An Otago university academic, Rob Hamlin, has lamented the ORFU was not a 'Ltd' rather than an 'Inc' for if it had been people and boards could be held accountable and blame apportioned.
From the comfort of a warm office in the ivory towers it seems easy to point the finger but the real truth is we owe the boards, directors, administrators and volunteers of the ORFU a vote of thanks.
Now, I hear a collective groan of disbelief that such heresy could be spoken but we owe these people thanks for keeping the body of the ORFU alive for so many, many years under extremely difficult circumstances.
Rob Hamlin's comments are ignorant of just what these amateur volunteers achieved and the millions of man hours put into rugby in this province, and I wonder just how often Mr Hamlin attended any of the many hugely successful tests held at Carisbrook over the years or indeed was down there in the early hours of a test Saturday getting the ground prepared for an event that any 'professional' sports management organisation would find hard to successfully achieve.
There are those today that seem to have short memories. For close to 25 years this city has benefited from the work of a relatively small band of amateur volunteers and an even smaller group of paid ORFU employees. The very people being kicked today are the same who helped put Dunedin on the map as the 'rugby test' capital of New Zealand, and indeed the world.
We all glowed with pride at the successful events held at Carisbrook over the years and many in the city benefited financially from the huge economic impact the big rugby matches had on the city.
The figures spoke for themselves. With each test, depending on its size, the economic impact ranged between $10 million and $20 million. The financial impact of these events would over the course of the last two decades be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, the publicity and goodwill showered on the city worth even more. No event Dunedin held could remotely come close to this impact.
So while everyone sincerely hopes the current creditors will get paid, there have been many, notably those in the tourism and hospitality sectors, who have benefited considerably over many years from the efforts of the ORFU.
So if we are to play the blame game and seek accountability as Mr Hamlin hopes, then there is an organisation on whose door the lynch mob should be knocking.
The genesis of the ORFU's problems lies with the totally flawed business model with which the NZRFU launched professional rugby. From the outset the NZRFU wanted total control of revenue and players, and under this scenario it was very difficult for any provincial union or super franchise to develop long term sustainability. While it's taken a period of time, the writing was on the wall 17 years ago.
For many of those 17 years behind closed doors the provincial unions have not only battled the intransigence and inflexibility of the national union but have also been cajoled, threatened and bullied into upgrading grounds and infrastructure.
First the unions were forced to hold games at times unsuitable to many fans - some were during the week, at night, others on Sundays - so crowd numbers suffered. With night rugby came the pressure to buy expensive lighting systems, then the NZRFU wanted either bigger stadiums or more seated stands to increase revenue, so the likes of the ORFU obliged. Indeed, what choice did they have?
And this is where the problem began, because ground owners such as the ORFU took out loans to build these new stands and hospitality facilities for test matches that might only occur once a year. Indeed, the idea of a new stadium in Dunedin came about primarily because the ORFU and the city had been threatened with the loss of test rugby and the Highlanders franchise.
So who was doing the threatening? Well funnily enough it was a man named Steve Tew.
Carisbrook had hosted two night tests in bitterly cold conditions in 2002 and 2003 and the crowd had stayed away.
By 2004 and the South African test the NZRFU were clearly unhappy and Russell Gray, then ORFU CEO said "We're not going to get another Bledisloe Cup test here until we can offer world-class facilities like some of the other venues. We're under notice from the New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) that, unless we significantly upgrade our facilities, not only will we not get Bledisloe Cup tests but we won't get any category A tests after 2005.The fact is that having category A tests is worth so much to the city and the province." Mr Gray says the priority is to upgrade player facilities, food outlets, toilets and media facilities.
Mr Gray proved to be correct and between 2005 and 2008 the ORFU was not granted any tests until another South African test in 2008. But even then after that successful event, Tew was saying the NZRU could not guarantee a test match for the ground in the following years.
He said with Carisbrook having a capacity of 29,000, the ground was relatively low yielding. It had a shallow main stand so more people had to stand rather than sit, and people paid less to stand.
