Details from the Welsh Rugby Union's sealed review into Welsh women's rugby have been released for the first time amid a damning Senedd report into issues of sexism at the governing body.
Wales Women have been going from strength to strength since first turning professional in January 2022, with 12 historic full-time WRU contracts awarded that month, a number which rose to 25 for this calendar year. Now ranked at a record high of sixth in the world, Wales Women have provided a much-needed positive to Welsh rugby in a season of otherwise doom and gloom.
But cast your minds back to the 2021 Covid-condensed Women's Six Nations, and it was a very different story. Wales were amateur and many balanced rugby alongside full-time jobs, their coaching staff came and went through what seemed like a revolving door, and the gap between them and the likes of England and France was just growing and growing. That tournament saw Wales lose 53-0 to France, unsurprising given Les Bleuses were semi-professional at the time, but then Wales lost 45-0 at home to fellow amateurs Ireland, a side they really should have been competing against.
Public support for this team who had their hands tied behind their backs soared, while an open letter signed by 123 former Welsh squad members in April 2021 said they could not "stand by and watch the game deteriorate further" as they demanded more resource from the WRU.
In May that year, the WRU announced a mid-term review of the women's performance rugby strategy, which they said would "leave no stone unturned to provide recommendations as to how the performance women's programme can be improved in a general sense and in order to positively impact Wales Women's ability to compete at [next] Rugby World Cup [scheduled for 2021, but later taking place in 2022]".
Some 40 recommendations from that review were made, the majority of which were implemented in full by former WRU performance director Nigel Walker, who crucially professionalised the set-up just months after coming into the role following years of contracts being discussed by his predecessors. But the contents of the report have never been made public, until now when some extracts have been featured in a report by the Senedd's culture, communications, Welsh language, sport and international relations committee. You can read the full Senedd report here.
The previously unseen review into Welsh women's rugby was written almost two years before allegations of sexism at the WRU were highlighted in a BBC investigation in January 2023. The 2021 review concluded that the WRU was "facing a significant number of risks not only in respect of the women's performance programme, but as a national governing body (NGB) for rugby in Wales".
Walker, now interim chief executive of the WRU, has published details from a letter he wrote to the Senedd committee after appearing before them alongside chairman Ieuan Evans in February 2023 in light of this year's sexism and misogyny claims. Walker's letter describes the full list of recommendations from the WRU’s women’s performance mid-term review commissioned in May 2021, in response to a request made during the Senedd hearing. The WRU said it stops short of detailing the full contents of the review which led to the formation of its recommendations due to the terms under which it was originally conducted.
A panel, made up of Helen Phillips, chair of Commonwealth Games Wales, Amanda Bennett, former Wales Women vice-captain and Sport Wales board member, and former Wales coach Kevin Bowring, wrote the review and sought testimony from a range of sources. The WRU said that all parties agreed that anonymous contributions would yield the best results during the process.
A WRU statement said: "Although the review will remain a private document, its full list of recommendations are now freely available and Walker has already made the commitment that a new independent review (taskforce) set up to examine culture and behaviour at the WRU will be privy to its full contents, as well as any other documents it may wish to or need to see."
Of the 40 recommendations made by the review, Walker confirms that the vast majority have been implemented already.
There had been fresh calls to publish the 2021 review in light of this year's sexism and misogyny claims, and Walker told the Senedd committee earlier this year: "The report will not make comfortable reading for those involved in the WRU, but I personally have no objection to the report being published. When I read the review, I was shocked as to the extent of the problem. There are 40 recommendations in the review, and it was obvious that the Welsh Rugby Union had failed women’s rugby... We have made enormous progress against the 40 recommendations. Probably 32 or 33 of those recommendations have been implemented in full.”
The Senedd report says the 2021 WRU review concluded that "the WRU is facing a significant number of risks not only in respect of the women’s performance programme, but as a national governing body for rugby in Wales."
This included the "strategic failure to deliver the WRU’s overarching strategy, including women’s performance goals. This failure could also apply to community and development objectives as young players drop out or move to England to play and are lost to the Welsh game".
As for reputational risk, the 2021 review said "the perceived intransigence and reluctance to fully commit to women’s performance in respect of investment, profile, culture and leadership will only serve to reinforce views of the WRU as a NGB for men’srugby with little interest in the female game".
