AFL: The Great Game

The 9th Ideas and Society lecture, held 5th August, 2010.

Andrew Demetriou (CEO, AFL Australia) discusses his views on the contribution that Aussie Rules makes to social and community life with Tim Lane (Commentator, Channel 10).

Transcript

Robert Manne:

Welcome here.  It gives me enormous pleasure actually to – we’ve had many Ideas and Society events but one concerning football gives me enormous pleasure.  I’ll just say a couple of things about that.  When I was a very, very little boy my father tried to interest me in soccer with complete failure and I had an uncle who realised that I wanted to follow Australian football – we were a refugee family and he, as long ago as the 1950s, and he wanted me to have a happy life so he suggested I barrack for Geelong and it was a long time before his wish was fulfilled.  It’s a very happy time for me at the moment.  I think there are many things that I value, it’s given me enormous pleasure and enormous pain over almost half a century.  I think one of the things I find really interesting about it is that in a world that’s globalised something that is uniquely Australian or even uniquely part of Australia, has thrived and that’s why I wanted to have a serious discussion of football in this series.

I’m really pleased that the two people I’d hoped would come have both agreed.  I’ll just introduce them very briefly.  Most of you will know them.  Tim Lane has been a commentator of football but also cricket and athletics for a very long time, mainly on the ABC.  He has struck me as an exemplary commentator, I think one of the great commentators of our time in all those fields.  He has moved from the ABC now to commercial radio and television.  But the reason that I asked him to come today was that I used to listen to his pre-match broadcasts on the ABC and I was struck by the sanity, the balance, and the passion, but also the humanity of his comments on the big issues of the day, and I haven’t heard anyone talking about the game in the media with as much incisiveness as Tim and I’m really pleased, Tim, that you’ve agreed to come today to La Trobe.

Andrew Demetriou is obviously known to everyone here.  He’s the son of Greek Cypriot migrants.  He was, from my memory, a great wingman for North Melbourne.  He is a very successful businessman.  He became the head of the Players’ Association for the AFL and then he became the CEO of AFL itself.  I’m sure most people who follow the game would agree that he is probably the best and most successful administrator that the game has ever had and the game has really thriven since or during his period as the head of the AFL.  It’s also important to me that he’s a former student of this university and one of our most distinguished former students who’s made an extraordinary impact on the world, not only in football, but he’s also for example, the head of the Federal Government’s Australian Multiculturalism Advisory Committee and he has very, very wide respect in the community now.

What’s going to happen today is that Tim’s going to begin talking to Andrew about various aspects of football.  There will be a chance at the end for you to ask questions so could I ask you to welcome these very distinguished guests of the university.

Tim Lane:

Thank you Robert.  Thanks to all of you who have come along and Andrew, welcome.

Andrew Demetriou:

Thanks Tim.  Again, thank you for the kind introduction and it’s lovely to be here.

Tim Lane:

A little walk down memory lane for you.  You’ve passed, you’ve got a degree in Arts and a Dip Ed and you became the CEO of the AFL.  I went to the University of Tasmania, studied Science, failed, and I became a commentator.  Not sure what that says, but that’s the reality of it.  I think we are on the record.  There’s a camera down the back and there might even be a journalist or two in the room, so…

Andrew Demetriou:

A fine journalist, Tim, they’re all fine journalists.

Tim Lane:

You’d better name names.

Andrew Demetriou:

They’re fine, F I N E, all good.  All good.

Tim Lane:

So, I guess that means that your guard is up to some extent.

Andrew Demetriou:

No.

Tim Lane:

We’ll see what we can do to penetrate it here and there.  I thought I’d start with the big picture.  The game has come a long way.  You’ve spoken of the AFL as a community and cultural organisation, able to use football to effect social change.  And criticism these days is more likely to be at football’s over-attention, rather than its in-attention, to issues like player behaviour, indigenous opportunity, respect and responsibility, vilification of minorities, etc.  Is this reflective of the sort of AFL, an indigenous code of football, that you’ve sought to shape?

Andrew Demetriou:

I hope so.  Because we’ve purposely gone about our business to make sure that as a code, we reflect in part what the community wants, and I’ve been a firm believer for a long time, that whilst I acknowledge that the game is a great game, the game’s success is really underpinned by the community support that it has.  In many ways having 120,000 volunteers supporting the game is a key part of that, if we didn’t have that sort of volunteerism, we wouldn’t have a game.  And the widespread community support, whether it’s from men, women, children from different socio-economic backgrounds, different multicultural backgrounds, it’s incredible community support and I think in many ways we feel a very deep sense of obligation to put back into the community, and I often say to people, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that there are 614,000 members of football clubs, because these members, they feel a really deep sense of belonging to their football club.  They actually feel an ownership in their club.  It means something to them, and I think they feel a real sense of belonging, which they long for and I think our players and our clubs, who do lots of things in the community, whether it’s community camps, or clinics, or whether it’s going into hospices or whether it’s putting on games to raise funds, I think in many ways the community says thank you in their own special ways.  In some ways they say I want to thank you by becoming a member, I want to thank you by attending a game, I want to thank you because I watch the game.  So in many ways, this community support, this undercurrent of community support, is a vital ingredient of our game.  And that’s why we tackle lots of issues within the community because they’re just a reflection of what we are.  I mean, we’ve got a bunch of young lads who kick a leather ball around, but it’s so much more than that to the community.  We purposely tackle issues that we get criticised for, that in some ways people will argue have got nothing to do with the game, but we actually think they’ve got everything to do with the game.

Tim Lane:

The AFL hasn’t always been as socially progressive.  Do you hope, and do you believe you have entrenched it as that sort of organisation?

Andrew Demetriou:

Oh, look, I hope so.  Because we operate a very socialist regime.  The whole code is about equalisation, Tim, as you know, we try to make the teams who are performing poorly get to climb the ladder quickly through draft picks.  We have a salary cap and a draft.  We equalise and centralise a lot of our revenues.  So the game in itself has been designed to be as equal as possible.  But on top of that, regardless of the organisation and regardless of any business, you sort of hope your business reflects the values of your leader.  And I think people sort of know what I stand for, I hope they do, I try not to leave any grey areas and at the end of the day if someone else comes along they will impart their own style and their own values on an organisation.  I think through a really wonderful team I work with, we’ve all signed up to the same mantra, and that is to be a very socially responsible football code that really respects our supporter base, our community base, because we actually feel a deep sense of obligation to the game. 

