Dolphins enforcer Felise Kaufusi has told The Roar that Australian Rugby League Commission chair Peter V’Landys was “absolutely disrespectful” for comments that Kaufusi believes accused the Rugby League Players Association of racism towards Pasifika players.
V’landys was reported by Sydney Morning Herald to have made the claims at meetings with the RLPA in reference to aspects of the CBA that pertained to payments for international matches.
“Let’s be upfront here,” wrote V’Landys in an email republished by the SMH. “The difference of opinion is that the RLPA wishes to take monies away from the players and use it to provide approx 83% increase in the funding of the union itself.
Australian Rugby League Commission chairman Peter V’landys and NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo. (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)
“Not wishing to pay the Pacific Islander players when they represent their country, which in itself improves the international game, so it can be used to fund RLPA staff not only prejudices at least 48% of your membership, but is incomprehensible.
“I for one will never agree to this and will ensure that the monies go to the rightful people, the players.”
The accusations caused uproar in the RLPA, which represents players of Pacific heritage, provoking Tonga, Australia and Queensland veteran Kaufusi to tee off on the ARLC boss.
“Absolutely disrespectful,” Kaufusi told The Roar of the chairman’s comments.
“I’m blindsided to be honest at the angle that he’s used. He’s trying to carry on saying that the RLPA is racist, which is us, it’s me, it’s other Pacific Islanders within the group. The RLPA is on our behalf.
“I take it as a personal attack, to be honest. Him thinking that we’re racist could be nothing further from the truth.
“He accuses us of being racist – and I say us, including myself, on behalf of all Pacific Islanders in the NRL and RLPA.
“For him to come out with something so outlandish – it’s easy for someone to read the headline and say ‘Oh my god, these guys are racist’, but you just need to look deeper to see why we’ve refused that proposal.”
The composition of the RLPA is around 50% Pacific heritage, in line with the wider playing group, whereas the NRL has no Pacific voices at the upper echelons of decision-making.
Sia Soliola. (Photo by Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images)
Sia Soliola, a veteran of over 300 games across the NRL and Super League, and one of the most respected Pasifika voices in rugby league, also spoke of his confusion at the V’landys comments – and of his role in setting up forums for Pacific people within the RLPA.
“From my own experiences, being in those conversations, being an RLPA delegate and moving on to be a board member, I didn’t see any racism towards Pacific players. I’ve not experienced that,” he said.
“I can’t connect the words to the point he’s trying to make. From my previous experiences being a player in the game, there’s always been questions around who is speaking on behalf of the Pacific players.
“When I retired, the RLPA leadership were adamant that they wanted some more Pasifika representation and were trying to get more Pasifika players involved, because they understood that it was – excuse the pun – a foreign area that they wanted to experience, learn and understand a little bit more.
“They knew the impact that having Pacific players within the conversations would benefit the not only the playing group but the Pacific nations as a whole.
“From that, we’ve been able to create a Pacific Advisory Group. I sat in the first one and it was about trying to get players in NRLW and NRL to have a voice, to encourage that.”
At the centre of the dispute around international payments has been discussions over who pays players for their participation.
The NRL has never disclosed the breakdown of payments within the broadcast deal regarding international football, but is thought to have included the rights to Australia and New Zealand games as part of it, leaving any additional games involving Pacific nations, who have reinvigorated the international scene since 2017, as a seperate question.
Tonga have already gone their own way and organised a post-season tour of England – on the same terms and conditions that the Kangaroos or Kiwis would expect – but Samoa are yet to announce any fixtures.
It is understood by The Roar that any series involving a third party against Australia or New Zealand would be included under the current broadcast deal, with payments for that team – whether Samoa, Fiji, PNG or anyone else – not covered by broadcasters.
Broadcasters are yet to receive any domestic content from the Kangaroos as part of their deal, as they have not played on home soil since 2019, a fact that confused Kaufusi further, given the lengths that Tonga have gone to in order to get on the field, and subsequent accusations from V’landys towards Pacific players.
