ARU and Di Patston settle out of court

[The InnFORCEr]

Date May 5, 2015 - 4:44PM
Phil Lutton


One of the most tumultuous periods in the history of Australian rugby has played out its final chapter, with the ARU reaching an out-of-court settlement with former Wallaby manager Di Patston.

Patston left her position with the Wallabies late last year in the wake of the Kurtley Beale texting scandal. But the matter was far from over with Patston taking the ARU to court to pursue her grievances against her former employer.

Documents had been lodged with the Federal Circuit Court of Australia in Brisbane, with the parties set for a showdown in June if the matter had progressed to a hearing.

But lawyers for the ARU and Patston have agreed to a settlement, putting an end to a chain of events that would also witness the dramatic resignation of former Wallaby coach Ewen McKenzie.

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Patston's lawyer, Robert Warren, said his client now wanted to put the matter behind her.

"Di is happy to move on with her life," Warren said.

http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-union/un...social_twitter

[The InnFORCEr]

JOINT STATEMENT: Australian Rugby Union and Ms Di Patston
5/5/2015




The Australian Rugby Union and Di Patston today confirmed that Ms Patston’s claim against the ARU has been resolved.

The Australian Rugby Union and Di Patston today confirmed that Ms Patston’s claim against the ARU has been resolved. The claim was due to be heard in the Federal Circuit Court.

The ARU and Ms Patston have reached mutual agreement in relation to the matter in the interests of all parties.

The ARU recognises the distress caused to Ms Patston and her family and friends in relation to the events of last year and sincerely regrets that this occurred.

The ARU wishes Ms Patston well in her future and thanks her for her diligent service at the ARU from August 2013 to October 2014 as Wallaby Team Business Manager.

The matter is now resolved and neither the ARU nor Ms Patston will be making any further comment about the matter.

http://www.rugby.com.au/News/NewsArt...i-Patston.aspx

[brokendown gunfighter]

wonder if they have any money left for a settlement with McKenzie?

[SNOB]

Next statement from the ARU will be declaring bankruptcy!

[Ralto]

wonder if they have any money left for a settlement with McKenzie?

She may have to share.

[brokendown gunfighter]

---though to the Keeper!

[Alison]

Hope she got a huge payout and that they send Beale and the mysterious second texter the bill. It really shits me that that lowlife piece of crap got nothing more than a limp pat on the wrist, and the accomplice (if there ever was one) has got off scott free

[valzc]

And Beale who started it all is of course mysteriously left out of all discussion??!? Looking forward to booing Beale and his fat arse at the game! Oops derogatory!

[The InnFORCEr]

Di Patston and ARU settle out of court following last year’s Kurtley Beale and Wallabies drama

Iain Payten
The Daily Telegraph
May 05, 2015 9:48PM


AN ugly chapter in Australian rugby history appeared to draw to a close yesterday with the ARU reaching an out-of-court settlement with former Wallabies business manager Di Patston.

After the Kurtley Beale text scandal last year saw Patston resign from the ARU with a financial payout, the former staffer pursued a further compensation claim in the Federal Circuit Court.

After initially challenging the legitimacy of Patston’s claim, the ARU yesterday confirmed the matter had been “resolved”.

“The ARU and Ms Patston have reached mutual agreement in relation to the matter in the interests of all parties,” an ARU statement said.

“The ARU recognises the distress caused to Ms Patston and her family and friends in relation to the events of last year and sincerely regrets that this occurred.”

Patston was at the centre of a tumultuous saga last year after a midair row with Beale led to revelations the Wallaby had inadvertently sent her a lewd text message. Beale avoided the sack but was fined $48,000.

ARU boss Bill Pulver and chairman Michael Hawker were heavily criticised for their handling of the entire incident.

The ugly episode had no winners, and a June 2 court date was set for Patston’s claim could have seen the damaging airing of more dirty laundry for all the parties.

Initially the ARU seemed keen for legal action and last year welcomed the notion of people testifying under oath.

But after presumably weighing the cost of a payout with further heavy damage to the game arising from a very public court case, the ARU elected to bury the issue.

With confidentiality clauses attached, however, the settlement will leave numerous questions unanswered, such as: Who sent the mysterious second text message? Who knew about the text messages and when? What level of ARU oversight existed within a fracturing Wallabies team environment?

As McKenzie said when announcing his resignation, the public have to wait for his book.

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/wa...-1227337658278

[The InnFORCEr]

Why we'll never know the full story around the Di Patston case

Date May 5, 2015 - 11:14PM
Georgina Robinson
Chief Rugby Reporter


We will never know the real story of the Di Patston saga.

There may be tell-all interviews to come, perhaps, and the chapter Ewen McKenzie promised to devote to it in his book the night he resigned as Wallabies coach last October.

There will be rumours and yet more innuendo as the rugby community struggles to make sense of who were the goodies and who were the baddies in the ugliest chapter to unfold in the history of the game in Australia.

Not a single character was left untarnished after the Kurtley Beale texting scandal came to light.

But only a public airing of grievances in a court of law would have gone close to painting an accurate picture of what transpired under McKenzie's ARU-backed management of the Wallabies between August 2013 and October 2014 and why it ended in disaster.

