Cricket Australia calls for 'urgency' from players as fears over 2017 Ashes grow

Cricket Australia have called for ‘urgency’ in negotiations with the Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA) over a contract row as the Ashes Tour looms.

Australia’s cricketers are currently unemployed following a payment dispute when the CA proposed scrapping a 20-year-old deal that shares its income with the players. The ACA rejected this deal and a new contract is yet to be agreed which casts doubts over the short term-future of Australian cricket.

James Sutherland, Cricket Australia’s chief executive, has proposed that the CA and ACA begin an “intensive period of negotiation” in order for the issue to be resolved as early as next week.

Should further negotiations fail, Sutherland has proposed an arbitration to resolve the issue. “CA proposes that the parties agree to take the outstanding issues to arbitration.”

An arbitration would see the CA and ACA present their case to an independent body, likely a retired judge, who will suggest an outcome which Sutherland says they will accept. “CA would accept any outcome determined by that process in order to get the game back on track and the players back under control.”

The governing body is calling for an initial deal to be reached following the arbitration which will keep the players contracted until the final memorandum of understanding (MOU) can be agreed.

“Any dispute issues that arise after the initial arbitration that are not able to be resolved by negotiation after a certain time period would also be arbitrated to ensure that the full MOU can be signed by an agreed target date.”

The ACA have responded to the CA’s call for an arbitration by suggesting that mediation is the way forward. “The ACA believes mediation is the right process to resolve the dispute because it is non-adversarial, voluntary and faces no jurisdictional constraints.”

“Arbitration is an adversarial process more akin to a court room,” the ACA added. They also questioned the time it would take for an arbiter to consider the arguments and suggested it “compromises the needs for urgency.”

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Every five years CA produce a MOA every which the players agree to. The last contracted agreement expired on 30 June and Australian cricketers have not agreed to the new MOA.

The new MOA proposes changes to the income sharing between the CA and the players. A salary increase was proposed for the players but at the expense of removing a clause in their contracts which gave them a proportion of CA’s revenue. The ACA rejected this offer as well as a revised pay deal.

The ACA say they have provided the CA with “a draft Heads of agreement, draft MOU articles and a draft tour contract for Bangladesh.”

The two parties want the issue resolved as soon as possible with talks taking place while the ACA consider an arbitration.

Australia are due to start a tour in Bangladesh at the end of August but the upcoming fixture remains uncertain as well as the Ashes series starting in November.