“It’s rich from him,” said the decorated Test forward. “We came from humble beginnings to get to what we’ve sorted out for the end of the year – it’s the first time a Tonga team has travelled overseas for a tour off their own back. It’s off their own back, there’s no help. It’s us doing our best.
“He is trying to dictate where money is going or what tournaments are run. I can’t see eye to eye with him or where he’s coming from. It bemuses me.
“He was talking about equal pay for internationals – we’re all for equal pay. If you peel the onion back, you see why we didn’t take the proposal up. Where’s that money coming from to pay all the nations?
(Photo by Gareth Copley/Getty Images)
“Not just that, but are the nations even at the table to talk about the money that is raised, the government grants and where that might trickle down to the section that I’m more passionate about, which is the pathways for other Tongans and Pacific Islanders coming through.
“It’s not just Australia and New Zealand that you can play for, and it’s been awesome to see how it’s grown over the last few years. I’d love to see any revenue above forecast trickle down into something like that.
“If they’re so invested in growing the game internationally, I’d love to see what that looks like. Not the kickbacks that the islands would get, but what pathways and scheduling we could do so that kids like myself growing up – even though I always wanted to play for Australia – could also represent their mum and dad and their heritage and be looked after.”
Kaufusi also hit back at claims that the bulk of players did not understand what the dispute was about, with the ongoing media boycott set to enter a third week.
The Dolphins enforcer said it was the job of senior pros such as himself to be on top of the issues, and to educate the younger cohort on why the CBA mattered.
“There’s information being passed on from the top right down to the bottom so there’s transparency on what we’re trying to do,” he said.
“I get that the younger guys maybe couldn’t care less, but in the next years to come, when they get their contracts, they’re the ones that will benefit the most. They’ll look back and be glad that these players stepped up and held the line for us.
“The next gen are going to benefit and be seen as equally and fairly as possible. We (older players) have seen it all, we’ve experienced it all and what know what could help if you’re 18 and coming out of school – what does the minimum wage look like, what’s it like moving into the city and moving out of home?
“When you’re young, you’re a bit naive and go with the flow, but when you get older you’re looking back. That’s what I want to be for this generation coming through – for them to realise how much we fought and are fighting.”
Felise Kaufusi. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)
Soliola retired in 2021 but has a relative, Sky Blues under-19s rep Monalisa Soliola, at the very beginning of her NRLW career with the Canberra Raiders.
He said that the RLPA were learning more and more about where they stood in the game, and that the likes of Clint Newton were doing the right thing by the players.
“We hear conversations and it ignites us to keep asking questions,” he said. “We’re going through the experiences of knowing how things operate. It’s why it’s important that we have guys like Newto and the board that can be a voice for us.
“We lean on them to provide things in context about the organisation so that everything is transparent. From us, that’s all we want.
“During the Covid period, it highlighted a lot of this. We had a few changes and were forced into those meetings to understand how the NRL operates.
“As players, we had just been focusing on winning the next game, but during that period we understood all about these different funds and how the NRL manage the game.
“It really flicked the switch in the playing group to keep asking questions. The more we asked, the more we got to understand what we were entitled to as players and important stakeholders in the game.”
Emcie
Roar Guru
I'm pretty sure that's exactly what I just outlined above... Not sure I see your point to the rest. Having funding guaranteed by a CBA makes them financially independent from the NRLs whims, and being included in the salary cap essentialy acts as preallocated membership dues. Their funding comes out of the players share of the revenue, so its the players giving up a portion of their split of the revenue to fund it (less then 1% atm) not the NRL
Paul Stollznow
Roar Rookie
You do realise that the nrl fund the rlpa right??? They get $100k per club from the salary cap for $1.7M. They wanted more money and were going to go out and fundraise , nrl said no we will cover that so you don’t have players representing opposition brands etc. this was to the tune of $1.3M dropped down to $300k since covid. If the rlpa Wants to be a truely independent organisation then take no money from the nrl, nothing from the salary cap and players pay their union or organisational dues as every other member of a union does if they choose too. Do you know why they don’t? Cause before the current model players didn’t want to pay to be apart of it so they took that choice away from them
Emcie
Roar Guru
https://www.nrl.com/operations/integrity/salary-cap/ $0.1m for RLPA funding per club included in the salary cap in 2020, ie within the players share https://www.nrl.com/news/2010/04/22/nrl-salary-cap-explained/ according to this it started in '06 This is the first cba since the amount of players they've managed had increased so it makes sense that it's only now that they'd be asking for more
Nat
Roar Guru
Yeah again not sure that is right. Check out the RLPA site: financial model. If that hasn't changed since 2010 then there is not much respect from the players to their union. https://www.rlpa.com.au/about-the-rlpa/ I think I am getting to far off my original point now (and boring myself reading RLPA documents. I don't begrudge them just don't think they have the man to get it done.