Tim Lane:

I think an illustration of the sort of change I’m talking about is in relation to the engagement with indigenous Australia.  This is quite a different time from, say, twenty years ago and it seems to me that in the eighties and even into the first half of the nineties, until the celebrated moments when Nicky Winmar raised his jumper and Michael Long complained of being vilified on the Anzac Day stage, and I should say too, that until some people in the media wrote and commented courageously on the issue, football was quite silent.  The AFL didn’t engage on the issue and almost didn’t… pretty much gave the impression that it wished it would go away.

Andrew Demetriou:

I think that’s true.  I think there was a period of time there where we probably as a code would have been ashamed of our attitude and…

Tim Lane:

But I think we pretended it wasn’t there.

Andrew Demetriou:

Yeah, there were clubs that purposely went out Tim and said they wouldn’t actually recruit an indigenous player, because they were too much trouble for them.  There are two pivotal moments as you’ve said.  You know, the Nicky Winmar raising of the jumper is a very powerful image, incredibly powerful image.  The Michael Long stance that he took was an incredibly courageous decision on that stage, the Anzac Day stage, and I’ll never forget that press conference where he wasn’t going to put up with any sort of spinning of the issue.  I mean, he was determined to make his voice known and from then, I think the AFL took a very courageous decision and it consulted with the Human Rights Commission and came up with the Racial and Religious Vilification Policy, sought expert advice, and really that was the catalyst for (a) a significant shift in the attitude of our players on the field to any form of discrimination.  We weren’t going to tolerate any form of discrimination.  And I think that’s actually extended over the fence into the crowd.  If there are people out there in the crowd actually vilifying someone, it doesn’t need a security guard or the police to intervene, it will be another member of the crowd that takes them to task.  You know, that’s how powerful it’s been, it’s had a significant change in Australia, what that policy’s done, and as an extension of that, we’ve also seen, we’ve got 87 indigenous players playing now, when ten years ago we had 20.  We’ll have a hundred playing within the next few years and that represents 11 or 12% of our workforce on field is indigenous.  And that’s a significant achievement, one that we’re very proud of.  We’ve got 87,000 indigenous participants in the game at any one time.  You know, they actually use football in parts of Australia to keep kids at school, to stop them using alcohol or drugs, to stop them being involved in things like sniffing glue.  I mean, it’s a very powerful thing, football, and we’re very proud of what the game has done.  And importantly, they’ve brought so much to the game.  I mean, the game is an infinitely better game because of this wonderful contribution of indigenous players.  I don’t think it is a coincidence that we’ve got an indigenous game that’s actually got such a wonderful contribution from the indigenous players.

Tim Lane:

Moving on to another issue. I mean, it’s obviously an issue we can talk about for a long time, but you mentioned the word “spin”.  Can I ask you, is that something you wrestle with, because people are watching an election campaign unfolding in this country at the moment and I think as a nation we’re getting fed up with it.  We’re getting fed up with the opportunism and we’re being taken for fools and all of that sort of thing, and yet, I guess, overseeing an organisation as prominent as the AFL, living under the public spotlight as a professional person, as you do, those of us who work in the media believe that the AFL is quite capable of it too.  How do you deal with that, the fact that it’s an undesirable aspect of public life, that perhaps it has become an imperative of it as well?

Andrew Demetriou:

Well, this is an easy question for me because I’ve held true from day 1, and in my view, and the AFL gets covered by… 150 accredited media cover our game on a national basis which is, they tell me, three times what covers federal politics.  You know, we’ve got 700 print journalists covering the game nationally, which averages out at one per player.  So if you think about the newspapers, you think about online media, and the speed of this media now, you think about television ratings, it’s an explosion of coverage.  So I’ve got golden rules, Tim, and I’ve never wavered from them and I’m very proud of them.  The first one is, I just don’t believe in spin.  In my view, people actually want to hear people talking in a language that they understand.

Tim Lane:

Some people might believe that this is spin.

Andrew Demetriou:

Well, they might, but I’m consistent on it.  I actually believe that spin is pretty boring and people have seen through it.  You’ve just articulated a view which I share, and that is, I think we all become tired, and people see through spin.  There’s a lot of spin merchants out there actually making a living off this.  In my view, people want to hear people speaking plain English, in the language that they understand, and they actually want to hear people telling the truth.  So our second golden rule is, we never lie.  We never ever lie.  If any one of our staff members lies to the media, they’re out.  They are allowed to say, “I won’t comment”, “I prefer not to comment”, but they’re never allowed to lie.  The third thing is they must always return calls to the media.  Always.  We do our best to try and get back to the media.  I think the media plays a prominent role in our game.  It’s why the game is so big.  It’s got, you know, a 95% of very, very positive coverage, it’s got another percentage that’s a critique on the game and they’re just opinions, so my fourth golden rule is, I tell my staff, don’t worry about opinion pieces because they are just that, opinion pieces.  You have the right to question people on facts.  You have the right to pick up the phone and say to a journalist “hey, that was wrong.  You need to correct that”.  But you don’t have a right to say “I don’t like your piece.  And you’re a bum”.  I find that really distasteful if people do that.  And the last thing is, I’ve never picked up the phone and rang an editor of a newspaper or a media organisation and told them to pull a story because I just don’t believe in it, I don’t believe in it and I find it really abhorrent that people actually try to interfere in editorial freedom.  And I don’t do it, our organisation doesn’t do it, but we do believe we’ve got the right to challenge people on fact.

Tim Lane:

Bearing in mind that the AFL exists primarily to run a football competition, is there a balancing act involved in dealing with the different sets of ambitions that you have, putting on the best football competition that you can, and also, operating as a social and cultural leader?

Andrew Demetriou:

There is.  I often tell people that… someone once said to me “What would you say to your successor?” and one of the things I would certainly say is that you’re forever balancing almost the rights and demands of your stakeholders.  And if you think about them, we’ve got clubs, a significant stakeholder.  You know, they’re shareholders in the AFL.  So they’ve got their priorities and their issues.  We’ve got our players.  They are a significant part of our competition, a very important part, they put the show on.  So they’ve got their demands.  You’ve got your supporters.  I believe the most important stakeholder.  Because there’s seven million that go and there’s 600,000 members, so you know, they’ve got their expectations.  And then you’ve got your corporate partners who’ve got a different set of demands.  You’ve got your broadcasters, your sponsors and so forth.  And then you’ve got your venues.  They’ve got a different set of demands.  They’ve want better games, and whatever, whatever.  And then you’ve got another stakeholder called State, Federal and local governments and they’ve got demands about what they want in their state and so forth.  So you are playing this balancing act, all day, every day.  And you’re in a constant negotiation, trying to grapple with these things.  The perfect example is today, what we’re living through now.  We will probably in the next few months finalise a broadcast rights agreement.  Once that’s finalised and you know the sort of money that  you’ve got with the other projections you’ve got, you sit down and you think, what are we going to do for the next five years with the game?  And these dollars.  So you going to try and work out what’s a fair share for the players, what’s fair for the clubs, what do we need to develop the game and grow the game at grassroots?  So we need more ovals, do we need more facilities?  Do we need to put more into New South Wales and Queensland?  And do we need to think about global… perhaps taking the game around the world?  Do we need to invest more in women?  Do we need to invest more in multicultural, which is another priority of ours?  So, this becomes a balancing.  I’m trying to say to the clubs, right, I know you want to have ten dollars, but you might have to have eight.  Players, you might x, you’re going to have to have y.  We need x for what we need for our purposes.  So it’s a very difficult task but one which we’ve done before and we’ll continue to do.  But you’re forever balancing the rights, quite rightly, of stakeholders.