As for legal risk, the report said: "There is the potential for individuals within the game (currently and formerly) to challenge the WRU with some worrying examples of what could be defined as unfavourable treatment and a lack of equitable provision provided through this review".
As for financial risk, the 2021 report said: "There is the potential for significant opportunity cost as the WRU has, to date, failed to assess, either in an integrated business planning model, or through discreet planning, the commercial value of women’s rugby. This includes the specific asset value of the women’s performance squad to partners, sponsors, kits uppliers and others.”
The Wales Women 2021 review recommendations
1. Implement player contracts
2. Board to set long-term strategic commitment to women’s performance rugby
3. Establish a women’s performance working group
4. Executive team to review and plan how to maximise business opportunities offered by the women’s game
5. Produce an annual operational plan
6. Establish a clear management and reporting structure
7. Appoint a head of women’s performance rugby and a head of women’s community rugby
8. Appoint a women’s rugby steering group
9. Implement a performance structure
10. Start to explore, negotiate and plan the involvement of Welsh super clubs in a GB league from 2023 onwards
11. Plan a structured season that caters for growing the game and developing the talent within the game
12. Establish a robust and visible performance pathway that is player-centred, development-driven and competition-supported
13. Invest in quality human resources to support the performance pathway programme
14. Appoint an executive director of people
15. Elevate the need for change in the women’s game to the risk register
16. Head coach to report directly to the new performance director
17. Contract the management team through to the end of the 2025 Rugby World Cup
18. Appoint a physician and full medical team
19. Appoint a sports psychologist
20. Provide adequate medical cover for the talent development pathway
21. Appoint a full-time strength and conditioning coach with a qualified assistant and intern
22. Appoint a full-time second analyst and a qualified intern to support a head of analysis for the women’s game
23. Create, maintain and monitor a player depth chart and succession plan
24. Integrate the women’s game into business planning and set departmental objectives
25. Develop and deliver an education programme within the WRU and externally to the wider game to highlight the importance of equality and inclusion of women in rugby in Wales
26. Improve communication internally and externally with regard to women’s rugby
27. Set a disaggregated budget for women’s performance that ensures there is sufficient human and financial resource
28. Women’s performance reports into PRB through performance director
29. Performance director must be accountable for women’s performance and head of women’s performance should report directly into performance director
30. Board to receive training on women’s game and women’s performance, including international landscape and benchmarks and issues specific to women in rugby
31. Team management to identify team values and role models to instil, celebrate and challenge team values regularly and consistently in addition to reviewing behaviours and emphasising core values
32. Performance director to lead the development of winning behaviours
33. Renew emphasis on WRU values
34. Engage the support of the newly-appointed World Rugby head of women’s performance
35. Align performance and community strategies with regard to girls' and women’s rugby
36. Appoint a dedicated Sevens head coach to work with Sevens players and to direct the regional age-grade Sevens programme
37. Re-instate Wales representative teams at U18, U20 and A level
38. Appoint a head coach for the 15-a-side programme
39. Implement an annual health check/pulse survey as part of performance director, head of women’s performance and head coaches’ appraisals
40. Continue with team performance debriefs with input from players about their experiences
Ongoing review into WRU culture and behaviours
In light of the 2023 allegations, the WRU announced that Dame Anne Rafferty would chair another external review, this time into the general behaviours and culture at the WRU from 2017 to the present day. It will examine the culture within the WRU; the actions and behaviour of leadership [at all levels] within the WRU; the extent to which employees feel able to voice concerns or to challenge inappropriate and discriminatory language and behaviour; the effectiveness of the WRU’s whistleblowing policy and procedures; the WRU’s actions in response to individual complaints set out in the BBC Wales investigation in January 2023.
The panel is expected to report back "before the end of summer" and the WRU has welcomed the Senedd's suggestion that an implementation plan should follow soon after.
Walker told the committee that the review’s report will be public and “we, as a body, have committed to implementing those recommendations.” He stressed that the WRU was "opening our doors and our books [... ] The review could take any direction that the chair suggests it should take."
Walker was asked if people who were bound by non-disclosure agreements they had entered into with the WRU would be able to contribute to the report, and he said: "If it’s possible, I would look to facilitate it, so that everybody who has been affected, those people who the panel would be interested in interviewing, can be interviewed."
