Top footy club in pokie probe

By TONY WALL - Sunday Star Times

ONE OF New Zealand's top two domestic soccer clubs is facing allegations it used pokie money meant for youth development to recruit professional players.

The Department of Internal Affairs confirmed it was investigating how Waitakere United spent more than $2 million of poker machine money, which can be used only for amateur sport.

"We are concerned, we are investigating it – money can't go to professional sport under any guise," said Mike Hill, the DIA's gaming compliance director.

Along with Auckland City, Waitakere United has dominated the amateur NZ Football Championship and has twice competed at the world club championships in Japan. Although it admits recruiting players from around New Zealand and overseas, it says they are amateur and have day jobs.

"They are like any other team – they get some expenses paid and a win bonus, that's all," said chairman Rex Dawkins.

He would not give details of the "win bonuses", saying they were commercially sensitive.

Dawkins was unable to shed light on Waitakere United's unaudited financial accounts for the year ended July 2008, which show the club spent $662,152 on "personnel" and $484,458 on "financial expenses".

Asked what that money was for, Dawkins said: "I haven't got a breakdown of the figures, I really don't know." He confirmed the club had only one fulltime employee, a coach.

Figures obtained by the Sunday Star-Times show Waitakere United received at least $2.3m in pokie money between 2005 and this year, most of it from Cuesports Foundation. Its chairman, Stephen Williamson, is a team manager with Waitakere City, one of Waitakere United's feeder clubs.

The funding controversy comes as NZ Football gets ready to reap its biggest ever financial windfall after the All Whites qualified for the World Cup. It stands to earn at least $8m from the sport's governing body, Fifa.

The DIA investigation was sparked by a complaint from the Problem Gambling Foundation, whose chief executive, Graeme Ramsey, said: "In the interests of transparency... we think the public of New Zealand should be able to see exactly how grants are being used."

He called for a commission of inquiry into pokie machine operations and the community funding model.

Dawkins featured on the front page of the New Zealand Herald in September, as part of an article about fears amateur sport would lose pokie funding. He was quoted as saying "grants filter down to 4000 players in West Auckland", but that has been disputed by the president of one of Waitakere United's 12 shareholding clubs.

Greg Smith, president of the Ranui-Swanson club, said his club was considering pulling out of its involvement with Waitakere United. "We pay over $1000 a year to be involved with the club and we don't feel we are getting any positive return from that. We don't get a bean of the pokie money."

Smith believed Waitakere United was buying in players from around New Zealand and countries such as the Solomon Islands. "It wouldn't be a cash-up-front thing, it would be fuel vouchers and hidden that way."

Smith said pokie money should be used to help underprivileged children participate in sport, so that they could one day play for the likes of Waitakere United.

"You've got a better chance of playing high-level football if you're living in a Third-World country like the Solomon Islands and getting picked by a scout than you have from one of our local clubs."

Smith said he had questioned Dawkins about how the money was being spent, but had not received a satisfactory answer. Dawkins told the Star-Times costs included "coaching, community stuff, physio, NZFC entry fees, all those sorts of things".

Although the club had received Fifa money for qualifying for the world club champs, it took "a huge amount of expenses to facilitate that". He was confident the club would be cleared by the DIA.

Hill said if any action was taken against the gaming trusts which gave the club money, the DIA had the option of recovering that money from the club.

New Zealand Football chief executive Michael Glading confirmed that the NZFC was designed as a strictly amateur competition and teams were not permitted to field fulltime professionals.

Glading and NZF chairman Frank Van Hattum said they had been aware of "innuendo" around how leading clubs paid players, but pointed out that Waitakere and Auckland had increased costs because they participated in the Oceania Champions League and World Club Championship.

additional reporting, Steve Kilgallon