Tim Lane:

A very specific example, which I want to address now is the matter of drug testing.  Where you allocate certain funds for the testing of performance enhancing substances, in line with your responsibility as a sports administration, while reserving other funding for an illicit drug testing program which is a unilateral AFL initiative.  There is an obvious question of balance and it does open the door to a discussion particularly about the illicit drug testing program.  For a start, can I ask you why you do more tests for illicit drugs than you do for performance enhancing drugs?

Andrew Demetriou:

So on the issue of performance enhancing.  We’ll start there.  We’ve been doing that since the early nineties.  We’ve conducted thousands of performance enhancing tests for steroids and the like, we classify them.  We’re part of the World Anti-Doping Authority and we are regarded worldwide as probably the blue chip client.  We’ve only ever had one positive test, which was Justin Charles.  And we’re at the forefront of things like, we’re used by ASADA, the Australian Doping Agency for things like EPO and human growth hormone testing, so as a sport we’re very proud of our testing regime when it comes to performance enhancing drugs.  About six or seven years ago it had come to our attention that the incidence of illicit drug use may have become quite prominent at AFL level.  We approached the players about whether they would participate in a trial and the players agreed and we did that one the basis that we wanted to look at a welfare model as distinct from a punitive model.  And we sought medical advice.  We sought advice from the Australian Drug Foundation, drug experts, others who worked in this area, and they all agreed that if you want a shift of behaviour of people, far better to do it under a medical and welfare model than a punitive model.  So for two years we collected data which was purely statistical.  There wasn’t any rehab attached to it.  If there were any positives, it was all anonymous, and we saw in the first two years, some figures that we were disturbed by.  The trend had gone up in the two years and the use of illicit drugs, we thought, was at a level we weren’t happy with.  And we’ve shared that with the Players’ Association and it’s not true that as an AFL we unilaterally impose this.  We asked the players whether they wanted to sign up, and agree to a regime that no other person in the workforce does, and that’s get tested in their private lives for illicit drug use.  And it was on the basis that it was a pure medical and welfare model.  And to their great credit they did.  In fact they had input into the policy and everybody deemed it as a three strike policy and that you don’t catch people, it was never about catching people.  It was about shifting the attitude and making sure that we could actually try and arrest this climb in illicit drug use.  And in the first couple of years we were doing three and four hundred tests and we had a certain percentage above 1%, you know, 1.8% and now we’re going 1,500 tests and the percentage has come down to .89 and what’s happened is that over the years we’ve learned many things.  That we’ve probably got the greatest bank of data in this area as a worldwide sport, because we’ve got five or seven years of data that we can actually learn things from and what we’ve learned is, it’s working.  We’re shifting the attitudes of players, that the players who tested positive on the first time all tell the truth, because they know that there’s a second and third consequence.  They don’t there and say, “Oh my drink got spiked” or whatever, they say “Look, I made a mistake”.  This and that, I shouldn’t have, whatever.  But we’ve found out that, in 96% of the cases, they’ve involved alcohol as a precursor which allows us to then attack alcohol as an issue.  We’ve found out that in some cases it’s related to other illnesses, like depression.  And we’ve never had a player test positive three times.  In all this time.  And that’s not to say that if they do test positive three, that they won’t have a consequence, because we’ve got a policy that there needs to be a consequence after that.  But after a first positive, they get rehab.  And in many cases, players aren’t repeating and in those cases… I can’t remember the exact number, we’ve got six or eight players on two positives, and this is after thousands of tests.  And players have actually said… they’ve said two things.  Which is interesting.  On the occasions that they’ve been caught, they say, in the majority of cases “Please don’t tell my mother”, which is interesting, because it’s all confidential.  The only person who knows is the club doctor and our doctors.  The club doesn’t know, which has always been an issue of contention. And they also say in many cases, “Thank god I’ve tested positive, because you’ve changed my life”, which is something we’re very proud of.

Tim Lane:

You’ve been attacked from both ends of the argument.  From those who believe that the three strike policy is too loose.  I’m not going there because we’ve got limited time and I’m not one of those who has been critical of that aspect.  I have been critical though of the fact that it requires players to give up privacy and freedom in a way that is not common within the Australian workforce.  Now I did hear you say in delivering the Dame Elisabeth Murdock lecture a few years ago that all sports should run an illicit drug testing program.  So is that to say for any person to be eligible to play an elite level sport, they should have to subject themselves to testing for illicit drugs?

Andrew Demetriou:

I’m not suggesting it’s compulsory Tim.  All I know from our code and the benefits of our policy, for what it’s done for our code, I think it’s had a significant shift in arresting a climb in illicit drug use and our rate for illicit drug use for young men, and they are young men, between 18 and 32, is way, way below the use out there in the community.  And drug experts from around the world and other codes now have sought our input.  They’re actually marvelling at what’s happening with this trend, that somewhere in amongst this, there’s something working.  And if we can reduce the incidence of illicit drug use in the community, because we, like many people, abhor illicit drug use, then we’re proud of that, and we’re the only code in this country, because there’s three codes now that have got an illicit drug policy who actually publish their results.  We publish them.  They’re out there for everyone to see.  We tell them, there’s 1,500 tests, we say we’re going to increase the number of tests to this, we say we’ve had eight positives, we say here’s what they are, meth amphetamines gone up, and cannabis has gone down.  We’ve got nothing to hide about this.  And what we don’t do though, is we don’t reveal players’ names, we don’t name and shame them, we treat this as a purely medical model to try and change people’s behaviour.

