Netball Victoria has reported a raft of positive outcomes across priority areas at its Annual General Meeting on Thursday 21 March.
In the first year of a new four-year Strategic Plan, participation figures once again demonstrated pleasing growth, with over 111,000 Netball Victoria members participating in the sport across the state. This included participation amongst males and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds increasing by 20 per cent and 28 per cent respectively, and a combined 6.9 per cent growth in Netball Victoria and Melbourne Vixens memberships.
The organisation posted a strong financial result, including a profit of just over $520,000 and 30 per cent growth in commercial revenue across Netball Victoria and the Melbourne Vixens, driven primarily by sponsorship and consumer revenue increases.
The Melbourne Vixens played an important role in promoting and enhancing the sport of netball throughout Victoria, breaking the club’s membership and attendance records, achieving multiple sold-out matches at John Cain Arena, and delivering $6.9 million in QI media value.
As a state sporting body and not-for-profit, the commercial success of the Vixens is important in helping Netball Victoria to invest more money back into grassroots netball. The Vixens also play an important role in inspiring the next generation of netballers through their contribution to increasing participation and encouraging Victorian talent through our pathways. We remain proud that 70 per cent of our Vixens athletes are homegrown Victorian talent.
Improvement and growth in facilities remains a priority for Netball Victoria, with over $107 million in state government funding secured for projects across the state. The organisation continued to work in partnership with government at all levels to deliver funding for facilities that support the growth of the game, including for 24 projects in metro and regional areas, and facilitating the Country Football Netball Program which supported the delivery of five netball infrastructure projects in regional Victoria to a total value of $3.2 million.
Netball Victoria also continued leading in the workforce space, offering development activities for coaches, umpires and bench officials, and seeing over 2,500 individuals achieve accreditation throughout the year.
The organisation continued to offer the Positive Netball Program in 2023 with support from the Victorian Government’s Positive Start Initiative. Tailored programs were delivered at no cost to over 16,000 students from government and low fee-paying schools.
Netball Victoria also made great progress in various diversity and inclusion initiatives including achieving a gold ranking in the Pride in Sport Index, one of just five sporting organisations in the country to do so, and continued its advocacy work for women and girls.
In the organisation’s 100th year, netball icons Sharelle McMahon and Anne Henderson were immortalised in bronze and their statues now stand proudly outside John Cain Arena and the State Netball Centre respectively, the spiritual homes of netball in Victoria.
Unveiled on International Women’s Day and at Netball Victoria’s flagship State Titles event, these events marked significant steps forward in the organisation’s pursuit of greater representation of women in our state’s cultural landscape and recognition of sporting heroes.
“Pleasingly, our latest figures demonstrate strong growth and success across key areas including netball participation, programs and competitions, commercial, advocacy and high performance,” said Netball Victoria CEO Andrea Pearman.
“As a non-profit organisation, Netball Victoria is proud to reinvest 100 per cent of our profits into strengthening our pathway and grassroots netball, so our 2023 result is an exciting one – what it ultimately represents is opportunities for Victorians, and particularly for Victorian women and girls.”
“Our priority is delivering more opportunities for more people to participate in our game, from Woolworths NetSetGO right through our talent pathway to the Melbourne Vixens, and these results show that we’re successfully bolstering our financial position in pursuit of that goal.”
“Every cent invested in us supports more young people to discover and fall in love with netball, and we’re looking forward to continuing to work with our affiliates and our valued partners across the state to build that lifelong love of our sport in our community.”
Thursday’s AGM saw three Board director positions voted on, and the election of two Directors to the Board; Margaret Molina OAM and Gayle Lambert.
Margaret joined the Netball Victoria Board as a director in 2018, bringing a wealth of knowledge and experience from her long history in netball as a player, coach, administrator and selector. Her re-election will see her continue on the Board for a further three years.
Gayle Lambert returns to the Board as an elected director for a three-year term. Gayle served on the Board as an elected director from 2014 to 2023 and returns to continue her legacy of outstanding service and dedication to our game.
The final vacated position will remain as a casual vacancy under Rule 19.2 (d) of the Netball Victoria constitution.
