Netball legend Joyce Brown calls for mediation to resolve ‘harmful’ player pay battle

As netball’s industrial dispute continues, playing and coaching legend Joyce Brown has called for a truce for the good of the sport, writes LINDA PEARCE.

To her players, a favourite Joyce Brown saying when dealing with challenges during her storeyed days as a triple world championship winning coach was “put your mind over it”.

To a divided netball community soon to begin a mediation process to try to resolve a bitter industrial stand-off that has dragged on since February, the sport’s matriarch has a similar message.

“This unseemly dispute in public is not good for anyone and is harmful to netball,’’ Brown said in a statement obtained by CODE Sports.

“It needs to be resolved now by an experienced mediator. The ordinary netball people are bruised by it, sick of it and want a solution now.

“We are all on the same team - Team Netball. Resolve it please. Joyce Brown.’’

While the 85-year-old is also a former Australian captain, umpire and international delegate, a lesser-known role is as a founder of the original incarnation of what is now the Australian Netball Players’ Association.

Former playing and coaching legend Joyce Brown has called for an end to Netball’s pay dispute.

The union, headed by ex-Diamonds’ defender Kathryn Harby-Williams, is at odds with Netball Australia and the Super Netball clubs over, in particular, a revenue-share – as opposed to profit share – component of a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.

Brown is not alone in calling for the impasse to be overcome, with the sentiment from multiple others at a weekend celebration of 100 years of Netball Victoria expressing displeasure at the turmoil engulfing the game.

There is also embarrassment about the fact that the Australian Cricketers’ Association has been moved to come to the unemployed netballers’ financial aid since all non-Diamonds contracts expired on September 30.

Brown’s association with an organised player collective dates back to the earliest national league days in the 1980s, when she was called up for help with negotiations with the governing body then known as the All Australian Netball Association over sponsors, logos, court signage, meal allowances, strapping, travel, etc.

All players became members, with one representative per team; Brown was part of a three-person committee which met six-weekly and was completed by a retired Arbitration Commissioner and a businesswoman with a legal background and netball management experience.

Kathryn Harby-Williams and the Australian Netball Players’ Association is at odds with Netball Australia and the Super Netball clubs over a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. Picture: Getty Images

“We had a seeding bank account and we supported the players and dealt with a stunned AANA,’’ recalls the captain of the inaugural world championship team in 1963, and coach of the gold medallists in 1975, 1983 and 1991.

“It was bumpy early on but the early contracts, team and personal, were born. We had a consultant sport lawyer at hand who gave advice. We were the fledgling committee and pressed on for about four years before AANA decided it was best under their umbrella and constitution. It later became a member of the Australian Workers Union.’’

Today, Brown reflects on her pride in having assisted players commercially and personally, and the humble beginnings that were necessary as the sport took its first, semi-professional steps.

“I am proud of the work of our committee and the platform we audaciously created for the players,” Brown says.

“There were difficult discussions with AANA but matters were mostly amicably settled. We handed the minutes over to AANA with a bank book still holding a small amount of money to which the registered players had made meagre contributions.

“I now find it puzzling that I was once called before the AANA Board in Sydney to explain myself and my stance with the Players’ Association formation.

“Last year the Netball Australia Board room was named after me. We still all belong to Team Netball, we just have to be reminded of it now and again.’’

Indeed. And so may the mediation begin. Quickly.

Originally published as Netball legend Joyce Brown calls for mediation to resolve ‘harmful’ player pay battle