Tim Lane:

Let me throw you a hypothetical.  What would you do if the parents of a young potential draftee of extreme talent, contacted you and said, “We’re a family of staunch libertarians, and we don’t want our son to be drug tested in this way.  He wants to play in the AFL, he understands and accepts performance enhancing drug testing, but as a matter of principle, he isn’t prepared to have his privacy invaded by the illicit drug testing code.  He lives at home with us and we support him to the hilt”.

Andrew Demetriou:

I’d say to him, first of all, I would really like you to sit down with the Players’ Association and go through an education process about what this policy is all about.  And why we have it.  And what some of the learnings are.  And after that, come and see me if you’ve got any issues, because in my view, he may have a different view after spending some time understanding what the policy is about.

Tim Lane:

One more question.  And before I change the subject.  The Players’ Association as you say, took this upon themselves, but they did it on a vote of… or a decision made purely by their executive, a small coterie of senior members.  Not representative necessarily of the 700 or so who are members.  Is that a reasonable way of such a relinquishing of privacy of each individual to be conducted?

Andrew Demetriou:

I could make arguments for both, Tim, because I think I know where the question is going.  But I think on balance, yes, because at the end of the day you vest your faith in a Board to make decisions on behalf of many.  You know, BHP has got tens of thousands of shareholders and they vest their faith in a Board to make decisions, rightly or wrongly.

Tim Lane:

This is about giving up privacy.

Andrew Demetriou:

No, I understand that.  But they wouldn’t have done that without each club delegate speaking to their players, the club delegates reporting back to the executive and the executive discussing it.  I just can’t imagine the executive would have taken a decision without a wide ranging consultation with their players.  And I actually know that they did, and of course, in amongst that you’ve got dissenters.  But I know when I was CEO of the Players’ Association, it’s impossible to get 700 players to agree on something, you know, whether it’s car parking or tickets or money or whatever.  So what you’ve got to do, I guess it’s like, in a somewhat bizarre way, like a political party, and you’ve got to take the majority view.  And I used to say that to the players, I know you don’t like that, but somewhere you’ve got to make a decision on behalf of your constituents and you’ve got to take the majority view. 

Tim Lane:

We can sit here debating this one until lunchtime.  We’ll change the subject.

Andrew Demetriou:

We try to do the same with our clubs, Tim.  By the way.

Tim Lane:

You talk of Australian football being a game for all.  And you spoke on that theme here on that theme last October.  How far advanced is it within our Asian, African and Middle Eastern constituencies for example?

Andrew Demetriou:

Look, I think it’s growing.  One of the things I think where we’re really proud of recently has been a trial that we did with the Victorian Government on hiring some multicultural officers, we trialled four, a few years ago with four clubs.  This was to expose the game into certain multicultural communities that weren’t exposed to the game and that involved visits by players to schools, it involved attending games, it involved a series of educational programs, and today we’ve got twelve full time multicultural officers the clubs have put on.  It’s been phenomenal.  We’ve exposed the game to 50,000 people now of a multicultural background where football is foreign to them.  And they really like it.  And this year in our Under 16 Championships we had a World 18 from all parts of the world, from Iraq, Canada, we had a South Pacific team which we’ve now got lots of players coming out of the Oceania region, so I see great hope particularly with what’s happening in South Africa.  I see great hope for what the game is bringing outside of Australia, but we’re not taking our eye off actually growing the game here as well, Tim, because we know we’ve got a massive challenge in New South Wales and Queensland.  But the game is a game for all.  It’s a very, very egalitarian game, it’s a game which doesn’t discriminate, it’s a game which is inclusive, it’s about as inclusive as it gets.  You can be tall, short, fast, slow, you can be from any background, you’re welcome to play for this game.  And it’s the same, as I say to people, to paraphrase Waleed Aly, it’s like holding a mirror across the fence, we actually want people across the fence looking at themselves and that’s what we hope we get.  The crowd is a cross section of the community.  48% are women.  We’re very proud of the diversity that this game brings. It says a lot about Australia, our game.  I’m not quite sure recently, Tim, but in general it says a lot about Australia.

Tim Lane:

My question related to those ethnic groups within our own Australian community, but bearing in mind the difficulty that we know expansion entails, we haven’t truly conquered Sydney and Brisbane, let alone New South Wales and Queensland, so should we be seriously entertaining international expansion at this stage?

Andrew Demetriou:

I think when you say seriously, we’re not investing significant dollars compared to what we’re doing in New South Wales and Queensland.  I mean, our strategy, particularly in most recent times has been to get the game shown on television in as many places around the world as possible, to expose the game so people see the game.  And when people see the game they like it.  And now with the new forms of media, whether it’s IPTV or whether it’s on cable, it’s seeing the game in better time zones than they used to.  Once upon a time the game in America was shown at a good time on SBN, then it went to two o’clock in the morning and people stopped watching it.  Now you can watch it at times that you want to watch it and when people see it they like it.  And one thing we’re proud of in the last couple of weeks even, that we’re playing a game in Shanghai later this year as part of a World Expo, which is Melbourne-Brisbane, and there will probably be 30,000 people at this game.  But what’s been remarkable has been that in the last couple of weeks, we’ve had Shanghai TV actually say that they want to broadcast a home and away game into China every week for the rest of the year and starting in the finals, and next year show one game every weekend.  Now, I tell people, if you’re a club out there and you can get 1% of the population watching, you’re going to have more than you get in Australia by 50.  So if we can get people to watch it, we think they’ll like it.  And from there, hopefully you can get a bit of participation and I think the great hope that we do see, which has got enormous potential, is South Africa.  Because these children, we’ve got about forty or fifty thousand participants, they are as gifted and have an aptitude for the game as our indigenous players and we’ve taken the Boomerangs, the Under 16 indigenous kids, there the last two or three years.  They play against the South Africans and the scores are getting closer and they’ll be drafted, they’ll be playing and it’s a really wonderful thing to witness.

Tim Lane:

You mentioned women and we have some women in the audience, I’m pleased to observe.  Firstly, is there a future for women’s football?  Might our game become a game for both genders in a serious way?

Andrew Demetriou:

Of course.  We’ve got eighty to eighty-five thousand women playing the game today, which is a phenomenal number and a number which I guess would surprise people here.  And I’ve got to tell you, they play the game exceptionally well.  There was a game on at the MCG just a few weeks ago and people that witnessed it couldn’t believe the standard. It’s exceptional.  We’ve got some really wonderful women working in the game as well.  And we’ve got some really wonderful people who are getting involved in the game as women in other forms of the game, whether they’re umpires, or administrators, Board members.  So of course there’s a future and there’ll be a woman running the AFL one day Tim, there’ll be a woman coaching.

Tim Lane:

Do you reckon there’ll be a woman coaching?

