Why insurers are walking away from footy

Concussion is possibly the greatest threat to the football codes Australians love. Some insurers say head trauma has such potentially devastating lifelong consequences they won’t insure against it. So where does that leave the players who put their bodies - and brains - on the line? 

Read more about this story at theaustralian.com.au and see the video by subscribing to our YouTube channel.

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Corporate standards forgotten by AFL directors ‘sniffing the liniment’ says Jeff Kennett

This episode of The Front is presented by Claire Harvey, produced by Kristen Amiet and edited by Lia Tsamoglou. Our team includes Tiffany Dimmack, Joshua Burton and Jasper Leak, who also composed our music. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.

Speaker 1: It's Tuesday, August twenty five, twenty twenty six. There's another

Speaker 1: tax hiding in the Labor Government's capital gains shake up,

Speaker 1: and it could hit billions of dollars in superannuation. One

Speaker 1: of the nation's biggest super funds says it's a higher

Speaker 1: tax on retirement. That exclusive by Matt Cranston is live

Speaker 1: right now at The Australian dot com dot au. Concussion

Speaker 1: is possibly the greatest threat to the football codes Australians love.

Speaker 1: Some insurers say head trauma has such potentially devastating lifelong

Speaker 1: consequences they won't insure against it. So where does that

Speaker 1: leave the players who put their bodies and brains on

Speaker 1: the line? Racial already been instrumental. Back to Bracial he

Speaker 1: can whim out? Can he finish with the goal?

Speaker 2: Angus bra Shaw?

Speaker 1: He can?

Speaker 2: Angus Brashaw. He was an incredibly talented young footballer. He

Speaker 2: played a critical role in breaking the demons the Melbourne

Speaker 2: Football Club's fifty seven year premiership drought only a few

Speaker 2: years ago.

Speaker 1: Jared Lynch's The Australian's Tech editor and today we're talking

Speaker 1: to him about something a bit different, how the Australian

Speaker 1: Football League has got itself into an insurance nightmare.

Speaker 2: Unfortunately, he was forced to retire when he was only

Speaker 2: twenty eight years old because he suffered repeated head knocks

Speaker 2: and concussion, really serious injuries, and based on advice, he

Speaker 2: had to make that tough decision to call the end

Speaker 2: of his career when arguably he was at his prime.

Speaker 2: Football is all consuming, no matter how long your career was.

Speaker 1: The transition is difficult and there seems no easy way

Speaker 1: around it. There was a sickening hit on him in

Speaker 1: the twenty twenty three elimination final against Collenwood. Hard crim

Speaker 1: to stop, isn't it.

Speaker 2: He can't.

Speaker 1: It's a real time of course, like most on field things,

Speaker 1: nobody intended any harm, but he was tackled by Bradon

Speaker 1: Maynard and lead us suffered eight brain bleeds. It's a

Speaker 1: sickening thought, isn't it.

Speaker 2: Oh definitely when nebe hear about a bleed on the brain,

Speaker 2: I mean that's incredibly serious. But more troubling is we

Speaker 2: don't know what the long term effects off head knocks, concussion,

Speaker 2: brain bleeds are. I was talking to a director at

Speaker 2: an AFL club last week and they likened it to

Speaker 2: the James Hardy asbestos crisis, because with asbestos, you could

Speaker 2: have two co workers working side by side. Decades later

Speaker 2: one might pop cancer in their lungs and one might not,

Speaker 2: and that there's no rhyme or reason why one person

Speaker 2: might be in the clear and another person might be

Speaker 2: in an early grave. Similar with concussion, like decades later,

Speaker 2: you don't know if it will develop into a brain

Speaker 2: condition known as CT which can lead to dementia, or

Speaker 2: you can continue to live into a ripe old age.

Speaker 2: We just don't know, and that is just a risk

Speaker 2: that increasingly a lot of young AFL players are put

Speaker 2: in their own health and safety ahead of their desire

Speaker 2: to play the game. And Angus Brayshaw was one of them.

Speaker 1: The twenty eight year old exits with five years left

Speaker 1: on his contract, a payout that's yet to be negotiated.

Speaker 1: All the contact football codes have become so much faster

Speaker 1: and more athletic and really more violent over the years.

Speaker 1: What is the insurance situation for players you get injured?