Emcie
Roar Guru
$100k from each clubs salary cap is allocated for the rlpa. They don't do member fees. It's in every salary cap release from the NRL since at least 2010 and hasn't changed
Brian Westlake
Roar Rookie
For an earning capacity of average players playing 23 games in their career is $400k pa. Statistics make it look like a great lifestyle. Ask someone like a Taane Milne what his tax returns looked like since leaving the ultra privileged school he went to.
Nat
Roar Guru
The emotive angle in the RLPA statements is “players money”. It infers player are forking out to do many things including paying to play international games. It comes from a position of all revenue receive by the NRL starts at their +40% revenue share. Any deal/cost that takes away from the total revenue received before revenue share is being deemed “player money”. In this instance of international games the NRL are proposing equal pay across the board (every player involved, men & women) from NRL run international games paid as a cost to the NRL, therefore before revenue split. The RLPA want to know forecasted revenue figures and decide on a sum from that. While the NRL do have an international fixture figure as part of the broadcast deal the problem is there is no schedule announced and every hard to forecast earnings on a game that hasn’t been played since 2019. At $5k per player, 25 players in a squad starts at $250k for both teams straight up. Then you have the team ancillary costs of putting the game on. With the NRL current offer, the NRL are $300k in the hole before a ball is kicked. This is across the board so a good men’s game might/should recover that but would a womens game played in Cairns? That’s what the RLPA have knocked back. In this example, we the fans want more International games but what is the incentive to the NRL if it comes at a cost?
Nat
Roar Guru
I'm not sure that it correct. Like most unions they take an amount from the participants. To say they haven't received extra revenue since 08 means player wages and participants have not increased either. They are effectively like player managers, the more they can argue for the more they get in return and I don't begrudge them that.
Nat
Roar Guru
The upward trend to the $370k ave was what was outlined by the end of the previous agreement not the start. Besides those wages lost during that time have been reimbursed to all clubs. 20/21 definitely affected that outcome but no player or club is behind from that sacrifice as of today. No one in the NRL has called the players greedy. Once that 20% dropped it was very clear it wasn't about NRL player money. That noise comes from the likes of old dinosaurs not understanding what the issues are about. When you read the points on the RLPA site it is about control. They way I read it is they want from both hands. Every financial point is about taking more after the revenue share split. 'The players money' is an emotive term used quite frequently. "The players make the product" Sure they do but the NRL pays them, trains them, feeds them, pays for their coaches and cars then broadcasts them into every house FTA every week. I read those issues on the issues on the RLPA (reading through the rhetoric) site and think these could be overcome but they don't release the 100 "take it or leave it" points? The NRL are hesitant to get back in the room with an arbiter for sake of starting at this point as opposed to the concessions already given.
Brian Westlake
Roar Rookie
You're new here aren't you?
Brian Westlake
Roar Rookie
Newton is the face, as he should be, of the RLPA. Abdo wouldn't tell you the time of day unless race guy says he can. Therein lie the difference. vlandy sits back and takes quite calculated pot shots at which his minion boys such as hooper and the free thinking buzz jump on like the subservient little gems they are If there is any doubt about Clint doing the right thing, just listen to the interview with him, Gordon Tallis, hooper and some talking potato called dobbo.
