The Decibel - Inside Canada Soccer’s equal pay fight

Episode Date: July 21, 2023

Canada’s national women’s soccer team is protesting unequal treatment by the sport’s governing body. The players say Canada Soccer is not transparent with its finances, and that they won’t agree to be paid less than the men. The men’s team supports them.Rachel Brady is The Globe’s sports reporter, and she’ll tell us about the dispute, the growing business case for equally funding women’s sport, and how that’s fuelling professional women’s soccer in Canada.This episode originally aired February 17, 2023.Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail]

The Women's World Cup is underway in New Zealand, and the Canadian national team is considered one of the favourites. While you'll be hearing a lot about the tournament over the next few weeks, you might also hear about a years-long dispute between the players and Canada soccer. One of the big issues is equal pay. It's such an important time to be a part of this fight and an important time to be a part of women's sport. And, you know, you always say sport is a avenue for change. And I think to be able to continue to use our voices and try and ignore

the trolls as much as possible and kind of push forward in this fight is really important. There's been an agreement in principle since we aired this episode earlier this year, but nothing's been formally signed yet. So today, we're re-airing this episode breaking down the Canadian women's team's fight for equality. Rachel Brady is the Globe Sports Reporter. She'll tell us about the growing business case for equally funding women's sport and how that's fueling professional women's in Canada. I'm Mainika Ramanwilms and this is The Deing professional women's soccer in Canada. I'm Mainika Ramanwilms and this is The Decibel from The Globe and Mail. Rachel, thank you so much for joining me. It's great to have you in studio here. Yeah, it's nice to be here.

So Rachel, can you tell me what has the Canadian women's soccer team been protesting? Yeah. So they they went on strike. They announced that last Friday that they were going to go on strike, which for a soccer player effectively means I'm not going to show up for the scheduled activities of training, weight room, meetings, video, all those things that would be required of you to play for Canada. So they were still in Orlando, but be required of you to play for Canada. So they were still in Orlando, but they weren't going to be showing up. And their strike, you know, was only only lasted about a day because they did meet with Canada Soccer. And Canada Soccer sort of made it clear to them that their strike was actually unlawful by Ontario laws, and that they would have to threaten legal action against the players if this is what the players said they were threatened with you know with legal action which means you know collecting

damages right collecting money from these players essentially and so the women said when we talked to them on Tuesday the women said you know we felt we had no choice we needed to go back we don't make millions of dollars and we couldn't afford to put ourselves in that sort of financial risk. And so we decided to go back to the field, but we are doing so under protest. And just to be clear, what are they striking against exactly? They're striking against the fact that there's not a deal done yet and that they didn't get paid for 2022. So they didn't get paid in 2022? Yeah, that's correct. We don't know all of the reasons why that is now.

That's going to come down to equal pay with what the men get. So I think that that sum needs to be determined still, I think, and agreed upon. I'm sure there's lots of factors that the public doesn't entirely know about why they haven't been paid. But it certainly is true that they had not received pay yet for that year. And so when they were on strike for these practices, this is when they're turning their jerseys inside out. They're trying to make kind of a visual sign here that they're unhappy. Yeah, certainly. And every time that they had spoken, they have expressed that, you know, using words like we're crushed, we're devastated, we're sick of it.

And this form of protest truly does receive support from their colleagues around the world, women on other national teams like the U.S. who are hosting the She Believes Cup and women in England who, you know, so many teams around the world, women's teams have had to have some sort of hard conversations about equality with their associations. So they do feel like comrades in a lot of ways and like allies that when one women's nation is going through it, that the other women definitely, even though the rivals on the pitch, they do support one another. Yeah. I just have to point out the irony here that they are being forced to play in this tournament, she believes, which believes which you know it sounds like it's supposed to be about female empowerment here that's the motto of it yep and they're being forced back on the field even though they're trying to protest this unequal investment yeah that was definitely the motto of the tournament when it was when it began uh that you know it's supposed to be for women fighting for what they deserve and what they believe and so so, yeah, there's definitely

appropriate, I suppose. Yeah. Wow. Can you just give me some context, Rachel, here about salary ranges? What kind of numbers are we talking about? Yeah. In the National Women's Soccer League, which is where many of the Canadian players play, they had a minimum salary of $35,000 and a maximum of $75,000 for instance. So that's just a very broad range. But it's hard to answer that because many women have sponsorship deals in different ways that money is coming in and then they're getting money from their national teams, those that are Olympians and play for the national team. So the famous players are making into the hundreds in Europe or in the U.S., but it's not as much as the men. And so how much do the men make?

