Sport Australia boss Kate Palmer moves to placate FIFA

Sport Australia boss Kate Palmer has moved to placate FIFA over fears of government interference in soccer.

Sport Australia chief executive Kate Palmer. Picture: Kym Smith

Sport Australia chief executive Kate Palmer says the organisation’s concerns over recommendations for changes to the governance of Australian soccer should not be viewed as political interference.

In a letter to Football Federation member associations and clubs yesterday in part designed to placate world governing body FIFA, Palmer says Sport Australia has handed the code ­almost $18 million in the past five years.

Palmer wrote: “Sport Australia has a responsibility to ensure sporting organisations receiving taxpayer funding comply with best practice governance standards.”

Palmer’s letter comes eight days after she had written to FFA’s membership declaring it would be a concern to the organisation if all of the Congress Review Working Group recommendations were passed as some of them did not meet governance principles.

Palmer said Sport Australia would provide a broader review of the CRWG report ahead of an FFA meeting on October 2 that will decide whether to accept the recommendations.

At the same time, the federal government body was warned it risked breaching FIFA’s rules around government intervention.

When governments have interfered in the past with various FIFA members, the world body has taken action by either suspending the member association or installing a normalisation committee.

The CRWG has called for a change to the voting structure of FFA’s Congress as well as for the A-League competition to be made independent of FFA.

In her letter yesterday, Palmer says the governance model proposed by the CRWG is, “in the opinion of Sport Australia, flawed insofar as best practice governance principles” and that “its primary concern is that the CRWG recommendations go beyond the original scope and intent of its remit”.

“The CRWG proposed model sees the FFA Congress not only elect the FFA board but also populate Standing Committees to advise the board.

“This creates a governance system in which the board (which ultimately has legal responsibility for the whole organisation) is subservient to advisory committees, the formation of which it is not involved in, and which are not accountable to the board.

“This creates risk, compromises the independence of the board, and restricts the ability of directors to fulfil their fiduciary duties.”

Palmer says a CRWG recommendation for the creation of 17 standing committees is “an exceptionally high number … creating a significant administrative burden on resources”.

Sport Australia also expressed concern over the power the professional clubs (from the A-League) would gain from the restructured congress model to the detriment of the grassroots.

“The allocation of votes placed in favour of the professional game at the expense of grassroots football is of concern,” Palmer wrote. “Some of the professional clubs are international-owned. Therefore the strong proposed influence of the professional game with the Congress of FFA, and the offshore ownership base of many of those clubs, should be considered by the current FFA members in deciding on these proposals.”