Speaker 2: Well, for many players, they access insurance as part of

Speaker 2: the default super arrangements and the default super is done

Speaker 2: through the AFL Players Association AMP is the fund that

Speaker 2: provides that superannuation and Zurich, the Swiss space behemoth, is

Speaker 2: the underwriter for that insurance. Now, earlier this year, Zurich,

Speaker 2: for the reasons you just identified, said okay, because of

Speaker 2: the risk and because of the lack of clarity between

Speaker 2: the link of concussion head injuries and these serious permanent

Speaker 2: brain damage related injuries, we can't price that risk. So

Speaker 2: we're putting our hands up and we're walking away from it.

Speaker 2: And that caused a huge public backlash. Melbourne Football Club

Speaker 2: ended there sponsorship with Zurich, which is effective at the

Speaker 2: end of this season. Angus Brayshaw was denied a seven

Speaker 2: figure payout because of his early retirement. So it's very very,

Speaker 2: very very murky at the moment. As it stands, if

Speaker 2: you're a player with that default superannuation, there are more

Speaker 2: than five hundred out there playing on the fields or

Speaker 2: training that aren't covered, and that's just unbelievable in this

Speaker 2: day and age. Last week we broke news at host

Speaker 2: Plus the hospitality industry related superfund has no exclusions when

Speaker 2: it comes to head trauma. Now, when I spoke to

Speaker 2: the CEO of that fund, David Elier. They sponsor Freemantle Dockers.

Speaker 2: They sponsor Richmond Tigers, among other AFL clubs and sporting clubs.

Speaker 2: He said there was no exclusions for head trauma, but

Speaker 2: he stressed that you still have to meet the criteria

Speaker 2: for a total permanent disability, and that's where some AFL

Speaker 2: players have had their claims reject it because saying, well, yes,

Speaker 2: you've had concussion, you've been forced to retire, but you

Speaker 2: seem to function day to day fine, so we're not

Speaker 2: going to pay you out. When I spoke to David

Speaker 2: Elier about this, he said, yes, you've still got to

Speaker 2: meet that criteria, but it has to match your skill set.

Speaker 2: So I might have to for whatever reason. I might

Speaker 2: be forced to retire because I suffered a brain injury

Speaker 2: and can't talk to you. Clear, I can't write articles,

Speaker 2: but in David's words, I might still be able to

Speaker 2: lick stamps and I can get a job doing that. Well,

Speaker 2: that wouldn't fit the bill with the way HOSTS plus

Speaker 2: currently defines a TPD a total permanent disability.

Speaker 1: Advocates for people with head trauma say one of the

Speaker 1: problems is that the code is making too much money

Speaker 1: out of this very exciting, very energetic sport to really

Speaker 1: act to limit head trauma, To make the changes that

Speaker 1: would slow the game down, for example, would take people

Speaker 1: off the field if they are hurt. One of the

Speaker 1: things that could change that is an inability to get insurance.

Speaker 1: But if an insurer steps up and says no, we

Speaker 1: will cover this, that changes the dynamic, doesn't It does

Speaker 1: that act as a disincentive for the AFL to change the.

Speaker 2: Rules definitely, And that is exactly the same thing position

Speaker 2: the Geelong Cats found themselves in when they created this

Speaker 2: waiver for Joke College. Asny now, Jake, he went to

Speaker 2: the concussion tribunal and he didn't receive a red rating,

Speaker 2: he didn't receive a green rating. He received an Amber rating.

Speaker 2: Now what does that mean. It means that the concussion

Speaker 2: tribunal thought, well, you've had enough injuries that we're not

Speaker 2: going to say you can definitely play, but we don't

Speaker 2: want to say you can't play, so we'll just call

Speaker 2: it an amber. It was an inconclusive rating, and so

Speaker 2: when Jake went back to the Cats with this, the

Speaker 2: Cats couldn't access insurance. So the Cats under then president

Speaker 2: who's now the AFL Commission Chair, Craig Drummond, came up

Speaker 2: with this wonderful idea for him to sign a waiver

Speaker 2: so he could continue his football career. The problem with

Speaker 2: Geelong is that they created this waiver in secret, it

Speaker 2: didn't get AFL sign off, and it was done without

Speaker 2: the AFL Players Association's knowledge. So you've got to ask

Speaker 2: yourself why Geelong put themselves in that situation When if

Speaker 2: push came to shove years down the track and Jake said, well,

Speaker 2: actually I do want a bit of money for my injuries,

Speaker 2: that it would never be legally enforceable, and that just

Speaker 2: shows you the mess that the AFL has got themselves

Speaker 2: into at the moment. And I've spoken with former club

Speaker 2: officials who have dealt with this very situation where you've

Speaker 2: had a player who so desperately wants to continue to play,

Speaker 2: but the health advice has said otherwise. And what those

Speaker 2: officials have told me is that when they've approached that situation,

