A question of votes

As the political fallout from England’s excruciating World Cup campaign reverberates, it’s nice to know that the game’s international governing body is also getting in on the act with a Shakespearean drama of its own.

The players may have cleaned up their act on the field but, in the background, the upper echelons of the International Rugby Board (IRB) are witnessing a monumental dust-up between Bernard Lapasset, the urbane Frenchman who has chaired the organisation for the last four years, and the straight-talking, English bulldog that is Bill Beaumont, vice chair for the past eight years.

Both men are standing for Lapasset’s current role as IRB chairman in what is the first-ever contested election for the post.

Round one took place on Wednesday, 22 October in Auckland during the World Cup when there was a lot more “argy-bargy” than many of the matches had witnessed.

A meeting disintegrated into a shouting match until Wales’ Gerald Davies brought a semblance of order to proceedings by reminding everyone of their responsibilities.

The delegates eventually voted not on who should be the chairman but on whether to delay the decision until December. The vote was tied at 13-13 and Lapasset cast his deciding vote in favour of postponing the decision – and for a very particular reason.

The Asian delegate at the Auckland meeting had been mandated by his union to vote for Beaumont but, because the vote was on the timing of the decision rather than the actual chairman’s position itself, he instead voted with Lapasset’s supporters in favour of delay. Had the vote proper taken place there and then former England Grand Slam captain Beaumont would now be sitting pretty.

But, after heavy canvassing by Japan, who support Lapasset, the Asian delegate has been replaced and the new man is now mandated to back the Frenchman in the vote which will take place on Monday, 12 December at a meeting in Los Angeles.

It promises to be every bit as edgy as the first episode.

And it is possible that much of the antagonism that has been generated comes from a feeling of betrayal due to circumstances which will be instantly recognisable to any followers of the soap opera that was New Labour over the last decade. According to several sources, Beaumont, the genial former team captain on A Question of Sport, stood aside in 2007 to allow Lapasset a free run at the plum IRB job.

But that was supposedly on the strict understanding that the Frenchman, a lawyer and former customs chief, who was president of the French rugby union from 1991 to 2008, would return the favour four years later.

Four years on, Lapasset is clinging to power like a Middle Eastern despot and denying absolutely that any such agreement with his rival was ever made.

“That was my understanding,” replied Beaumont when asked about his handshake with Lapasset back in 2007. “There were no witnesses present except there were lots of people who I told immediately after that we’d made the deal. I had been asked by them to stand against Bernard and I would have done so but for our agreement. My conscience is crystal clear on that account.”

The obvious implication is that not everyone else in the saga can make the same claim.

One reason for Lapasset’s change of mind, if the Frenchman did indeed ever make such an agreement, is the possibility that his ultimate goal is a seat on the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The IOC is run by former Belgian international player and rugby aficionado Jacques Rogge. In order for Lapasset to join the IOC board the word is that he needs to be the head of a sporting body, which may explain his reluctance to make way for Beaumont. However, Lapasset remains the vice chair of the French Olympic Committee. which might offer him another route to the IOC.

In laying out his manifesto for the IRB job, Beaumont admitted that “the man in the Edinburgh street might not notice any great difference”.

But he went on to outline his vision of a truly global game.

He said: “We can’t emulate soccer, we’ll never be soccer, and we shouldn’t try.

“But I want to enable people of all shapes and sizes who have had no experience of rugby to take up the game and enjoy the camaraderie that comes with it – both men and women.

“We need to make sure that the tier one countries are financially viable because it’s no good having one that’s skint if all the others have the money.

“There is a financial conference in February and we need to do a completely transparent auditing of the various countries’ profit and loss so the IRB can help out where necessary without diminishing the grants given to tier two and tier three countries.

“Just look what the Pacific Islands, Romania and Georgia contributed to the World Cup.”

Beaumont was responding to New Zealand’s threat to boycott the next World Cup unless and until the IRB offer further compensation for the loss of earnings that unions suffer by participating. The New Zealand Rugby Union is losing money hand over fist and are supporting the Englishman’s bid for office, presumably in return for IRB action on that very matter.

Lapasset, on the other hand, is widely credited with getting rugby sevens into the Olympics and the savvy Frenchman is milking it for all it’s worth. He has been campaigning frantically in the last two months and one South African paper claimed that he won the South African Rugby Union’s two votes simply by offering its boss Oregan Hoskins the position of vice chair.

Beaumont has promised that role to another rugby giant, the former All Black flanker Graham Mourie. From the outside, it looks as though real rugby men are lined up against rugby politicians, which must be worrying for the Englishman.

It’s possible that the meeting on 12 December will see England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and New Zealand, who each have two votes, support Beaumont. The other nations with two votes, France, Australia and South Africa, will back Lapasset. Of the delegates with one vote each, only Canada and the Oceania representative are likely to be for Beaumont. Argentina, Japan, Italy and the representatives of Asia, Europe, South America and Africa are all thought to be for the Frenchman. North America’s intention is unknown.

If those voting intentions are correct, Beaumont is up against it with just 12 reasonably solid votes against 13 for Lapasset, with much resting on which way North America’s Bob Latham swings. His union, the USA, is said to favour Lapasset but, should the delegates again be split 13-13, they will have to remain in LA until someone switches, because Lapasset does not have the casting vote on this issue.

Whoever wins the battle in eight days’ time will almost certainly launch an independent review of the IRB’s governance, which will inevitably focus on a voting system that gives Scotland, as a founder nation, twice as many votes as the much larger rugby populations of Japan or Argentina.

That said, the World Cup every four years is the sole source of finance for the IRB and, with the best will in the world, the big global broadcasters don’t pay ever-bigger chunks of money for their viewers to watch Georgia play Tonga.

England, France and South Africa are the financial engines which drive World Cup revenue so, to argue in favour of one union, one vote, where Madagascar would be the equal of England, is as daft as the current set-up.

So, what about Scotland?

“Scotland are a major contributor to world rugby in the past and in the future,” says Beaumont with two Scottish votes safely in his pocket.

“The governance will be looked at but there are no promises because the whole IRB council needs to vote to change anything. Scotland are currently tenth in the world and going well in the Heineken Cup. The World Cup was disappointing but, but for a dropped pass or missed tackle, they could have been in the semi-finals.” Lapasset is unlikely to be so sympathetic.

It seems that tell-it-like-it-is Beaumont is learning a little diplomacy late in life but, as the self styled “rugby candidate”, the Englishman has it all to do against a trilingual Frenchman for whom politics is second nature.