Andrew Demetriou:

Why not?  I mean, there’s a woman Prime Minister.  Of course there will, why not?  There are some fine women coaches out there and hopefully over time we’re breaking down this crazy sort of boys’ club that I inherited a few years ago and I think we’re making progress.

Tim Lane:

How far away are we from a female CEO?

Andrew Demetriou:

Oh, well, I’d have to disclose when I’m leaving Tim.  I don’t know.  But why not?  There’s some wonderful talent out there.  And it’s inevitable.

Tim Lane:

How much ground have you made in modifying attitudes towards women more generally?  Via the respect and responsibility code in particular.  I have to say whenever I watch The Footy Show with its tremendous exposure but with its nudge, nudge, wink, wink sort of sexism, I wonder if much has changed at all.

Andrew Demetriou:

Well I know internally, and I know within our clubland it’s changed significantly.  And there’s still more work to be done.  And it came… it started when we had the issues with the two St Kilda lads a few years ago and I think I got up publicly, much to the dismay of people and I said “I want all women to come forward if they’ve got a story to tell” and we did, we had women approach us, and from there we set about with the University of Melbourne, with the Victorian Police, and the Victorian Government, set up a task force to set up a Respect and Responsibility Program.  That’s been implemented.  It goes across the clubs, not just the players, it’s for administrators, Board members.  We’ve won awards because of it.  We’ve got 71 players who are now White Ribbon Ambassadors as well.  It doesn’t mean we don’t have incidents Tim, but there is now a mechanism for dealing with these incidents.  There is a significant shift at clubland now about how to deal with these issues and the attitudes towards women and whilst I agree with you in the main about The Football Show I always say to people “I don’t employ people on The Footy Show.  I don’t run Channel 9.”  Sometimes I sit there and scratch my head as well but I will say this, I did have cause to pick up the phone this year and congratulate them when they actually dedicated a whole show to our breast cancer awareness game, the pink ponchos.  And I couldn’t believe what I was watching, because the whole show was done tastefully, and I thought, oh my god, there’s hope.  They’re actually getting some of this.  And sometimes it takes a lot of time but it doesn’t mean you stop persevering.

Tim Lane:

Do you ever seek to use your influence to express your disapproval though, I know you talked earlier about not ringing editors and that sort of thing, but if you feel the wrong message is being associated with the game, as I think it’s fair to say does happen on that show…

Andrew Demetriou:

I think it’s on public record that when the particular Footy Show incident happened with Caroline Wilson, that I picked up the phone to Caroline Wilson the following morning…

Tim Lane:

That’s a reversal of roles.

Andrew Demetriou:

It is. But I did say to her how offended I was watching that.  And how I wanted her to know that.  And I did take it up with the Channel 9 management.  Because there’s just no place for that and I wanted them to know that as a code, I didn’t want our code to be in any way associated with that.  And this show.  And to David Gingell’s credit, he took it very seriously.  And he took some action internally.  But it was after a few weeks, and I have done that.  There was an incident once, I don’t know if you remember, there was an incident on the show where they drank a  bottle of Jim Beam or something.  That was the most letters I’ve ever received.  On my desk.  And people were absolutely horrified that that happened.  You know.  And I had no option but to pick up the phone because the sort of magnitude of people’s disappointment about that, which surprised me.  It didn’t surprise me that they were horrified, but when I say I got a number of letters, I got lots and lots of correspondence about that.

Tim Lane:

What about gambling?  There’s such a strong link between gambling and, not just football, but a range of other sports in Australia and I’m talking about the fact that people who like sport tend to, probably in a majority of instances, like to have a flutter as well.  I see it in commentary and in press boxes.  A lot of football media, you know, they’re on the punt, most weekends.  Can the game do more to discourage habitual and potentially problematic gambling?  This is an era, I should say, where more and more we’re seeing the link, because the game is becoming connected with gambling outlets.

Andrew Demetriou:

Look, I need to go back to explain where we’ve got to as a code.  A few years ago I was sitting at a Grand Final and on the scoreboard at quarter time was coming up odds, you know, this is what this team is, $2.40, this team is $1.10.  At half time the same. One of my commissioners said to me “Why on earth are we involved with gambling during a Grand Final, it’s on the score board?” and I said “Actually, we’re not”.  You know, we’re not.  It’s got nothing to do with us, we can’t stop it.  But it’s being run by one of the betting agencies.  The next year, there were lots… because we didn’t get involved with betting agencies there were lots of caricatures or bastardised caricatures on trams, so they’d caricature a player, because they weren’t allowed to use our intellectual property, so they’d draw a cartoon of a player who looked like Nick Riewoldt for example, saying “come and bet at such and such” and so forth, and again, people were saying, Oh, the AFL’s got involved with that.  Because it was associated with us.  And then the increase in gambling and the turnover started to increase and we were being asked to use more and more our IP, our fixture and the colours of our teams and we were rejecting it.  So, with the change in legislation with the government,  which then said, I’m going to open up gambling to approved bookmakers and other betting agencies, we said that this is a tide and it’s not going to stop, so we did one or two things, we could allow these guys to keep making money off our code, or we can partner with them and actually have some control and get some say in what’s going on.  So what happened was, we did partner with two betting agencies and we put the following requirements in.  The first one was that any forms of betting had to be approved by us, so they couldn’t introduce, you know, the second goal of a quarter, that needed our approval.  The second thing was, we were guaranteed access to betting sheets, which we never had the information about before and when the cricket gambling happened in… you know, the famous Shane Warne incident, you know, one of the things that came out from the judge who oversaw that was, it’s far better to get involved with betting agencies to information than not be.  So we now get all the betting sheets and we’re privy to all the information.  And the third thing is, we got a percentage of turnover, or whatever arrangement we did, which we could then reinvest back into the game.  And invest into educating our players about gambling within the industry.  So we’ve got far better controls Tim, and what’s more important is, we’ve actually picked up people who were gambling on the game.  You know, and you’ve seen it, when someone does, they’re penalised.  And it’s actually improved our… the actual integrity of the game.  We’ve now got access to this information which we never had before.  But it is something that we think deeply about.  It’s not just gambling on football, it’s gambling everywhere – we’ve got clubs involving gaming machines, you know, and if you could replace that income, it would be preferable.  If the income was there.  But as long as we have some control and we have some information around it, and that we have some say in what’s going on, and we also have access to betting information, we’re comfortable with the position we find ourselves in.

Tim Lane:

We’ll throw it open in just a moment. In fact I might do that now. I’ve got a number of other issues that I’d love to address with Andrew but if I do that we’re probably not going to give you much of an opportunity, so if there is anybody out there who has a question, put your hand up.  There’s one right there in the front row over here on the left.