Millions. Wow. That's a big difference. You know, in major league soccer, the lower end players are not making that, you know, but in Europe, obviously, they're making millions there. So Canada soccer, so this is the governing body for sport, for the sports in the country. What have they said about equal pay in terms of how much they pay their male and female athletes? They said this is a goal to even it up. The men and the women each have their own players associations, and those players associations effectively negotiate with Canada Soccer. So what Canada Soccer has said is we want it to be equal. We want whatever the men are getting, we want the women to get.

So now they need to get there. They very publicly said it. People have seen them say it on video. Now they need to get there. And it sounds like it's not just about pay. We talk a lot about pay for athletes, but it seems to be an issue about investment too, right? Like how much teams get for preparations for World Cups and things. I guess, can you touch on that? Like how important is that to the conversation? Yeah, when the players spoke on a media call the other day, we heard from Christine Sinclair and Sophie Schmidt, who are

veterans and have been there for a long time, and Janine, Becky, and Quinn, we heard from all four of those players. And they stressed a number of times that it's not like pay per game that's so top of their list, although that is important. It's support. So by that, they mean, you know, numbers of staff, numbers of opportunities to have camps, how many players are being invited to a camp? They made the sort of example that they don't want staff members subbing in on the field, kind of shadowing as a player just so that they can play 11 v 11. They want the proper number of players invited to camp just as the men would have. So it's things like that that they want. They want to be able to say that all those sorts of resources that the men have, they

want to be able to look and say, look how they prepared for Qatar. We want all of those things in an equitable way as we prepare for our Women's World Cup this summer. Right. And it's coming up in a few months. So this is kind of top of mind, I would imagine. Yeah, it sure is. And that is what has kind of struck the anger of the women is that they have found it that there are budget cuts coming across the board. And it's not isolated just to the women, but across the board, like so to the men's program, to the women's program and to their associated youth programs. And these cuts happen to be coming not last year when the men were going for their World Cup, but right now in this critical six month stretch as the women are preparing for Australia and New Zealand. And so they sort of

take that personally, right? Like, why aren't you finding a way? Were you finding a way for the men and now you're not finding a way for us? And why are you sort of putting this level of stress and worry on us now and making us feel that we're not going to be as prepared as we could be when we feel that we have a very good team and a very good chance to compete and succeed at this World Cup. And now we feel as though we're not being supported in the way that will make us feel best prepared to show up there. Yeah. And so what has Canada Soccer said about these cuts? Like, why do they need to make these cuts now? Yeah, very little. And that's part of the issue here. There have sort of been some questions about

how transparent they've been with money. Do we know where the money that Canada Soccer has, do we know where that money comes from? Well, lots of different places. So some of that would come from ticket sales, right? The players receive prize money from FIFA. So the men would have received money as prize money. I know they didn't win the World Cup, but they received prize money for the level that they did make it through the tournament. And the women will equally, not equally, because it's not equal at all in FIFA and what FIFA awards to a men's World Cup and to teams in a women's World Cup. And then there would be lots of other, you know, things that might like sponsors and things like that. And some of that money comes in through a different entity called Canadian Soccer Business, which is part of the IR as well, that players want

