Global articles on espionage, spying, bugs, and other interesting topics.

What’s really been bugging Meninga and Murdoch?

 

Fired up … Maroons coach Mal Meninga. Photo: Getty Images

THE revelations of phone hacking by Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World newspaper resurrected memories for a couple of executives of the media magnate’s Super League.

When officials of the News Ltd-funded rugby league organisation reported for work one Monday morning in 1995 at their headquarters in Elizabeth Street, Sydney, they found a small group of technicians busy near their desks.

Told they were ”sweepers”, the league men surveyed the offices, considered them neat and tidy and wondered why they needed vacuuming.

But there wasn’t a Hoover in sight, although J. Edgar Hoover, the old FBI chief, would have felt comfortable in the environment.

It was explained the technicians were checking for electronic bugs, and securing phone lines. Furthermore, they were back the following Monday.

The Super League war was, after all, a battle between two rival telecommunications companies for control of one of the richest assets in pay TV: rugby league broadcasting rights. Murdoch was aligned with Telstra, while the Channel Nine proprietor, Kerry Packer, was partnered with Optus.

Maybe Ken Cowley, the News Ltd boss at the time, feared electronic spying by Packer, or perhaps it was an industry-wide practice. Paranoia ruled in those days, as it still does in Queensland rugby league.

Cowley seriously considered a request from the Super League chief, John Ribot, to move the offices to Brisbane, where News Ltd had an emotional ally in the Brisbane Broncos.

The Broncos’ ebullient owner, Paul ”Porky” Morgan, had railed for years about Sydney rule and discriminatory treatment by the NSW Rugby League’s match review committee, the judiciary, referees and the selections of representative coaches.

Porky’s views were resurrected on Sunday by Queensland coach Mal Meninga, when he wrote a column in a Brisbane newspaper attacking the NSWRL, the NRL and people associated with the Blues camp, calling them ”rats” and ”filth”.

Meninga has subsequently revealed he was hurt by a News Ltd column in a Sydney newspaper that claimed he was merely a figurehead of the Queensland team, and the real coaching was done by his assistants.

This was based on TV footage from half-time in the Sydney match, showing Maroons assistant coach Michael Hagan addressing the team. Meninga’s friends say he believes the Sydney attack was masterminded by someone in the Blues camp.

If so, it was a dumb ploy. If it was designed to destabilise a coach who has no alleged influence on the team, it would come to nothing. Judging by the first words out of the mouths of the Queensland players when they greeted Meninga after the game, it certainly fired them up.

The unanswered question is why was Meninga so upset? Mal is a sensitive soul but surely he must have realised his opponent and former teammate, Ricky Stuart, is one of the most competitive people on the planet.

But Mal answered his critics by winning the game, delivering Queensland six successive Origin series victories. Furthermore, some people actually consider it a positive man-management policy to delegate.

Empowering assistants is a sign of a confident coach, secure in his role. But the origin of Meninga’s fury could well be revealed in an email he sent, wondering why Stuart would seek to undermine his future earning opportunities as a coach.

Meninga has a new four-year contract, at $200,000 a year, with the QRL as Maroons coach to the end of 2015. It was approved by the outgoing QRL chief executive, Ross Livermore, and has been reported as an $800,000 deal.

But Livermore might well have sent a hospital pass to his successor, Robert Moore, because Mal’s arrangement is not finalised.

Meninga seeks an ambassador’s role in Queensland and worthy remuneration for his Maroons support staff.

While the QRL are probably willing to pay Meninga $1 million for his services over the next four years, they might object to how much his assistants are paid.

With a new independent commission about to rule the game, the QRL will be subservient to handouts from the peak body.

Maybe Meninga felt the Sydney newspaper column demeaned his role and could have undermined his total coaching package from a belt-tightening QRL. His subsequent refusal to apologise has galvanised parochial Queensland and put him in a position of indispensability.

We like to think rugby league is about friendships but it’s usually about money. After all, it’s the reason the code began in 1908; why the Super League idea was created 16 years ago and why British reporters hacked phones – to increase newspaper sales.

In short, perhaps money was bugging Mal but the British bugging was all about money.