A team without a coach, a coaching career in tatters, a business manager in distress, a playing career on a knife's edge, and a game in turmoil.

There are so many questions that remain unanswered, but the plain fact is that the Australian Rugby Union could not afford to have its case heard in court.

To fight Patston's claim of adverse action under s351 of the Fair Work Act, the ARU would have exposed itself to scrutiny of its own myriad management failures.

For it was ARU chief Bill Pulver, backed by chairman Michael Hawker, who created the structural environment where power, mistrust and disrespect festered within the Wallabies. They were responsible, and they are the only two figures, along with Beale, who remain in the game today.

The problems did not start when Beale inadvertently sent an ugly text message to Patston in the idyllic surrounds of Sanctuary Cove last year.

The problems started when Pulver handed absolute power to McKenzie when he anointed the Super Rugby title-winning coach successor to Robbie Deans a full year earlier.

Pulver had sound reasons for doing so at the time, including the failure of the high performance model as it functioned when Deans coached the Wallabies and David Nucifora was in an oversight role as high performance manager. That relationship was riddled with mistrust, but hindsight will prove there was nothing intrinsically wrong with the structure of the two roles.

What the new chief executive did not have was any high level experience in sports administration. So while Pulver set about saving rugby from financial ruin - a challenge he deserves credit for meeting and conquering - he trusted McKenzie to make the right calls on the rugby program. Crucially, after a mass clean-out following the John O'Neill era, there was no one in a senior management role at the ARU to help share that burden, apart from long-standing team manager Bob Egerton, who resigned after clashing with McKenzie over his handling of the 2013 spring tour Dublin drinking fiasco.

It was this utter lack of sporting street smarts within the ARU that allowed everything else to tumble like dominoes in the 10 months that followed. Pulver handed McKenzie the keys to the castle, and the new coach took it upon himself to not only resurrect the Wallabies' on-field performance, but its off-field efficiencies as well.

Instead of worrying solely about how Australia could win back the Bledisloe Cup, McKenzie became equally obsessed with cutting costs. Among a raft of measures designed to help get the ARU back in the black - but with nothing to do with rugby - the Wallabies coach asked staff to fly premium economy instead of business class and was observed taking issue with matters as small as wastage in the ARU kitchen.

In this climate, encouraged by the boundless remit granted by Pulver, McKenzie deployed Patston's skills - none of which were verified by the ARU upon commencement of her employment - as a catch-all business manager.

Part mother-hen, part psychologist, part accounts clerk and all-around trusted adviser, Patston, who began her career in rugby as an administrative clerk at the Queensland Reds in 2012, came to wield extraordinary influence over every aspect of the Wallabies program.

The Beale incident, which saw the Wallabies playmaker fined $45,000 after a bitterly-fought tribunal hearing, was the culmination of growing tension, fuelled by poor team performances, that centred around Patston's role within the team. McKenzie had been aware of discomfort surrounding her ever-presence, having confronted his squad about it in Europe in 2013. But there was no resolution, and her role grew from office-based adviser to full travelling member of the team during the 2014 season.

The rest is well-documented history. Tuesday's settlement, which was accompanied by a statement recognising the "distress caused to Ms Patston and her family and friends" and followed an $80,000 payout in October last year, closes the chapter.

But it leaves so much unanswered, and means both Pulver and Hawker may never be asked to fully account for their inadequate steerage of the game during this dark time.

No wonder an out of court settlement became the ARU's only option.

http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-union/un...social_twitter

[jargan83]

I bet there will non disclosure clauses in the settlement.

[Macattack]

Hope she got a huge payout and that they send Beale and the mysterious second texter the bill. It really shits me that that lowlife piece of crap got nothing more than a limp pat on the wrist, and the accomplice (if there ever was one) has got off scott free

Hear, hear Alison, this was a disgraceful period in Aus rugby, both for the lowlife acts that started it and the absolutely shithouse way it was handled. Another high profile incident that served to drag our code down, right when we need to be building it up. Still makes me angry.

[BeeJay]

Georgina Robinson should really just shut up. She has done enough damage already. It was she who leaked all the innuendo, all in the name of a good story. Shame on her; as a woman she should have been more sensitive, and have known better. She stooped to a level even lower than Grumbles Growden. Perhaps trying to make a name for herself.

The coverage in the Australian by the likes of Wayne Smith has been beyond reproach. An experienced, knowledgeable and level-headed journalist.

All of that character assassination of Patston came from Georgina's desk. The body language at the RugbyClud also suggests she was out of favour with most of the past players. Took ages for her to get back on the show.

I for one have lost all respect. Now she writes this piece with a diatribe against the ARU, an easy target, knowing that will get support from the section of ignorant readership of the SMH.

[AndyS]

I'd bear in mind that she was touring with the Waratahs last year, which was probably her first time on the inside and feeling part of the clique. Seems likely that the texting would have been a predominantly Waratahs thing between mates and I certainly got the sense through it all that she was very much fighting a corner. I doubt there was much (or any) objectivity in it.

[valzc]

Exactly Andy - a newby (female) on hallowed grounds of a clique tight knit boys club, on tour with a couple of half wits who act as 'leaders' trying to assert done authority. How did she even think she had a chance in hell of battling that one even with Ewen's support?