to be able to see exactly how things funnel in through there. Okay. We've been talking about the budget cuts for this year. Just I I guess, briefly, what kind of impact would these budget cuts have on the women's team preparing for the World Cup? What's the direct impact of that? Yeah, we don't know those details yet. The women and Canada Soccer have kind of an agreement here where they decide not to speak about the nitty gritty of details because they're trying to get a deal over the line. They're trying to get a deal over the line. They're trying to get a deal signed here. So the two groups have agreed that they won't talk in specifics. So as much as we all want to know, what are we talking about here? Are we talking

about hotels? Are we talking about flights? Are we talking about meals and per diems? What is it that is the shortcoming that the women don't get that the men do? We all want to know those details very much. Nobody's talking about those in too detail about those specifics at this time until their deal is struck. We'll be back in a minute. Okay, let's take this a little bit broader for a moment here, Rachel. The issue of unequal pay for women in sports, it's not really something new. We've been talking about this for a while. What are some of the arguments that people use, I course, right? Like Billie Jean's been fighting for this and continues to fight for this. And she's just not fighting in tennis anymore. She's fighting for women in all kinds of different sports. And many times I've actually talked to her many times and she says, you know, in some ways it feels like it is just going so slow. It certainly has happened across many sports. Tennis has had a lot of victories

at it, equal pay in many of the major tournaments around the world. So that's a big one. But when you look at things like, you know, the arguments that people make for why men in tennis, you had the very basic one, which is, but they're playing five sets and women are playing three. And then you hear things like, but there's more tickets being sold and more people attending, you know, maybe an NBA game versus a WNBA game. On the other side, a lot of people that work in women's sport and that are fighting for women's sport now will tell you the investment hasn't been there and the staff and the support

as well hasn't been there. So what would happen if you did put in the same amount of marketing and the same amount of investment and all of the things that come with it, get going and they have a hard time getting off the ground. And there certainly have been failures for women's sport. You know, a lot of people that are detractors, you know, keep a checklist on that stuff, right? Well, people don't show up for that. People don't watch on TV. People don't, you know, respect it or don't think that the level is as high or the athletes are as good. It's not really about that. You know, it's about looking at each entity and saying, is it entertaining? Are you getting value for your dollar? Are sponsors getting value for investing in it? And the research right now that we're seeing is that it very much is a value proposition, that women's professional sport is something that sponsors and fans do want to put their money into. So we'll see how it grows.

And it is very, it's kind of like a self-fulfilling thing, right? If you put the money into it and invest in it, like for example, you get more training camps before a World Cup, you get better facilities, you're probably going to do better, owners are putting money into that, investing in that. We've seen it in women's tennis, you know, that we've had just remarkably successful women in tennis. We've had successful women in golf across all kinds of sports. Look at the growth of the WNBA. They're looking at expansion now because the growth isn't, just because the growth isn't exactly on par number-wise and money-wise with men, people look at it and still can sometimes say, well, it's lesser than, it's not there, it's not worth my money as much as the men are. But women had a – they started way behind. They're decades behind in starting their leagues. So if you actually look at the trajectory of growth, that's where you get a different picture of the trajectory of growth might be different.

And especially when we're talking about Canadian women soccer players, I mean, they've been doing so well, right? Even compared to the men's team in their league. So I think there's a lot of excitement at this moment in time too around supporting these players. Yeah, as they made the point this week i believe janine becky made the point like we won the damn olympics is what she said and it really just hit you like what more do they need to do you know like they are and no one's disputing that you know can it's

not like canada soccer isn't saying you know these women are are heroes and stuff that no one's disputing but this is a time where everybody should be getting really excited about them leaving. There should be a send-off game. That's another thing that the women are really upset about. Why isn't there a game, a send-off game on the calendar already that you can already start buying tickets for, for May or June or whatever, where you see these women off in Vancouver or Toronto or whatever, right? Just have them in a Canadian city on a

big send-off game for people to get excited to see them off to the World Cup. So it sounds like there's kind of, you know, slow movements, but movements towards this kind of equality in sports. You've been following this for a while, Rachel. Is there a reason, I guess, that this moment in time or the last, like, few years where we're seeing this kind of shift towards, you know, making that a priority? For women across the board sports yeah i think there's uh there's going to be some real movement as we've seen women's hockey has been has been like really on the on the cusp of it for a while there's two groups currently operating in north america on two different leagues that are just trying like one league has has already started and is growing quite a lot with teams in the U.S. and Canada. And then you've got a group,

