A bit more about the sudden name change for Australia’s first-class cricket competition from Sheffield Shield to Pura Milk Cup in November 1999.

(For a bit of background, see the article I wrote at the time for CricInfo.)

It aroused a lot of controversy at the time, not just because a national icon had suddenly lost its identity, but because of the way it happened: in the middle of a cricket season, and with the original Shield suddenly being locked away with no intention of being allowed to see the light of day again.

JH was asked for his opinion by Neil Mitchell on Melbourne’s 3AW on 19 November 1999, and this is the transcript:

MITCHELL:Pura Milk Cup, that’s our cricket [inaudible]. What do you think….

PRIME MINISTER:Well, I know the difficulty of getting money but look, we did have a Fosters Melbourne Cup.

MITCHELL:But at least we kept Melbourne in the…

PRIME MINISTER:Well, that’s right, that’s right. I wondered why we couldn’t say, you know, Pura Milk Sheffield Shield. I know it’s a bit of a mouthful but look, it’s always hard. I understand the problem that administrators have got and getting money into the Sheffield Shield is very important, into that competition, just does tug at a lot of us and it’s a pity you couldn’t have had the two things merge. I don’t know why the, I mean, presumably the company has said well, you have got to change the whole name otherwise the money is not there. Now, that puts the cricket authorities in a difficult position and I try and understand their position and not just blast off.

(source: http://www.pm.gov.au/news/interviews/1999/3aw1911.htm)

This transcript is the only reference prior to October 2003 that I can find on the PM’s website to any discussion of the “Sheffield Shield”. His sentiments about “Pura Milk Sheffield Shield” were fairly widely held, and indeed I supported them.

The view of the ACB and National Foods (producers of Pura Milk), however, that they did not want the presence of the Pura Milk brand to be diluted by combining it with the Sheffield Shield name, believing that people would simply continue calling it the Sheffield Shield in any case.

Some of us still do that, of course… though I personally think good riddance to Lord Sheffield. JH, I am sure, would never agree with that sentiment…

JH appeared to show a displeasure at the confusion caused by naming rights sponsorship of sporting venues and tournaments in a radio interview with Liam Bartlett of ABC Radio in Perth on Friday October 10. In a discussion of the Rugby World Cup (of which I have used other excerpts elsewhere in this forum), JH got himself into the following tangle:

PRIME MINISTER:…As somebody who loves sport, I count myself very fortunate as having been Prime Minister at the time, not only at the Sydney Olympics but also the Rugby World Cup and that, of course, will be opened at the Olympic Stadium or Telstra Stadium or Stadium Australia, as some people call it. I think it’s officially called Telstra Stadium, but when you say the Olympic Stadium, everybody around Australia knows what you mean.

BARTLETT:Yeah, well, here at the ABC we tend to like those generic names.

PRIME MINISTER:Yeah, well, I do too actually, like Sheffield Shield - I shouldn’t have said that.

BARTLETT:[inaudible] let’s not go back there.

PRIME MINISTER:No.

(source: http://www.pm.gov.au/news/interviews/Interview518.html)

Now I share the same sentiments over the renaming of sporting arenas every time a sponsor throws in a few million dollars, mindful of the fact that it is sponsorship money much needed most, if not all, of the time. But is JH being so mindful of the importance of naming right sponsorship when he, the parliamentary leader of the party of capitalism and free enterprise, makes these sort of off-the-cuff remarks?

Especially when it concerns a company of which the Commonwealth of Australia owns 50.1 per cent (however much JH and the boys want to get rid of it)?

And as for his defence of the name “Sheffield Shield”, he no doubt would be thrilled if he knows that he is perpetuating the name of the 19th century British lord of the realm who provided that trophy… but I hope to say more in retrospect about the 1999 Sheffield Shield/Pura Milk Cup controversy at another time.

JH is a simple man of simple 1950s Sydneycentric values, so missing an AFL grand final because his daughter was getting married at the same time didn’t trouble him that much. Though it did upset lots of Melbournites.

Melanie Howard married Rowan McDonald (no relation to Ronald, apparently) at the father of the bride’s taxpayer-funded residence at Kirribilli House on Saturday afternoon, September 27. The ceremony started during the fourth quarter of Brisbane’s drubbing of Collingwood.

There were rumours at one point that the date of the wedding had been arranged to avoid the Rugby World Cup (October 10-November 22) but there appears to be nothing in this.

While JH missed the Festival of the Boot Part One, he was present at Part Two on Sunday night, October 5, when Penrith beat the Sydney Roosters (no his beloved St George didn’t come close this year). And the Cheshire Cat was up there on the podium to hand out the premiership trophy to Penrith captain Craig Gower.

