Pay equals play, for all.

While the demands by the highly successful US women’s soccer team to be paid the same as their male counterparts made headlines around the world, the sentiment and the conversation is far from new. And it’s part of a broader conversation about general inequities, beyond pay, that our female athletes have faced for decades.

If you sit down for a chat with a female cricketer from years past, you’ll hear stories of making their own uniforms, getting changed in the car because there were no girls’ facilities at the grounds, squeezing in training between full time employment and home responsibilities, stuffing their man-sized shoes with socks and tissues to better fit their feet.

Back in 1934 an enthusiastic English team paid their own way to tour Australia for the first Women’s Test. These are just some of the lengths that women have had to go to over the years to play the sport they love, for which they didn’t get paid a penny.

So I read with interest The Age's editorial o--n Sunday Women's sport needs and deserves more backing and felt proud to work for Cricket Australia, an organisation that has demonstrated meaningful steps in this space.

In 2017, Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association negotiated a pioneering outcome for all players, offering the same base rate of pay regardless of gender. This saw a seven-fold increase in payments for elite female cricketers, from $7.5 million over the previous five year period to $55 million over the term of the current collective bargaining agreement. This commitment is in place with a view to renegotiation in 2023, at which point the group premiums will be reviewed.

Today, cricket is the most lucrative team sport for women in Australia, with national players receiving an average of $200,000 a year, and the stars significantly more, while domestic players with WBBL and state contracts earn an average of more than $55,000. This has made cricket one of the first fully professional women’s domestic team sport in Australia.

The Age noted that the implementation of equal pay in sport “is inextricably entangled with revenues, audiences, government subsidies and other complex mechanisms”.

Arguably, this is no different in the corporate world where salaries can be weighted according to commercial contribution, complexity, seniority and profile.

But in sport the revenue argument is linked to historical under-investment. We can’t expect women’s cricket to be generating big commercial dollars when we’ve not invested in the sport to build a profile that attracts commercial investment. Saying players shouldn’t be paid because they don’t bring in the money is just punishing them for this historical under-investment. This is why Cricket Australia has introduced an approach to help break the cycle.

The guiding principle in the development of the remuneration model is that work of equal or comparable value is remunerated equally regardless of gender. The foundation of the remuneration model is that all player groups (national men’s and women’s, along with state men’s and women’s teams and Big Bash men’s and women’s teams) receive the same base rate of pay.

Cricket Australia’s approach allows flexibility in recognition of the key variables that make up a player’s pay. As The Age noted, currently, men’s sports for the most part generates vastly more revenue in TV rights and sponsorship than most women’s professional sport. Acknowledging that some teams have bigger audiences both in match attendance and television viewership, premiums are then paid on top for teams and individuals. Similarly, the step up from State to National level is recognised with Australia’s Men’s and Women’s players receive a premium for representing Australia.

Individuals are also recognised with individual performance premiums reflecting the relative standing of each player within their squad.

It seems we are finally making financial headway for our incredible women in sport, though there is still a way to go: we need to keep our foot on the pedal, raising awareness of these talented athletes and giving people reason to follow them. The fact that six of 10 young players signing up for cricket today are girls, and that two of the top three favourite W/BBL players are women is certainly a reflection of the growing awareness and interest being driven by greater investment in women’s cricket.

First published in The Age on 17 July, 2019: We must break the cycle of underinvestment in women's sport