Question:

Andrew, you talked about drugs before.  Ben Cousins has obviously been the guinea pig I suppose for footy – he’s our first big case.  He’s fighting for his career now, or playing for his career.  He’s got a far bigger battle on his own hands, as we all know.  How have you seen and viewed the coverage of Ben, be it in the media and the attitude to his struggle I suppose, from the community, from clubs, right down through the stakeholders, and what can we learn from it I suppose. 

Andrew Demetriou:

There’s a lot to learn.  We’ve all learned through what happened with Ben and in many ways, I’ve said this repeatedly, I’m glad he’s playing football, because football has got structure around it which is helpful in his rehabilitation.  And I’m really grateful to Richmond for giving him the opportunity to actually go to a club environment, put some structure around his life, he’s got a very, very disciplined testing regime, and you see him today and he’s clean, he’s playing good football, and he’s got some meaning to his life, because he’s got a deep love of football.  He has got a documentary coming out soon which I think will probably explain a lot of things to people about, not just his football, but in general about what can happen in families and what we can all learn from that, and the support that parents have and others.  But there’s some very deep learnings and interestingly enough, I think the media in the beginning, like the AFL and others in the industry, found it hard to leave.  Then of course there was the shock of it.  I think the coverage was fairly balanced.  Some people were outraged and others were more balanced.  I think in general the coverage was pretty balanced.  We learnt a lot through it.  Interestingly enough, when he was penalised, I think a lot of people were relieved and then when he came back and he became a hero, people were glad to see him back playing.  I think the public threw their arms around him.  I think his first training session at Richmond had 1,600 people at is at Punt Road.  And that game that he played, his first game for Richmond, we got 85,000 to a Richmond Carlton, who’d finished in the bottom four the year before, or whatever it was, or they weren’t in the finals.  So, I think Ben’s next challenge, if he plays next year, he’ll have another year of structure around him.  If he’s not playing next year, I hope that he can stay within football because I think the football family will help Ben and I think he’s got a lot to offer the football family.

Tim Lane:

Yes, it’s been interesting, even in the last week or two, as the discussions gathered momentum as to whether he will have a playing future beyond this year and certainly the impression I get, and it can be misleading I guess, basing that on talk back radio and a few newspaper articles, but there does seem to be a strong sense of support growing for him and I think people are really enjoying the fact that his career is thriving still.

Andrew Demetriou:

It’s easy to forget that he won a Brownlow in 2005.  He’s an extraordinary player.  He’s one of the great players that’s played and sometimes it gets a bit lost even with Aka, he’s a super player who’s left the game now for different reasons, but you know, he’s a fantastic player and sometimes we forget the ability of these guys, their playing career, they’ve done some extraordinary things, and Cousins, at the height of his powers, was extraordinary.  You know, his capacity to play, his endurance and his fitness regime, his mental toughness.  And he’s showing it now, for Richmond, that at the age of plus 30, he’s playing great football.  So he’s an extraordinary player.

Question:

My question is, you were talking about the supporters.  One thing over the last few years, it’s been harder and harder just to get general admission tickets, especially at the MCG.  Even five years ago, you’d turn up and just be able to sit with your mates, with your membership or as a supporter.  These days, with all the pre-sale of tickets, it’s getting harder and harder just to turn up and meet your people there, meet your mates, the Ponsford Stand is always sold out, there are other stands always sold out, are you going to look at making a stand that’s going to be a general admission again once the redevelopment’s done of the Southern, to help those people who just want to turn up on the day, meet their friends, to be able to go and enjoy the footy.

Andrew Demetriou:

The only way this is happening is if you’re a Collingwood supporter. 

Question:

I’m actually a Richmond supporter and it’s hard for Richmond supporters as well, especially when we’re up and flying when everyone jumps on the bandwagon.

Andrew Demetriou:

One thing I would say, at the MCG, we’ve always maintained with the MCC a policy of having as many general admission tickets available as possible.  It’s got a capacity of 100,000 and outside of the AFL members and MCC members, there is still 50,000 seats and outside of Collingwood games which get phenomenal crowds and whether it’s Richmond Collingwood, there should be capacity so I’m not sure… I do agree with you that you do have to buy tickets now to games and that’s been a shift in the last few years, that’s for a  number of reasons, it helps with queues and so forth, but I would find it hard to believe that the MCG, as different from Etihad, that there should be capacity in the majority of cases.

Tim Lane:

It’s going to get harder for Tiger fans.  They’re on a bit of a roll.  OK, it looks as if we’ve got some interest. I’ll just go up the back first.  Thank you sir.

Question:

I think there’s only one long term threat to the AFL and that’s if the game into pure entertainment.  And there are a lot of pressures moving in that direction.  Because if that happens, soccer’s going to win and if that happens, that’s a lot more serious for football.  The code is… for people to be as engaged as many of us are in that visceral way so it really hurts when a team loses, that’s not entertainment.  So somehow, the counter has to be to maintain that sort of engagement in individuals,  and so much of Victorian, in suburbs and country towns, in tipping, in workplaces, depends on AFL.  Take AFL out and this is going to be a much weaker and less good place to live. 

Tim Lane:

Are there symptoms that you can give us?

Question:

It’s inevitable, with more and more television, it’s inevitable with more and more options of what you do at the weekends, and what you do during the week, that going to the football becomes, I’ll do it if I feel like it.  There’s inevitable pressure in that sort of globalising way in that direction.  So to hang on to something that is so strongly community based and so sort of traditional in its types of attachment, so six year old kids who suddenly believe in something.  You know, in a world where it’s more and more difficult to believe in things with that degree of passion.  I think there’s a lot at stake for our world and not just football, that AFL just defeats soccer.   I was the one person in this state who was actually pleased the Socceroos did badly for this particular reason.  But the key to this I think, and I know you know all this, is the kids.  Is getting attachment in primary school and once you’ve got that, the Jesuits used to know this, once you’ve got that, then it’s fine, if you don’t have that, almost the whole social pressure of our times, is towards it becoming mere entertainment.

Tim Lane:

OK.  Let’s hear Andrew respond.  It’s a big thing to protect.  It is the fundamental ethos of this game.

