House debates

Monday, 19 August 2024

Statements by Members

Women in Sport: Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks

4:42 pm

Simon Kennedy (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | | Hansard source

The Cronulla Sharks were founded in 1963, and this organisation has spurred Sutherland shire to have the most rugby league, touch and Oztag female players in New South Wales. In 2022 the National Rugby League appropriately added an NRLW team to the Sharks, but the change rooms and their facilities are diabolical. Opposition teams need to use change rooms across the road, having to cross at the lights and walk into the stadium, past all the punters and the public, to enter. They have no proper showers or toilets and no private spaces for physiotherapy.

Other electorates are being looked after. The Sea Eagles at Brookie have been promised $36 million. There's $40 million going to the Tigers at Leichhardt Oval and a whopping $300 million to the Penrith Panthers. The Cronulla Sharks NRLW have had no federal funding—nothing. They just have a suburban ground that's used for all their home games as well as the men's home games. Under a Liberal government, I will fight for the Cronulla Sharks NRLW team to have adequate training facilities. That is something only a Liberal government will deliver for the female players in the Sutherland shire.