Football: Canada women’s team reach interim agreement over funding
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The Olympic champions played last month’s SheBelieves Cup under protest.
PHOTO: AFP
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ONTARIO – Canada’s football federation said on Thursday it has reached an interim funding deal with its national women’s team in the wake of a gender equity dispute that led to its president’s resignation.
The terms of the deal reflect that of the national men’s team, Canada Soccer said, with per-game incentives and results-based compensation.
A new overarching collective bargaining agreement with both the men and women’s national teams is currently being negotiated, and it may result in changes to the interim deal.
The women’s team’s last agreement with Canada Soccer expired in 2021.
“This is about respect, this is about dignity, and this is about equalising the competitive environment in a world that is fundamentally unequal,” Canada Soccer’s general secretary Earl Cochrane said in a statement.
“We have been consistent and public about the need to have fairness and equal pay be pillars of any new agreements with our players, and we are delivering on that today.”
A labour dispute between the governing body and its women’s team had plunged the run-up to the Women’s World Cup into turmoil,
The Olympic champions played in the SheBelieves Cup in February under protest, after being informed that they face the threat of legal action because of their plans to boycott the tournament over pay equity and budget concerns.
They had demanded the same terms as the men’s team.
The players had said the “disgusting” discrepancy between the Canada men and women’s programmes became obvious in 2022 in Qatar, where the men’s side made their first World Cup appearance in 36 years in November.
Canada Soccer spent C$11 million (S$10.9 million) on the men’s programme in 2021, and C$5.1 million on the women.
On Monday, Canada Soccer president Nick Bontis announced his resignation and, two days later,
REUTERS, AFP