Eden Park and AMI stadium were undergoing major renovations for the 2011 Rugby World Cup and would have reduced capacity next year but Tew said those grounds had made commitments to increase capacity which had to be recognised.
Carisbrook wasn't alone in being threatened by Tew and the NZRFU. Even in his former home city Chrsitchurch, a poor turnout for an All Black versus Italy game had Tew saying "We would like to see more people there than are currently committed to the game, otherwise we are going to have to take a very deep breath about future allocations in that city,".
How does a union or city respond under such threats? Well, AMI stadium committed to a $60 million upgrade and, of course, Dunedin took the decision to build a new stadium.
But such expenditures on stadiums and upgrades are taken with huge risk when all the power and control rests with one national body - the NZRFU, with revenue streams for the unions being very limited. Remember, the provincial unions do not benefit from any global media rights even though the NZRFU has received windfall income from the two News Limited media contracts worth around US$900 million to the Sanzar partners since professional rugby began little has trickled back to the NZ provincial unions.
The unions do not control the test and super 15 players contracts, they do not receive test gate takings, they have little opportunity to obtain major corporate sponsors after the NZRFU have picked them over, and while they receive a fixed 'fee' for hosting a test match they also carry all the associated costs.
What with Sky television coverage and other competition for the discretionary dollar there is little money these days in gates from ITM cup matches and even Super 15 gates are modest, so the test matches become the major opportunity for generating income but are not 'guaranteed'.
So how does a union such as Otago survive a three year period between 2005-2008 when they were not allocated any test matches and yet this is their major income stream. Well, as events have shown in the past week, they don't.
In terminology Mr Hamlin will understand, you can't make a silk purse out of sow's ear. While some may question ORFU expenditure, limited revenue streams were really the problem.
What is also greatly ironic is that Mr Tew squealed very loudly last year when faced with similar controlling behaviour from the IRB and petulantly threatened to pull the All Blacks from the next world cup.
He said "We lose NZ$13.2m worth of revenue after income from Rugby World Cup and costs are adjusted. It cannot carry on. We said at the last board conference that we needed a full review of the IRB's financial model, Rugby World Cup commercial rules and RWC money flows. We are waiting with some anxiety what the IRB are going to do about it."
Another commentator added "Why should your major stars be in a debt situation to make money for somebody else? It doesn't really make any sense. That's a simplistic way of looking at it, but there's a whole financial model around rugby, particularly in this country, that is struggling.
Well Otago was and is a major 'star' of New Zealand rugby and for many, many years it was the most popular team in the country. And yet Tew seems very comfortable about letting this particular star go. Perhaps he is adopting the mentality of the IRB chairman Mike Millar who when confronted with Tew's argument, was heard to say "everyone is replaceable".
So it is clear that from the birth of professional rugby in New Zealand, the NZRFU business model handed to the provincial unions was always going to fail and the desire of the NZRFU to increase revenue through stadium development accounts for most of the debt unions, cities and stadium trusts are saddled with today.
The fact that it has taken this long to fail is only because of the efforts of provincial administrators, most of them amateur and their time given voluntarily, who have kept these organisations afloat. The fact is that the professionalism of rugby has only survived because of the millions of unpaid man hours given by rugby amateurs.
Certainly there have been mistakes made, but we must also recognise what the ORFU boards, administrators, staff and most importantly its army of volunteers have given to rugby, the city and province.
We must never forget what they managed to achieve as amateurs, the incredible events they staged, the enjoyment they gave us, the time they have given most often at night or on weekends, the sacrifices they made to their own jobs, businesses and families and the huge positive economic and social impacts they delivered to the city of Dunedin.
If we are to apportion blame then look to those who gave them the flawed business model they tried to make work and rather than point the finger at members of the ORFU we should reflect on what they gave us, thank them for keeping the dream alive for so long and stand by them now more than ever before.
Didn't the NZRFU use the song 'Stand By Me' in a former All Black marketing campaign? Well, it seems very appropriate now. The pain in the face of ORFU chairman Wayne Graham was evident - we need to stand by these guys now rather than ditch them.
- Dr John Cossens, an education and marketing consultant, was marketing manager of the ORFU in 1995-96.
