A local player has spoken out about the impact of SA Rugby’s planned pay cuts which is scheduled to run until December.
To ensure the post-Covid-19 viability of the sport through an Industry Financial Impact Plan (IFIP), SA Rugby confirmed on Tuesday that this strategy had been agreed in a united plan formulated in discussions including representatives from all stakeholders.
This included SA Rugby, provincial unions, players and rugby industry employees. The plan incorporates the Industry Salary Plan (ISP) which will have a united and collective approach towards salary reductions. The IFIP is scheduled to run until the end of December in the first instance.
According to OFM, the top scale of the pay cuts will be up for 43% of the player’s wages. A player who earns less than R240,000 a year is safe from a salary cut for now. From R240,001 to R750,000 the players will see a 36% cut in salaries, and this will go up to 39% for those earning between R750,001 and R1.5 million a year. From R1.5m and more there will be a cut of 43%.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a player painted a dark picture of just what these pay reductions mean for players.
‘The top scale of the pay cut is going to be 43% and that will probably be until the end of August. If there is no rugby for the rest of the year the pay cuts will be until the 31st of December,’ he said.
‘It is a difficult time now because we have to take up to a 43% pay cut just to be able to survive this thing.
‘We have been giving three weeks to find another job overseas, but we are only allowed to move overseas and not locally. This will go for all the unions. This comes from SA Rugby and MyPlayers is running it as well.
‘We have three weeks to leave if we find another job overseas, but I don’t know what the market abroad looks like at this point in time. So, we are definitely in for difficult times now.’