(Yes, Bob Hawke does have a lot to answer for…)

Not content with ignoring the Kyoto Protocol on global warming or the UN Security Council over Iraq, JH decided to disparage a ruling of the International Rugby Board over the singing of “Waltzing Matilda” before Australia’s Rugby World Cup games.

The IRB made a decision in August that only national anthems and performances such as the haka could be performed before the start of matches in the World Cup. While the haka was considered to be of “cultural significance”, Waltzing Matilda was rejected because the IRB deemed the emotional Australian ditty about a suicidal sheep stealer not to be culturally significant.

An absurd ruling in most people’s eyes, but a ruling nonetheless (which they later clarified to say that it could be sung in the stadia after all, but only before the Wallabies come out onto the field). JH’s attitude to the authority of the IRB?

In a doorstop interview at Parliament House on 28 August 2003, JH had the following to say:

JOURNALIST:

Mr Howard, what do you make of the moves to ban Waltzing Matilda from the Rugby World Cup matches?

PRIME MINISTER:

I think it’s very silly. I resent it. Waltzing Matilda is deeply evocative of Australian culture and how can you justify trying to ban the singing of it and allow other presentations which are evocative of the culture of other countries? But in any event, I pose the question - how are they going to stop it being sung? You try and stop 82,000 Australians singing Waltzing Matilda - you’ll only make their night.

JOURNALIST:

So you’ll encourage people to sing the song if it is banned?

PRIME MINISTER:

Of course I will. I think it’s ridiculous and I’m sure they’ll rethink their decision, if they’ve made the decision.

JOURNALIST:

The board meets on Monday but they are arguing that they don’t think it has much cultural significance.

PRIME MINISTER:

Nations determine their culture not other people. Thank you.

JH’s defiance of international authority reappeared in a radio interview with former speechwriter for Malcolm Fraser, former Wallabies coach, and present-day Parrot, Alan Jones, on 2GB on September 15:

JONES:

Just before you go, is the PM likely to be leading a cause, singing Waltzing Matilda when the Wallabies play?

PRIME MINISTER:

Try and stop us.

JONES:

Try and stop us – is that the word?

PRIME MINISTER:

Try and stop us. I mean this is just ridiculous. I can’t believe this. I really cannot believe that grown men, I think all in this case – I’d better be careful, would be so foolish.

JONES:

But Australians being what they are, it most probably only encourages them to defy it.

PRIME MINISTER:

People will… I mean I am going to start, I think I’ll start a campaign to encourage every single Australian to learn all the verses.

JONES:

That’s it. Join 2GB and News Ltd. That’s what we’re doing. Put the Prime Minister head of a campaign.

PRIME MINISTER:

I think you ought to play it at the beginning… they ought to run it on the front page so we know, everybody knows every darn word of it.

And on the day of the opening ceremony of the Rugby World Cup, October 10, in a radio interview with ABC Perth’s Liam Bartlett:

BARTLETT:…will you be singing Waltzing Matilda?

PRIME MINISTER:I certainly will be with great gusto and great enthusiasm and I would imagine that 82,000 other people, more most of them, I guess we’ve got a few visitors from overseas who may not know the words, but I certainly will sing it yes.

BARTLETT:I don’t think that ruling from the International Rugby Board is going to carry much weight.

PRIME MINISTER:No. No offence meant

No offence of course, just total contempt for the authority of an international governing body. (By the way, What the IRB should have done is permitted the singing of Waltzing Matilda, but banned John Williamson from taking part.

JH visited Darwin on Monday August 5, where he attended the Darwin Cup (and failed to pick the winner). On Tuesday and Wednesday August 6 and 7 he headed east to northern Queensland to visit aboriginal communities in Weipa. Australia played Bangladesh in a one-day international at Marrara Oval, Darwin, on Wednesday the 7th - the first ODI ever held in Darwin (which had staged the First Test between Australia and Bangladesh almost three weeks earlier). JH wasn’t there.

Maybe if Australia was playing England, or South Africa, or New Zealand….? Of course, Bradman never played against Bangladesh, nor did Menzies ever watch them play.

JH was quizzed about his non-attendance at the cricket on Tuesday the 5th on Darwin radio station Top FM by Daryl Manzie. The relevant extract from the interviews is as follows (source):

MANZIE:

Okay. And lastly Prime Minister, you’ve enjoyed our Darwin Cup. We’ve got the cricket against Bangladesh, again a one-day match, here tomorrow. You’re not tempted to stay an extra day?

