating for improvements in their terms and conditions, that absolutely has an impact on the future of the game.
“We want players to be going to rugby league because we can say (the NRL has) the best remuneration, the best support, the best services, the best wellbeing and education programs and the best opportunity to not just be good players, but good people.
“And then when they transition to retirement they have the best protections in place.”
Asked if he is gunning for V’landys over the CBA Mexican stand-off, Newton said: “No, there’s no William Wallace here - we’re not putting heads on spikes.
“Peter’s clearly passionate about the game. What I’d like to believe is that the Commission, which is clearly led by Peter as chair, understands our claims, they respect our claims and they respect the role of the players.
“If we were all moving in the same direction, we could be an absolutely formidable force in Australian sport.”
