A Shorten Labor Government will make the biggest investment ever in Australian netball by a federal government, committing $20 million over two years to Netball Australia.
This investment will help fund a range of Netball Australia’s grassroots participation and engagement programs, and ensure a strong future for netball in Australia – from local netball clubs, to our Super Netball stars and our outstanding national team, the Diamonds.
The funding will also support Netball Australia’s bid to host the 2027 Netball World Cup in Australia.
Labor’s commitment is great news for more than 850,000 women and girls who participate in netball, and will ensure that both grassroots and elite netball gets the best support it has ever received from government.
Netball has the highest rate of female participation of any club sport in Australia. AusPlay research released in April this year showed netball is particularly important for girls’ participation in organised activity outside of school hours. The benefits of team sport for kids is well known, particularly for girls in helping to develop confidence and self-esteem, learn new skills and make new friends.
The rapid rise of elite female sport in Australia is a great thing. It means Australian girls are seeing more sporting role models more often on the TV, and are inspired to take up sport themselves.
But it also means that netball isn’t competing on a level playing field in television coverage and sponsorship space. While the expansion and broadcast of women’s footy and cricket has been supported by revenue generated by their elite male competitions, this is not an option for netball.
Labor’s $20 million investment will ensure that netball, which has done so much for women’s sport for so long, can keep pace with the rapid expansion of elite women’s competitions in other sports.
Labor has made hard budget decisions to ensure our priorities are fully paid for – we will make multinationals pay their fair share and close unsustainable tax loopholes, because we want to help a new generation of young girls fall in the love with netball and inspire the next generation of Aussie Diamonds.
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