PRIME MINISTER:

Much and all as I like cricket, I can’t get into a situation where I see every cricket match that takes place. I’d like to, but I have some very important commitments in the Cape York area. I want to meet the people in the Cape York Land Council, I want to learn something of the programs they have there involving restrictions on the consumption of alcohol and the very big link between alcohol consumption and violence against women. And I’ll have to give this one a miss.

As a Prime Minister, JH doesn’t appear to have had much interaction with Bangladesh. The then-PM of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina, visited Australia in October 1999, and Howard’s office issued a short press release to announce that fact. Despite the brevity of the statement the PM’s office did find space to mention that:”Of course our two countries also share a love of cricket. ” (Source)

JH spoke about his meeting with Sheikh Masina in a radio interview with David Hookes and Gerard Healy on 3AW a couple of months later:

JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, when you are dealing on very serious matters, and that’s not to put our topic of sport down, but more serious matters with the heads of State of other cricketing playing nations. Is it used as an icebreaker?

PRIME MINISTER: …when the Prime Minister of Bangladesh was out here recently she told me very enthusiastically how the interest in cricket had burgeoned in Bangladesh as a result of Bangladesh beating Pakistan in the one-day game in the World Cup. And you could tell from her that the game was really going to continue to grow and she was very appreciative of the interest the Australian Cricket Board was taking. But your point is right.”

Some thoughts about the controversy over the ABC’s post-midnight delayed telecast of the netball National League final on Friday (September 12).

It amused me on Thursday night to see Fox Sports News making a point of discussing the ABC coverage for the game. What, precisely, has Fox Sports done in the way of televising local netball in the 2003 season? Zilch. The national netball competition has not been shown on Pay-TV since C7 was alive.

Fox Sports, the monopoly pay-TV channel for Australian sport these days, has shown no interest in the major domestic competition for one of the country’s post popular participation sports. They didn’t even cover the World Championships this year.

I believe the ABC got it wrong in delaying the netball telecast till midnight. While it’s fair enough to say that sport in prime-time is not part of ABC television’s culture these days, I find it hard to understand why some sort of compromise could not have been reached and at least a 10.30pm replay arranged.

The ABC should, in any case, be given full credit for televising the netball World Championship final live from Jamaica one Monday morning a couple of months back. Unfortunately we probably won’t see this type of event on the ABC in the foreseeable future with their new tighter program spending policy in place.

The other interesting observation was of the politicians who jumped on the bandwagon calling for a live ABC telecast: NSW premier Bob Carr, and deputy prime minister John Anderson. Not a peep from John Howard, not normally short of a gratuitous remark about national sporting events.

Of course, Don Bradman didn’t play netball, did he?

It looks like Shane Warne will be barred from training with the Victorian, Australian (or even St Kilda) teams if his twelve-month ban for drug transgressions is carried out to its fullest. We’ll hear more about this. JH was asked for comment by Neil Mitchell on Melbourne’s radio 3AW this morning (August 22). Transcript (Source):

MITCHELL:
Prime Minister, something else - the Sports Commission is threatening funding if Shane Warne trains with the national team while he’s under the drug ban. Do you think he should be training with the national team?

PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I think he should observe in the full the conditions of the ban and I support what the Sports Commission has done.

MITCHELL:
But withholding of funding if necessary?

PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t believe it will come to that but the Sports Commission is upholding the code and it’s taken the right stance and I support it.

MITCHELL:
Why? It’s always been your view that the cricket should be left to the cricket administrators.

PRIME MINISTER:
But we’re not talking here about cricket administration, you’re talking here about the vision of Government funding and the code that we support. But the cricket administrators themselves have imposed the ban, haven’t they?

MITCHELL:
Well yeah, but the cricket administrators decided he could train and in fact he is training with the Victorian team.

PRIME MINISTER:
Well, you’ve asked me my view and I’ve given it. I mean…

MITCHELL:
Was the Government asked to approve this line of approach?

PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I wasn’t asked to approve it, but then I don’t get asked to approve everything that… the action was taken by the Sports Commission and I back the Sports Commission.

MITCHELL:
Do you think he’ll come back, Shane Warne?

PRIME MINISTER:
What, into Australian cricket?

MITCHELL:
Yeah.

PRIME MINISTER:
I hope he does because he’s a great cricketer.

MITCHELL:
This will keep him out a bit longer.

PRIME MINISTER:
Well there was a ban for a year…

MITCHELL:
Oh yes, but he’s not going to walk in one day after the ban…

PRIME MINISTER:
I do understand that. I mean, you can’t have something in relation to a ban like that and not uphold it.