Andrew Demetriou:

Look it is.  And it’s a good question and I’m happy to answer it.   Because I actually love this answer Tim.  At AFL House the first and foremost priority is to get people to go to the football.  You would have heard me say that a hundred times.  We actually obsess about going to the game because we think the at-match experience, this meeting place, is fundamental to why the game is what it is.   You talk about the attachment.  There’s 48% of attendees are women.  And there are 25% that are children.  It’s a family environment.  It’s unusual.  You get overseas visitors coming to our game.  They cannot believe, one, that there are so many women in the crowd and families, and two, that supporters of opposing teams sit next to each other.  They just can’t believe it.  Because it’s this wonderful meeting place that football is.  And it’s that for a number of reasons.  One is it’s affordable, it’s absolutely affordable.  You know, when you talk about $18.50 general admission price, $2.20 for children, we held that price for ten years and then this year it went to $2.50.  If two adults go and two children, the two children get in for free.  That’s affordable.  The second thing is access.  We’ve got wonderful venues that we’ve all invested in with government support, federal, state, local, some private and of course, you’ve got good public transport access.  You’ve got good amenities, you’ve got good lavatories, you’ve got good food choice, you’ve got safety.  We have half a dozen incidents a year, Tim, in the crowd.  All these things go to making people feel comfortable about going to the game.  It’s what drives our attendances.  And we actually believe in the mantra that if you go to the football, and you experience it, you’re going to go home and watch it on television.  We don’t believe in the opposite.  We actually believe that if you get involved in the game, you become an Auskicker, or a purchaser of merchandise, a member, maybe an umpire, maybe a volunteer, who knows, but that’s where it all starts.  It starts by getting people to go to the game.  It starts as Auskick, with five year olds, they get exposed to the game, with parents, we track them all the way through and we’ve got enough research to show that if we expose them to the game and they start going to the game, then you’ve got a chance of keeping them in the game.  Having said all that, you’re talking about soccer.  I say publicly while I respect other codes and I welcome competition, we have great faith in our game.  I’ve got enormous faith in our game.  150 years old and it’s deeply embedded in people’s DNA in this country, and particularly in this state, and traditional football states and I don’t sit at home thinking about soccer.  The challenge is for soccer to make inroads into AFL.  On a global scale, it’s a different situation.  You know, soccer is part of people’s upbringing.  But in this country there are people today following the teams who their great, great, great grandparents followed Tim.  Poor old Eddie McGuire’s children – they’ve got no option – they’re barracking for Collingwood.

Tim Lane:

 I think our questioner though, in a way, is asking whether it’s possible to have too much confidence and therefore to be a bit complacent.  A question I had on my list was, I mean, this is a very fundamental thing, jumpers.  And we now every week wearing these alternative strips, almost all of which look the same, they’re white with a little bit of something else on them, and the jumper is so basic to the kind of visceral thing that we’re talking about here.

Andrew Demetriou:

Well, first of all, I would hope that we aren’t complacent because I would say that’s our greatest challenge.  That complacency can set in.  Particularly if you’re a leader, leading the codes and you’re actually going quite well.  What you don’t want to do is become complacent.  And we are actually relishing competition.  It makes us work harder.  It makes us perform better. There’s no doubt about that.  And that’s why I want soccer, and I want rugby league and I want union in this town because it will make us work harder.  Secondly, the fact of the jumper is that we’re just in a different era now where what people want to watch on the ground and I’m saying from an aesthetic perspective, they want to see teams differentiated as distinct from clashes.  And I always… I’m one who was in the camp of, we’ve gone for a hundred and something years, Richmond have played Carlton and there’s no clash and Collingwood are playing Carlton and suddenly they’re wearing white but the fact of the matter is, that’s the spectacle, one team wearing dark and one white, it’s just easier for people to watch, and we’ve responded to what people have told us.

Tim Lane:

I saw the drawn Grand Final in ’77 between Collinwood and North and I’ve never heard anyone complain about the fact that the blue and white and the black and white stripes were confusing.

Andrew Demetriou:

I was there.

Tim Lane:

 It was a pretty exciting day.  But I won’t labour the point.  We’ll go extreme left or your extreme right.  You come in.

Question:

G’day.  Just wondering about – I grew up in Canberra and we saw North Melbourne playing at Manuka Oval for years.  We, me and my brothers always hoped, probably half-heartedly, that one day there’d be a team called the Canberra Kangaroos.  I’m a bit confused about how I see Western Sydney branch into Canberra.  Do you see Canberra ever having a team?  Their support base for the two rugby teams over there is wavering to an extent. 

Andrew Demetriou:

A good question.  Look, I think the AFL in the early ‘80s missed a great opportunity to I guess capture Canberra and left the door ajar for the NRL and for rugby and since then we’ve been playing catch up.  And I was involved in the North Melbourne agreement playing games in Canberra and been involved in the other teams playing games, but all along it’s always been the view and I think it’s a view that we share, that you would prefer that there was a much greater degree of permanency playing these games, rather than fly in, fly out.  It’s a cash grab – are they really putting back into the community.  And I think Hawthorn have demonstrated that you can do it really, really well.  That’s what they’ve done with a long term commitment to Tasmania.  So I guess to go to the second part of your question, with Greater Western Sydney, it’s a very, very large catchment area and there’s been discussions with the ACT government and several football clubs in Canberra about whether there’s an opportunity through this new team out of Western Sydney to have some permanency.  So that when this team’s playing Greater Western Sydney that maybe they could play two, three, four games permanently and develop their own supporter base, a membership base like Hawthorn have done, in Canberra.  And so far those talks are progressing very well.  We’ve had a great relationship with the ACT government. I think it’s important that we play in Canberra, because there are people who do love the game, and I think it’s also important politically when you’ve got the federal government there and you’ve got a lot of public servants there.  We get the games well attended by a wide range of people.  So hopefully that deal can come off.  But it’s in dialogue at the moment and I think the discussion’s going very well.

Tim Lane:

The temptation to indulge myself in a discussion about Tasmania is growing but I’ll resist it for the time being.  And we’re now running out of time.  Rob I’m not sure how we’re going.

Question:

Just on that Tasmanian point actually.  I’m a Hawthorn supporter and I’ve been down there and watched them and I find it interesting that you’ve been discussing international opportunities, I know they’ve looked into Argentina and South Africa as you mentioned, and we were just speaking about Canberra.  Greater Western Sydney is obviously economically a very, very viable option, but do you think if you were a Tasmanian, you’d be a bit a little disgruntled with yourself?  And the AFL’s decision to look into those franchises over the top of the Tasmanian people’s interests?

