If You Say So – Happy Tuesday

This week the Swimming New Zealand (SNZ) High Performance Logistics and Operations Manager, Amanda White, decided to reply to the Swimwatch posts discussing the $5,300 fee SNZ is charging swimmers selected to represent New Zealand at the World Short Course Championships. This is what she wrote.

For clarity on the finances on this user pays meet (no different than previous years) if anyone would like a breakdown on the costs please feel free to contact me directly on amanda@swimming.org.nz.

We are always more than happy, as the swimmers and families have already experienced, to be 100% transparent about costs for accommodation, Food, transport, accreditation and event entries which are charged to SNZ by FINA, the NZOC and other International bodies we liaise with to send swimmers to their meets. We do not on charge Staff costs. The HP Team and the Board strive to keep costs at a minimum for the Swimmers to ensure future sustainability. We only wish we had more and could pay for attendance for all of our HP Swimmers!

Happy Tuesday :-)

I accepted SNZ’s kind offer and have asked to be sent the breakdown of the $5,300 user pays fee. I hope to be able to include the SNZ reply later in this post. But before doing that let’s consider the content of Amanda’s Facebook comment. The first line says, “this user pays meet (no different than previous years)”. That is not true. It is a lie. In 1991 I went with Toni Jeffs to what was then the first World Short Course Championships in Majorca, Spain. To this day I believe that team is the only New Zealand team to go to a world event and have every swimmer win a medal.  Toni got bronze in the 50 freestyle. And for Amanda’s education, all three swimmers had their costs paid. The same thing applied to the Perth and Rome World Championship teams.

Contrary to the Amanda lie, charging swimmers a user-pays fee to swim in World Championships is relatively new. When SNZ was well run and financially independent, before the days of Miskimmin social welfare, swimmers didn’t have to pay to represent the country in a world championship. It is only since the rip-off merchants in charge of SNZ today came along that stinging swimmers for every cent has been the norm. Amanda should not lie to us. It reflects badly on her honesty and on the organisation.

Besides even if charging swimmers in the past was true, there is no reason why it should continue today. If that was true we would still have ten year olds working in coalmines. Because something was done in the past is no reason for it to continue.

The beginning of the second paragraph makes great play of SNZ’s transparency. Amanda says, “We are always more than happy — to be 100% transparent.” This is the ultimate irony coming as it does from the least transparent organisation I know. Remember when Board Minutes used to be published. That doesn’t happen anymore. Remember when we received monthly management accounts. That’s gone too. Remember when I asked for the report into a complaint about my coaching. That is still denied. Amanda really needs a shot of reality. She works for an organisation that is about as transparent as Russia’s Kremlin.

Amanda concludes her comments with these two gems. “The HP Team and the Board strive to keep costs at a minimum for the Swimmers to ensure future sustainability. We only wish we had more and could pay for attendance for all of our HP Swimmers!” What a pathetic joke. Johns and Francis are paid the thick end of $300,000. Johns flies to Japan on a ceremonial junket. Francis is on a freebie to China. There is no purpose in him being there. He doesn’t coach anyone. None of this is keeping costs to a minimum. It is the same old spend as much as you like on Antares Place inmates; to hell with those who actually do the work. Amanda clearly has no idea of what keeping “costs to a minimum” means.

And as for the trite “sustainability” comment. How much money does Amanda think these swimmers have? $5,300 is probably about 25% of many swimmers’ annual income. What world does she live in? There is nothing sustainable about that. Making a comment like that shows all the understanding and care of Marie Antoinette’s, “Let them eat cake.”

Amanda concludes by wishing SNZ had more money; what a joke. SNZ has plenty of money. If they had more they would spend it on themselves. The problem is what they waste it on. Nowhere is that better illustrated than by the lies and distortions in Amanda’s Facebook post. We simply cannot believe a word that Cotterill, Johns, Francis and now Amanda say.

I have now received Amanda’s reply with the $5,300 cost breakdown. Here is her table of costs.

Flights $2477 Considerations when booking flights are to satisfy the overall question –

“To ensure our athletes arrive on location in the best shape possible, able to recover quickly and perform at their absolute best in competition”

How long is the flight?

  • How many transfers are there?
  • What is the transfer time? Is it long enough or too long? If it’s too long is there an option for comfort and rest?
  • Does the team need to collect luggage due to changing airlines?
  • What do we know about the transfer location?
  • How stressful is this journey?
  • What is the departure and arrival time?
  • Can we get food when we need it?
  • Who is the airline we are travelling with and what have the reviews been from previous teams?
  • Can the flight take the full team?
  • What is the cost?

For this journey to China, when answering the above questions, to name a few, the Air New Zealand option was considered the only option for this team.

Accommodation

(Full Board / Airport Transfers / Daily transport to and from the training venues and competitions venues / entry fees

$1850

NZD for 11 days.

Once the FINA Subsidy of has been split across the athletes equally.

These costs are none negotiable

Uniform Individual.

The most any athlete would pay for uniform is $600 for 13 items.

Considerations:

Temperature of location?

Duration of stay?

Ability to wash kit on location?

On a daily basis the team should be matching, smart and proud.

The Team Kit for the SNZ HP Team has been kept the same since the end of 2016 based on feedback from previous events.  We have done this to allow athletes to use the same kit each year and avoid purchasing a full set. Each team member has the option to buy as few items as they need as long as they travel with the full team kit list.

The team kit ensures that they look smart, the feel great representing their country. Feedback from teams previous to 2016 was that  “they would rather pay more and feel like they have presence when competing on the World stage away from NZ”

For China, SNZ have added 1 Merino Long Sleeved top to the list but removed a short sleeved t shirt due to location.

SNZ are funding a black hooded puffer jacket and a woollen hat for each member of the team.

Travel Insurance $121 All members of SNZ are fully covered when travelling with the teams.
Team Management fee $0 SNZ fully funds all Team Management

I will discuss this more fully in a future post. However two items are of immediate interest.

First it is interesting to note that in the accommodation section of this table Amanda says, “Once the FINA Subsidy of has been split across the athletes equally.” Quite obviously the amount of FINA’s subsidy has been deleted after the word “of”. So much for Amanda’s earlier assurance that she would, “be 100% transparent about costs for accommodation”. Hiding the amount FINA is paying hardly sounds like 100% transparency to me. I guess that’s another lie.

And second, what is the last line, “Team Management Fee”, designed to prove? Why is that there? The only possible reason is to convey the message that SNZ considered asking swimmers to pay for the Gary Francis’ junket, but behold how wonderful they are, SNZ is going to pay for him themselves. Including the fee category leaves the door open for Cotterill, Johns and Francis to charge swimmers for their overseas perks in the future. The very presence of that line is a monumental insult and should be of serious concern to every swimmer in New Zealand. It clearly shows that swimmers paying for a New Zealand team manager at a World Championships is considered legitimate. It just wasn’t done this time. They are seriously disgusting people.

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