Changes already made
In a letter to the Welsh Government in February 2023, the WRU outlined the operational changes that had taken place already.
They include the appointment of a new people director in 2022, investing in new procedures and mandatory training to develop every day working culture, a HR team restructure, the appointment of an equality, diversity and inclusion manager, an internal working group being established, an anonymous, external whistleblowing line being established for staff to be able to raise any issues in a safe and supported way. The letter added: "This is an ongoing process and we have further mandatory EDI training for board members and community game representatives."
Review into community women's rugby in Wales
Walker also said in his letter that a review had taken place across levels of the women's community game. There are now 37 Female Hubs in Wales and 5,000 women and girls are registered grassroots players, while there is an ambition to engage 10,000 women and girls in regular rugby activities by 2026.
The WRU said "the review looked at a range of areas to further support the growth of the female game in Wales and ensure that there is equitable and sustainable rugby provision for women and girls.
"The review covered broad aspects of the game, including season and competition structure, formats of the game and measures that could be put in place to help Welsh rugby structures to adapt to improve the female player pathway and support player development. It also covered issues such as training schedules, facilities and changing rooms, representation, attitudes and support from within the wider rugby community.
Key recommendations of the review were that the playing pathways girls and women were adapted and progressed, with changes to competition structures and further development of the community-based Female Hubs and further changes to the senior domestic competition."
WRU response
In the letter addressed to Delyth Jewell MS, chair of the Senedd's culture, communications, Welsh language, sport and international relations committee, interim WRU chief executive Nigel Walker said: “Whilst this period has been extremely challenging for us, I hope you can appreciate that our intention is to accept and learn from the challenges we face, and to change the way that we work day to day, as well as renewing our governance, community and operational structures.
“In tackling some of the issues raised, we have received a great deal of challenge and advice from the Welsh Government and Sport Wales and you will know that progress has been made in appointing an independent Chair (NB this process now concluded) and outlining the terms of references of the external taskforce.
“The review made very challenging reading for us and described a committed squad of high-performance athletes frustrated by the support they were receiving, with failures in strategic and operational management, and not enough care, resource and encouragement for our international players to perform at their best.
“The review report also made clear that we had not ensured that our female players felt fully welcomed, valued and an equal part of our game.
“The recognition of these serious failures as an organisation led to rapid changes, and of the 40 recommendations that were made as part of the review, most have been implemented in full, with further action required in other areas.
“We have been heartened by the immediate positive outcomes… but whilst changes to management, investment in resources and new professional contracts have led to positive change, we recognise that considerably more needs to be done to ensure that women players at all levels receive the support they need to flourish and that we need to continue to change the way our organisation works day to day to be more inclusive.
“I can only apologise again for the challenging environment and the personal impact it has had on the women involved.”
After publication of the Senedd report on Friday, a WRU spokesperson said: "We have already accepted, and did so again at the committee session, that we have much work to do to ensure that we address our past failures and we again express our sincere remorse for the missed opportunities and failures described and offer our sincere apologies to anyone affected.
“We commissioned the independent report into the women’s performance area in 2021 to identify concerns and help us reshape our support for our international players. This led to a great deal of change and we are pleased to be able to report that the recommendations have been substantively delivered. We are very proud of the way in which our squad has responded to these changes and we hope that the results are clear to see.
“We are fully committed to implementing all of the recommendations of the current Independent Review into the WRU, led by former Court of Appeal judge Dame Anne Rafferty DBE PC (Taskforce). We expect the Taskforce to report before the end of summer and welcome the Senedd’s suggestion that an implementation plan should follow soon after.
“The committee are right to highlight that we should not wait until the Taskforce completes its work before we make changes, specifically to ensure that our staff feel safe, supported and valued, and that we tackle incidents and behaviours in a robust and consistent matter.
“We have invested in new procedures and enhanced and restructured our human resources team, with a particular focus on equality, diversity and inclusion.
“The HR Team has sought external expertise to provide advice and support in reviewing all of our people policies in 2022, which includes our EDI, whistleblowing and grievance policies, to ensure these are as robust as possible. This period of challenge has made us doubly committed to developing an everyday working culture that is professional, inclusive and welcoming.”
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