ScouseinOz
Roar Rookie
Good insights. It's refreshing as well that someone can see through both sides. I think PVL has done a good job with the NRL in general, but I don't think even his sycophantic followers could describe him as diplomatic. It's not been his finest week. However, I've always thought the make up of the RLPA isn't quite right atm. There isn't enough day-to-day union experience. The board is impressive on paper but made up of people from law, banking, and academia. Its a different skill to sitting between people during disciplinary matters, work issues etc. Theres also a misconception that union people want conflict and go on strike. They dont. The best ones are pragmatic and know how to keep everyone on board - far more than business or executive types where it can be dog eat dog. Most of the NRL players on the board are smart common sense people, but there is a reason most of them (except Welch) have agents to represent them. Those people deal with any conflicts and negotiation on their behalf. Seriously, Clint Newton would have been better meeting Wayne Beavis or Isaac Moses this week but its not part of the image. Always thought Newton was naive as a union boss and enjoyed the ideals of the movement without having the awareness and pragmatism. Hopefully he will prove me wrong.
ScouseinOz
Roar Rookie
Reading about entertainment disputes in the media is different to how it operates in reality. Leaders need to be pragmatic and respectful because the next negotiated CBA will be begin in a few years. Being disrespectful is unwise and counter-productive.
JimCam73
Roar Rookie
Great reporting Mike. I can't wait until V'landys is gone. We need progressive administration to support the grassroots and grow the international game, not some spiv owned by gambling interests.
Nick
Roar Rookie
Can you point out that average salary figure to me please? I've only seen $334k as the average in 2023, compared with $406k for the AFL player.
Emcie
Roar Guru
The rlpas funding hasn't increased in about 15 years, they've now got an extra team of players and an entire nrlw comp under their umbrella with the NRL wanting more teams. It's not exactly out of hand to want more funding
Emcie
Roar Guru
20/21 definitely played a part, but the NRL proclaiming record high wages and minimum wages to dismiss player claims during CBA negotiations which would have been what players would have been getting payed two years ago had they not forfeited that for the sake of the game smacks of self interest. The NRL then ups the cap for this year to 20% more then the players were asking for then spends the rest of the year calling them greedy. As far as viewership goes, last year’s GF was the lowest rated in history by a fair margin, this year’s origin series is well down on historical viewers too. I’m not sure where record highs is coming from outside of creative accounting. 800k total might sound high now but it wasn’t then (https://www.theroar.com.au/2017/02/09/broncos-get-best-tv-timeslots-heres-deserve/amp/). Things aren’t as rosey as the NRLs media releases want us to believe
Emcie
Roar Guru
Which questions? The only interviews with Fox I've seen have been very adversarial and more interested in talking over Clint then finding anything out. There have been other rlpa reps on other programs, Jamie Buhrer spoke about the CBA on a podcast with Willie Mason. Wade Graham and Christian Walsh have been on others. There's a lot of great footy content out there that's far removed from the gossip columns of Weidler and Buzz
mushi
Roar Guru
The emotive part aside, the NRL wants the international payments to come out of the NRL players slice of the pie but not get details of the revenue, or necessarily share in it if it doesn’t form part of fox/nine’s rights. Basically they want internationals NRL player funded but with club and other leagues getting returns. Including having the players to pay for insuring the clubs against injury in rep games. The staff payments at the RLPA is another separate point and should be up to the players as it comes from their share. The nrl want to cap it (whilst expanding what it has to look after) because it then restricts the capability of a supplier. If the players want to pay their representative body more after getting legged over previously it’s not a shock right.
Pomoz
Roar Rookie
Great article Mike, setting the scene for a brilliant discussion below. Very interesting and informative and a credit to the contributors of the Roar. If only Fox Sports could hold such balanced and informative discussion eh? The class struggle continues, as it always has. I am not a fan of PVL’s politicking and selective use of facts. It is hard for negotiations to progress in the toxic environment created by this approach. To add to this, Fox Sports and News are now starting to make personal attacks on Clint Newton to try and make things worse. The JWH approach. Play the man, not the ball. As an aside, who knew that Kauai was so eloquent? His on field persona is of somebody who wants to tear your head off and sh*t down your neck. Books, covers and all that.