Brendan Schwab

Brendan Andrew Schwab [ˈbɹendən ʃwaːb] (born 10 March 1968) is an Australian sports administrator, trade union official and lawyer. He is the former Executive Director of the World Players Association (WPA), an autonomous sector of UNI Global Union, a global union federation based in Nyon, Switzerland.^[1] He co-founded Professional Footballers Australia (PFA),^[1] and served variously as its lawyer, chief executive,^[2] and chair.^[3]

Schwab is the son of the late Alan Schwab, a prominent Australian sports administrator and Australian Football League Executive Commissioner, and the brother of Cameron Schwab, the former chief executive officer of the Richmond, Melbourne and Fremantle football clubs.^[4] He graduated from the Melbourne Law School in 1992.^[5]

As a young industrial relations and employment lawyer, Schwab forged a partnership with schoolfriend and Socceroos and National Soccer League (NSL) player Kimon Taliadoros to establish the PFA. The PFA won a standardised contract, forced the industry to become more professional,^[6] and through the then Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) worked to abolish the domestic transfer system.^[7] In June 1995, the domestic transfer system's abolition was recommended by both the AIRC and the Environment, Recreation, Communications and Arts Committee of the Australian Senate which had held an inquiry into Australian soccer.^[8]

Schwab led the PFA's research and advocacy for a new Australian Premier League to replace the ailing NSL with the vision, “For the Fans”.^[9] In 2003, he was appointed by Football Federation Australia (FFA) Chairman Frank Lowy to a task force which recommended the creation of a new national competition as long proposed by the PFA.^[10] In 2004, FFA launched the A-League Men.^[11]

The A-League Men introduced a salary cap instead of a transfer system and Australian players were paid better than ever before, but Schwab often faced detractors demanding a reduction in player payments.^[12] In December 2011, Warwick Smith, the chairman of the Australian Sports Commission, released a review on behalf of the Australian government into Australian soccer, which concluded that “salaries had increased at an unstainable rate” with “players paid around 40 per cent of income generated by the A-League, compared to approximately 20 per cent paid in the AFL, NRL and Super Rugby.”^[13] The PFA rejected this aspect of the review, with Schwab describing it as a “fundamental error”.^[14] By 2012, the harmony between the players and the game which had helped build the A-League Men was in question, and Schwab was reported not to be popular with both FFA and the team owners.^[15]

In 2010, the PFA and FFA negotiated a collective bargaining agreement that saw the introduction of full-time contracts for the Matildas in time for the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup.^[16]

At the 2010 FIFA World Cup, under the PFA's collective bargaining agreement with FFA, the Socceroos were reported to be among the best paid teams at the tournament despite being rank outsiders.^[17]

In 2012, Schwab announced he was stepping down as PFA Chief Executive having worked for the PFA for two decades, although he would retain the union's collective bargaining brief.^[18][19] Schwab denied his tensions with FFA and the owners informed his decision.^[20]

Schwab was appointed the inaugural chair of FIFPRO Asia/Oceania, and from 2008 prioritised closer ties with the Asian Football Confederation as well as the development and growth of player associations in the region.^[21] He called on FIFA to ensure international labour standards were upheld to protect migrant workers in relation to the 2022 FIFA World Cup to be held in Qatar.^[22]

Schwab acted as general secretary of the Australian Athletes’ Alliance (AAA), the peak body for Australia's player associations,^[23] and represented the AAA in Senate inquiries into the impact of the expansion of the integrity powers of sports bodies on athlete rights.^[24] He was critical of the ineffectiveness and disproportionate impact on athletes of the World Anti-Doping Agency, including in the wake of the Essendon Football Club supplements scandal, and in 2014 called on Australian sports bodies to follow the lead of their United States counterparts and resolve anti-doping policy in partnership with their player associations.^[25]

In 2012, Schwab and academic Braham Dabscheck advised the Rugby League Players’ Association in its collective bargaining negotiations with the Australian Rugby League Commission.^[26] In 1999, Schwab had acted as secretary to the landmark review conducted by Dabscheck of the AFL Players’ Association.^[27]

The WPA is a collective of over 85,000 athletes, through 138 player associations, in more than 70 countries, across 17 different sports. Schwab served as Executive Director of WPA for just under a decade to June 2023.^[28]

Working with WPA President Donald Fehr, the former executive director of the MLB Players Association and the NHL Players Association, Schwab's tenure coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic and the widespread revelations of adverse human rights impacts in global sport.^[29] The WPA coordinated efforts to enable player unions to negotiate return to play at the height of the pandemic,^[30] and engaged with bodies such as the International Olympic Committee (IOC)^[31] and the International Labour Organization (ILO)^[32] to embed respect for human rights, including by co-establishing the Sport and Rights Alliance (SRA),^[33] and the Centre for Sport and Human Rights.^[34]

In 2017, the WPA launched the “Universal Declaration of Player Rights” at a press conference at the NFL Players Association with the aim of it becoming an international benchmark for athlete rights.^[35] However, the IOC instead developed its own “Athlete Rights and Responsibilities Declaration”,^[36] which was endorsed at the IOC Session in Buenos Aires in 2018,^[37] resulting in heavy criticism from Schwab and the SRA.^[38]

Schwab has been an active human rights lawyer and campaigner in the field of sport, supporting athletes such as Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir,^[39] Hakeem al-Araibi,^[40] and, with Khalida Popal, members of the Afghan Women's national football team.^[41] He has also advocated for equal prize money between men and women at the FIFA world cups,^[42] and published law journal articles on athlete activism and the responsibility of international sports governing bodies to respect human rights.^[43]

In 2022, Schwab was inducted into the Football Australia Hall of Fame.^[44]

• Stensholt, John and Mooney, Shaun (2015), “A-League. The Inside Story of the First Tumultuous Decade”, Nero, Collingwood, Victoria ISBN9781863657595.
• Gorman, Joe (2017), “The Death and Rise of Australian Soccer”, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, Queensland ISBN 978-0-7022-5968-5^[45]