Waratahs to turn up heat in fight for government funds

NSW Rugby has hired a government relations manager, charged with securing government assistant for the struggling sport.

An artist’s impression of the proposed new NSW Waratahs base

For a long time, rugby wasn’t just the game they played in heaven. It was also the game they didn’t play in the hallowed halls of Australia’s parliaments. Where virtually all other sports were able to secure government funding, rugby for decades was always deemed the sport of the elites and passed over.

Natalie Baini is hoping to change that perception.

“It really is a credit to the supporters of the game that it has survived for so many years but the fact is that rugby’s roots in Australia were very much working class,” Baini said.

The 41-year-old lawyer has been employed as the NSW Rugby Union’s government relations manager, charged with securing government assistance for major rugby projects, and it would have to be said she has started big — pitching to the NSW government the concept of a $20 million facility at the Waratahs’ new home at Daceyville that will provide a headquarters not just for rugby but hubs and office space for the community and charity projects it supports.

So while there is the usual “Get into Rugby” beginner’s course and the programs to bolster women’s and indigenous rugby, there is also the anything-but-ordinary concepts known as batyr. It’s an unusual name, drawn from an even more unusual source, an Asian elephant which reportedly had a vocabulary of more than 20 human phrases.

Accordingly, the charity has been set up to give a voice to the elephant in the room about youth mental health.

“There is an alarming record of young people suffering from this by not speaking up about it,” said Baini. “And if there is something that we can do as a game that supports young people to overcome these challenges, then we want to be involved.”

Baini concedes that she will need to work hard to convince the powerbrokers at state and federal level of the need to help.

“We have some work to do to get this over the line. But they (the NSW Government) are certainly keen to more about the project and they are appreciative of how far we have come on the University of NSW campus to house our head office here.”

Baini has been involved with NSW politics from a young age, starting with the Young Liberals, but it was her work as an honorary president of a junior AFL club, Concord Giants, that first brought her to the attention of NSWRU executive director Andrew Hore.

“Rugby were aware of projects I had been involved with in AFL and initially just wanted to ask me some questions about how I could help rugby,” she said. “I am also a rugby fan. It was just a discussion at first but then an offer of employment arrived.”

Rugby was in such a dire financial state last year that the national body was forced to cull one of its five Super Rugby teams, the Western Force. Since then, the Waratahs have explored all means of raising revenue, including the establishment of a new NSW Positive Rugby Foundation.

Progress is being made elsewhere too, with Damien Frawley and Richard Barker working with the Queensland government on the $15m redevelopment of Ballymore that will hopefully deliver a headquarters for women’s
XV-a-side rugby.