Andrew Demetriou:

Sure.  I’m sure there are a number of people in Tasmania who would have that view.  And the view’s been expressed to me.  But I mean I can honestly tell you that when I started as the General Manager of Football Operations, I think I’d been in the job for about a week, I was asked by my then CEO, Wayne Jackson, to go down to Tasmania to meet with the Premier who was the late Jim Bacon and he said, just go down, Jim Bacon wants to have a meeting with you.  So I said, OK.  I didn’t realise that when I walked in, Jim was screaming and yelling at me, saying “I’ve promised the electorate AFL games in Tasmania.  You guys haven’t delivered.  Ian Collins says it will never happen.  Wayne Jackson…” and I thought, thanks Wayne, you’ve set me up here beautifully.  And during that discussion, what became apparent to me was that the Tasmanian government at that time, they had a great desire to play football in Launceston.  They had a desire to get more mainlanders coming across because of what had happened post Port Arthur and they had this desire for whatever reason to have cricket in the south and football in the north.  And we then set about collectively to see how that could happen.  And Jim’s view at the time was that he didn’t want more than four games, because he’d rather get four games of 18,000 than eight games of 10,000.  But that was a view that the government held.  I respected that view.  It wasn’t for me to tell the government… We then set about getting football in Tasmania.  I was there from day 1.  And as you know, Hawthorn and St Kilda, and Hawthorn got a greater degree of permanency, and then of course the calls came for a team in Tasmania and we prioritised Greater Western Sydney and Queensland.  We’ve always said that we want to play more football in Tasmania, so now the Premier has shifted his view, that he would like football in the south, at Bellerive.  It’s to the great credit of the Tasmanian government that they’ve invested heavily as we have with the Launceston City Council in York Park.  It’s a great facility and there’s talk about doing something similar at Bellerive.  And I guess if you can get another four games in Tasmania, you’ve got eight games, and they’re well attended, then you start to build something.  And I’m pleased with the way Tasmania’s gone and I know it’s not perfect for everybody.  But Tasmania has been a significant contributor to AFL football and produced some of the greatest players that have ever played.  And hopefully in time we can do more there.  I think that the way it’s been built up over time with four well attended games, a club doing some good work down there, and getting more content down there.  It gives us a foundation.  Over to you Tim. 

Tim Lane:

I don’t have time to pursue the argument because we have some more questions from the floor.  We’ll go to the young lady in the middle.  On the right hand wing.

Question:

This is from the Internet.  It’s come to my phone.  Will the AFL be pushing for live Friday night matches as part of the next TV negotiations?

Andrew Demetriou:

Yeah, look, I’m on the public record as saying in this new age of information and speed, and what’s happening globally, people want to watch their sport live.  This is the way of the world we live in now.  You can download a story that’s happening now on the election campaign and see it in five seconds.  Two seconds.  So people don’t actually want to watch delays or replays.  So I think there’s been a significant shift there.  We’ve got no doubt it doesn’t affect the crowd.  There’s nothing to show us that live against the gate will in any way diminish the attendances.  So our desire is to have as much live football as possible.  I’m not just talking about Friday night.  I just think it’s inevitable.  You can’t stop what’s happening.  If you ignore what’s happening with the world and people’s demands, and everything now and Gen Y, I think you do it at your peril.

Tim Lane:

I think it has been really interesting to see how the balance between live coverage and crowds had unfolded.  As time’s gone on.  You must have been particularly with matches not all being played on the one day, being separated…

Andrew Demetriou:

Well, this Saturday night, Tim, Geelong Collingwood, will probably get 85 to 90,000 people.  It’s going to be live.  People want to go and enjoy the experience. 

Tim Lane:

Up the back.

Question:

I’ll be really quick.  I’ve only got a whole book here.  I just wanted to speak to you about attitudes towards women.  I’ve been trying to write down what I actually want to ask you.  I think it’s about how influential AFL footballers are within the community.  I understand the Respect and Responsibility and everything so there’s education going on with the AFL but I feel that media outlets such as The Footy Show really undermine all the positive treatment of women you’re trying to educate.  Like these players with.  I’m not articulating myself very well, so I was wondering if you guys ever considered using the public profile of AFL players to encourage the community to treat women better, rather than just educating the players and allowing it to sort of go on in the community the way it is.

Andrew Demetriou:

We do.  You know, I could tell you coming up again this year, I’m a White Ambassador, sorry 71 players are White Ambassadors out there promoting the abhorrence about violence against women.  And I can tell you that there would be a number of people in the industry, players included, who if there was anything they could do to help promote a shift in attitudes towards women, they would put their hands up.  Because they believe in it now, they do.  And we’re not there yet, but we’ve made huge progress and we’re going to continue to try and make more progress, because it’s very, very important for us, very important. 

Question:

I guess I just feel as a woman, I love football, I think it’s a great sport but I feel really isolated from it.  It’s mainly from things like The Footy Show and I feel like, and I know that you don’t spin and I really respect everything you said, but I feel like a lot of things are happening because that’s how it should and I don’t feel like there’s actually things being done in the community to say, you know what, this is the correct way to treat women, and we’ve got your really big role models demonstrating this. 

Andrew Demetriou:

 I try to as best as possible try to convince people that we don’t run The Footy Show because we don’t.  I don’t have any say in who they employ or how they run it just as I don’t have any say in Before the Game which I think is a wonderfully different program with humour on a Saturday night, it educates lots of people about what’s good about the game.  And there are some good aspects about The Footy Show and they bring it out with some other aspects.  But having said all that, I can assure you that with our Respect and Responsibility Program it does filter through to all our state bodies.  AFL Victoria has run it through our metropolitan football leagues and country football leagues and it slowly filtering through and when we take on an issue the whole purpose of that is it has an effect, it has some influence at the grass roots.  It will be picked up by state leagues, the country football leagues will pick it up, the metropolitan football leagues will pick it up and you will have seen recently with the issue at the Montmorency Football Club the abhorrence about that.  A few years ago… things like that, ridiculous, like strip nights now, they’re a no no.  And all this that used to happen and these stupid sportsmen’s nights with people up there joking about women and that doesn’t happen and if it does, there’s outrage about it.  So I think we’re making progress but we’ve got more work to do.

Tim Lane:

Thank you very much.  Robert’s coming up to bid us farewell.  I hope we haven’t kept you from your lectures and I hope we’ve kept you awake.  I’ll hand it over to Robert Manne.

Robert Manne:

Thanks.  I’d just like to thank both Tim and Andrew very much, very sincerely.  I know we could have gone on for another hour with questions because as John Carroll, who is one of the questioners, knows, it’s a game that matters a great deal in quite deep ways.  And I just want to say thank you for the generosity of what you’ve done today.  On next Wednesday there’s another game which we’re interested in called politics, and Bob Brown’s going to be here so just this afternoon we’re really privileged to have a commentator like Tim and an administrator like Andrew in what is for me, The Great Game.

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