the PWHPA, they're called, who have a lot of the current national team players for Canada and the U.S. They're showcasing around. They're on the cusp of trying to get a league. We're seeing, obviously, expansion in the WNBA. Yeah, it's a moment we've seen some professional women's volleyball. We've seen some professional women's softball in recent years. Lots of different models, lots of different business people thinking and looking. And it's the way businesses want to spend their money now too, that they're saying, wait a minute, we've invested for many years into men's sport. We want to start putting our money. And in fact, it's a mandate of many companies to start putting their money into girls and women.

Sounds like that's becoming more the norm then now. Yeah. And there's statistics that there probably never used to be decades ago that it is now a value proposition. That's a good ROI to put your money into girls' sports and women's sport. You're seeing a good return on your investment there. So like, look how quickly just a small number of sponsors came on board for just at the very idea of a women's professional soccer league here in Canada, a number of big Canadian sponsors jumped on right away. It remains to be seen how many more investors will pony up right away and say, okay, we're willing to put our money

into that. I'll sign up right now, you know, whether or not people will buy tickets and all that kind of thing. But so far, that was a positive. They have a long road to go to get that thing going. It would prove a lot to people if they could be successful in the sort of in the debut few years of that league. Yeah. And so just to go back to the dispute we're seeing now between the women's team and Canada soccer, this has got a lot of people's attention, including MPs in Ottawa. There's actually three members of parliament on the Federal Heritage Committee that say they want to hear testimony from Canada soccer. Why do they want to hear from them? Yeah, there's been such a look at the governance of sport in Canada and our national sport organizations, because certainly the government and Sport Canada do put money into that, right? And so they want to say, okay, Canadians have a right to know here, you know, how good you're being at governing, how you're treating your athletes. Are you using that money wisely? Are you being ethical

about it? How are you treating athletes? And so there's a larger conversation about safe sport that's happening at the same time that the government and certainly the Hockey Canada, when the Heritage Committee called executives from Hockey Canada on to Ottawa to answer questions. I mean, people were were so compelled by that and so interested and so waiting for someone to be held to account for things. Now, this is very different. That was about allegations of sexual assault. This is about, you know, equity here. But it's a concern. Yeah. And so does this committee actually have the ability to compel Canada soccer to share their finances and get that transparency? They will be able to compel documents.

I don't know the extent yet of what they will be able to ask for. Certainly, it sounds as though they can ask for minutes and things like that so they can look at communications and what's being discussed in meetings and stuff. So it will be very interesting to see the extent of the sorts of documents that they can bring out and what you can tell from that. Just lastly here, Rachel, all of this tension and controversy is happening right around the lead up, of course, to the Women's World Cup, which is happening this summer. How do you think the team is going to fare this summer and how will they play? Yeah, it's a great question, really, right?

Like it's maybe it fuels them. Maybe they get what they want or they get a deal in place. It appears that all sides want a deal struck as soon as possible. So by all accounts, this is a very close-knit team and that everybody has, you know, they've agreed that they would fight together, you know, and that they would stick together. And they're very motivated to leave women's soccer in Canada in a better place than it was when they all came to the program, right, for the young players that are coming in now, for the young girls that are playing. emotionally drained, you know, that they spent a lot of their time focused on arguing and negotiating and fighting and being stressed that maybe they could have spent on their soccer. So we'll see how they refocus. Rachel, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me today. Thank you for having me.

That's it for today. I'm Mainika Raman-Wilms. Jay Coburn helped produce this episode. Our summer producer is Nagin Nia. Our producers are Madeline White, Cheryl Sutherland, and Rachel Levy-McLaughlin. David Crosby edits the show. Adrienne Chung is our senior producer, and Angela Pachenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening, and I'll talk to you next week.