The Chair of NZ Rugby's board is promising to recruit a female member within a year.
The organisation has never had a woman on its board.
But NZ Rugby's widely criticised Chiefs investigation has provided a hurry-up.
Before she committed to a life of public service as a Labour MP, Louisa Wall was a hot-shot Black Fern in World Cup-winning teams. More recently, she unsuccessfully applied to become the first woman on the NZ Rugby board.
"They're the CEOs of Fonterra or these major companies, so there's more of an emphasis I guess on the financial side of the game," she says.
Ms Wall is calling for a policy change that would guarantee at least one woman on its nine-person board.
The Chair, Brent Impey, agrees it needs women, but would rather not make it mandatory.
"We don't want to be accused of tokenism either. There are other ways of doing it, such as encouraging the provincial unions to nominate women for the first time," he says.
But the Chiefs saga has added urgency to the whole issue of whether there should be a woman on the NZRU board.
One of the women who complained about poor behaviour at the team's end of season party was never even interviewed by NZ Rugby's investigator.
"There's no question that if we have the same scenario playing out where senior white men are talking to senior white men in a closed-loop scenario we are going to get the same conversations and same outcomes," says Equal Opportunities commissioner Jackie Blue.
But Mr Impey believes the Chiefs scandal could help him in his campaign to convince provincial boards of the need to nominate women.
The game is growing hugely among women and girls; our sevens team got silver at the Olympics, and now there are about 20,000 female players.
The board is made up of nine men. Not one of the 11 women who applied this year made it to interview stage.
"Watch this space. You will find we will have a woman on the board within the next short period," says Mr Impey. "My timeframe is within 12 months."
A NZ Rugby diversity group is looking at the problem, and will report back on how to tackle it in December.
Newshub.
