Ex-skipper Taylor reveals CA frustration in MOU talks

Mark Taylor, who as Test captain was instrumental in the establishment of the Memorandum of Understanding that has underpinned Australian cricket for the past 20 years, says frustration is at the heart of the recent escalation of the players' stand-off with Cricket Australia.

Taylor – who led the national playing group to the brink of a strike during the 1997 dispute that ultimately yielded a breakthrough deal based upon a revenue sharing model, and is now a CA Board member – claimed today that he was "not surprised" that CA Chief Executive James Sutherland had delivered a blunt message to the Australian Cricketers' Association.

The parties have not engaged in direct negotiations since the ACA outlined their objections, and Taylor – who has served in his current role in the CA Board of Directors since 2013 – claimed it was frustration in the absence of ongoing negotiations that prompted Sutherland's correspondence.

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"I'm not surprised that James has done what he's done," Taylor told Channel Nine's Sports Sunday program today.

"Things have not been going anywhere for months now, and I know that Cricket Australia – and I'm a board director, so I'm biased that way – feel the ACA aren't negotiating at all.

"Cricket Australia want to change the MOU, they want to get away from what they call the revenue sharing model, although the one being offered to the players is still revenue sharing to a certain extent.

"No-one is worse off, women are going to be very well paid under the new model.

"But right from the word go, the ACA – I'm not so sure the players – (but) the ACA have not wanted to engage at all on this deal that's being offered.

"It's all about (maintaining the) status quo or the highway, and I don't think you can negotiate that way."

Sutherland wrote to the ACA's Chief Executive Officer Alistair Nicholson last Friday and stated that if a new MOU is not agreed to before the current Memorandum expires on June 30, "players with contracts expiring in 2016-17 will not have contracts for 2017-18".

"To be very clear, in the absence of a new MOU, CA is not contemplating alternative contracting arrangements to pay players beyond 30 June if their contracts have expired," Sutherland wrote in a letter that has since been publicly posted on social media platforms.

The players who fall into this category include a majority of the current Australia Test and limited-overs representatives, with those players who hold multi-year contracts with State associations and deals with KFC Big Bash League franchises that stretch beyond this year told they will be required to honour those agreements in the absence of a new MOU.

Members of Australia's women's team, the Southern Stars, who will be involved in the World Cup tournament in the UK that bridges the June 30 deadline will be offered contracts for the duration of that event and paid in advance, should an outcome on a new MOU not be reached beforehand.

Sutherland's letter was sent two weeks after the ACA rejected CA's proposals to alter the framework of the MOU, with the players' association claiming the shift away from the revenue-sharing model devised in 1997 would "end a successful 20-year partnership with the players".

"In summary, CA’s proposal is a 'win' for cricket administrators but a 'loss' for cricket," the ACA claimed in their formal response to CA's proposal.

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ACA Chairman, and former Australia Test wicketkeeper Greg Dyer, wrote to CA Chairman David Peever last Friday suggesting that an independent mediator be jointly appointed by both parties to try and resolve the impasse.

"The ACA remains genuinely committed to seeking to renew the MOU by the due date," Dyer says in the letter, which has also been posted on social media platforms.

"This process (appointment of a mediator) would be confidential and is consistent with previous discussions around a negotiation protocol, wherein CA had proposed mediation in such a circumstance."

It is believed the only agreement between the two parties is to negotiate in good faith, and the ACA did not accept other protocols that included mediation. 

Taylor, who as Australia's Test captain at the height of the 1997 players' dispute invited his former Test teammate Tim May to take on the role as head of the ACA, claimed he is "uncomfortable" to find himself in the opposite negotiating position to that which he occupied 20 years ago.

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When he claims he "put my job (as Test captain) on the line" when he received a letter from the then Australian Cricket Board asking him to explain his rationale for leading the players' dispute.

"They wanted to sack me," Taylor said today.

But he claimed it was the absence of direct negotiations, with less than seven weeks remaining before the current MOU expires, that had driven Sutherland to pen his blunt assessment.

"The Board, and Cricket Australia in general, have been frustrated by the fact that there has been no negotiation," Taylor said.

"I had players say to me in January this year that 'we could well be on strike by July'.

"This is before this MOU (proposal prepared by CA) was presented to them."