Heather du Plessis-Allan: NZR's financial problems are its own fault

If you are at all interested in understanding what's going wrong at rugby headquarters in Wellington, can I recommend that you read Gregor Paul's piece in the Herald today? It's an excellent summation.  

The question that we had yesterday when we were looking at the financials was how on Earth is it that New Zealand Rugby pulls in more money than it ever has in a financial year and still manages to not make a profit? How do you do that? The answer is it seems going by Gregor's piece, it's just wasteful spending and spending in the wrong places.  

For example, New Zealand rugby spent more than seven and a half million dollars last year on paying board members and executives. That is more than the seven million it spent on Heartland rugby teams last year and it is more than five and a half million it spent on its five Super Rugby clubs.

No organisation should spend more on the people running the thing then on the thing itself, that's nuts.  

New Zealand Rugby flew two board members, Dame Patsy Reddy and Bailey Mackey, to the UK last year when they were leaving the organisation the following month.  

What's the point of that?  If you know that people are leaving, stop flying them places. They're now redundant, aren’t they?  

When the All Blacks played in Tokyo, they took players and coaches and management. Fair enough.  

But then they also took administrative staff and executive staff.  

That was 75 people for a rugby game. Honestly, that's way too much.  

Do you know how much they were paying at the hotel they were staying at? $900 a night.  

That is an organisation spending like it's in the gold mining game, not like it's an organisation making more annual losses than profits in recent memory.  

Gregor Paul suggests some people are going to lose their jobs and I think that's probably fair.  

To be fair to NZR, we all understand what's going on here and not all of it is their fault.

 The biggest problem they've got is that rugby is boring. That's because the rules suck and NZR has only got so much control over the rules. It's really a World Rugby problem.

But for NZR, it has been obvious for ages that the problems that they face with participation and viewership, attendance, and money are not going to get solved anytime soon.  

Now, if you know things are tough and they're not improving, do you not put the credit card away? Do you not cut the spending?  

You and I might, but not NZR, apparently, and that's their fault.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now listen. If you are at all interested in understanding
what's going wrong at rugby headquarters in Wellington, can I
recommend that you read Gregor Paul's piece in the Herald today.
It's an excellent soormation here because the suggestion, I mean,
the question that we had yesterday when we were looking
at the financials which was released was how on earth
is it that New Zealand Rugby pulls in more money
than it ever has in one financial year and still

(00:22):
manages to not make a profit, Like how do you
do that? And the answer is it seems, going by
Gregor's piece, just wasteful spending and spending in the wrong places.
For example, New Zealand Rugby spent more than seven and
a half million dollars last year on paying board members
and executives. Now that is more seven and a half
That is more than the seven million dollars it's spent

(00:42):
on Heartland rugby teams last year, and it is more
than a five and a half million dollars it's spent
on its five super rugby clubs. No organization should spend
more on the people running the thing than on the
thing itself. That's nuts. New Zealand Rugby flew two board members,
Patsy Ready and Bailey Mackey to the UK last year
when they were leaving the organization the following month. What's
the point if you know that people are leaving, or

(01:03):
if they know they're leaving, stop flying them places. They're
now redundant, they're useless. When the All Blacks played in Tokyo,
they took players and coaches and management, fair enough, but
then they also took administrative staff and executive stuff. Seventy
five people for a rugby game. Honestly, this way too much.
Do you know how much they were paying at the
hotel they were staying nine hundred dollars a night. Now,

(01:24):
that is an organization spending like it's in the gold
mining game, not like it's an organization making more annual
losses than profits in recent memory. Now, Gregor Paul suggests
some people are going to lose their jobs, and I
think that's probably fair. To be fair though to inzt oar,
because you know, we all understand what's going on here.
Not all of this is inzt Our's fault. The biggest
problem I think that they've actually got is that rugby
is boring and that's because the rules suck and inzet

(01:47):
are only only has so much control over the rules. Right,
that's really a world rugby problem. But they know and
we know, and it has been obvious for ages that
the problems that they face with participation in viewership and
attendance and money are not going to get solved anytime soon. Now,
if you know things are tough and they're not improving,
do you not put the credit card away? Do you
not cut the spending? You and I might, but not

(02:10):
in z R apparently, and that's their fault. For more
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