Speaker 2: they've taken the finances off the table, and that's what

Speaker 2: they're arguing should be incorporated into player contracts. There should

Speaker 2: be a fund that should be paid to that player

Speaker 2: to tempt them to retire, and that fund be I

Speaker 2: don't know, based on what they're telling me, is based

Speaker 2: on a multiple of say three times what their current

Speaker 2: contracted earnings are. So that's like getting another three years

Speaker 2: pay to retire. And they're saying so exactly the reasons

Speaker 2: you identifying, that's what needs to happen, because that financial

Speaker 2: it's just like it's just like, I don't know, moths

Speaker 2: to a flame, like, yeah, we need to set ourselves

Speaker 2: up for life, we need to play I love playing football.

Speaker 2: Just take that away and that's what needs to be done.

Speaker 2: What those officials say.

Speaker 1: Coming up, who's responsible for looking after footy players. There's

Speaker 1: an interesting situation in rugby league at the moment where

Speaker 1: the South Sydney Rabbit o star Gy Arrow, who was

Speaker 1: on a multimillion dollar multi year contract, very talented player. Again,

Speaker 1: he's now thirty years old and has been forced into

Speaker 1: medical retirement because he's been diagnosed with motor neurone disease.

Speaker 1: Now there's not a proven connection between head trauma and

Speaker 1: motor neurone disease, but you would imagine it wouldn't help,

Speaker 1: and certainly doctors say that one of the risks of

Speaker 1: head trauma is that we don't know exactly how it's

Speaker 1: going to affect our brains. But there are big fundraising

Speaker 1: rounds going on where fans are being asked to donate

Speaker 1: to Jay Arrow and his family. Now a lot of

Speaker 1: Rugby League fans don't themselves have a lot of money.

Speaker 1: It does seem to me as though this is something

Speaker 1: that this multi billion dollar franchise should be looking after.

Speaker 1: Where does the ethical responsibility life for the welfare of

Speaker 1: these players?

Speaker 2: So I've been thinking a lot about this, Claire, and

Speaker 2: you'd like to think in the past two thousand years,

Speaker 2: we're significantly evolved from when we used to chuck gladiators

Speaker 2: into a ring and watch them fight to the death.

Speaker 2: I mean, you got the AFL who says, okay, we're

Speaker 2: a not for profit. On the other side of the coin,

Speaker 2: you've got people who are saying that AFL players know

Speaker 2: that this is a contact sport. They know as soon

Speaker 2: as they go out into the field every week, they

Speaker 2: know what they're getting into. So why should would they

Speaker 2: be able to claim compensation?

Speaker 1: Yeah, but you could say that about Uber drivers, you know,

Speaker 1: or the guys on the back of the Uber eats bikes.

Speaker 2: You know.

Speaker 1: Will they know that it's a risky occupation to be

Speaker 1: riding a scooter on a wet road on a Friday night,

Speaker 1: you know, under pressure to deliver the meal on time.

Speaker 1: The obligation, though, has got to be on the employer,

Speaker 1: doesn't it to create conditions where the employee is safe.

Speaker 2: Absolutely? I mean, if you had okay, let's pick an employer,

Speaker 2: if you had BHP say okay, we're going to pay

Speaker 2: you a lot, a lot of money to mine on

Speaker 2: this site. It's very dangerous work. But don't worry. You're

Speaker 2: getting paid bucket loads. You know what you're going into.

Speaker 2: And if that employee was killed or seriously injured, I

Speaker 2: don't think you'd see BHP say nothing to do with us. Actually,

Speaker 2: our customers every day is strange. Use our copper in

Speaker 2: your wire and off your house. Actually you contribute to

Speaker 2: their injury, so they're actually okay. So why on earth

Speaker 2: is that good enough for the NRL or AFL. I

Speaker 2: mean it seems that they are almost treated as these

Speaker 2: sacred cows for one of a better word, where there's

Speaker 2: this mythical where they get special treatment and according to

Speaker 2: the letter of the law. I don't think that's very.

Speaker 1: Fair, Jared Lynch, thank you very much, Thanks Claire. Jared

Speaker 1: Lynch is The Australian's technology edit up. You can check

Speaker 1: out Jared's work anytime at the Australian dot com dot

Speaker 1: au