Sports tribunals. Being a volunteer no excuse for procedural unfairness

Being a volunteer is no excuse for procedural unfairness or poor governance. Sandi Logan checks injustice in sports tribunals.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup currently underway in Canada, USA and Mexico is now into its “knockout stage” with more than 200 yellow cards (formal warnings to players issued by on field referees) and 10 red cards (immediate ejection) issued.

A special FIFA Disciplinary Committee, and separate Appeal Committee have been established to address on-field indiscretions with arbitrators aiming to resolve any appeals within 48 hours. Qatar’s Assim Madibo – handed a five-match ban following his red card ejection for a tackle which broke the leg of Canada’s Ismaël Koné – was expected to have appealed to the committee seeking a reduced suspension, until Qatar was eliminated so his suspension will be served during their next international games. 

FIFA’s tribunal and appeal processes introduced for the world championship are no different to those applying to Australian sports clubs and associations around governance, procedural fairness and natural justice.

Australian administrators on notice

But Australian sports administrators were recently put on notice that while none of them have a FIFA budget to run their operations and stage games, they cannot hide behind their voluntary status as an excuse for poor governance and procedural unfairness when suspending and sanctioning their members.

The clarion call to more than 70,000 local, state, and national sports comes in a determination (NST-E25-124664) from the National Sports Tribunal (NST), an independent statutory authority established in 2020 to resolve sports-related disputes. Its members are appointed by federal Sport Minister Anika Wells and include legal experts, sports administration professionals, medical personnel, and elite athletes.

A pithy response

In a pithy response to recent scathing NST criticism of what amounted to one sport’s kangaroo court masquerading as a “tribunal”, Western Australia’s ice hockey association (IHWA) announced in March this year it would work to “strengthen internal policies, education pathways, and governance processes”.

What its outgoing 51-year-old president Deon Shearer, who oversaw the tribunal process which began in 2024, didn’t say was the NST hearings have allegedly cost her members tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees, and that the agency’s determination essentially found the association’s three-member tribunal had denied a member procedural fairness both at the initial hearing and again at appeal. The NST determination also found the sanctions IHWA imposed were excessive.

Part of IHWA’s defence was it was a voluntary organisation which preferred informality in its interactions with members!

The case involved a 28-year-old female ice hockey coach – Arlene Ooi – who was hauled before the sport’s tribunal on charges of breaching IHWA’s social media policy, and for allegedly swearing at a minor (a young female on-ice lines-person) in July 2024.

The three IHWA tribunal members are all senior executives outside of their voluntary roles in the sport, including in major resources (Michael Sucher), WA Police (Dympna Njirich) and executive recruiting (Michaela Fellowes).

No procedural fairness

The tribunal refused to allow Ooi any witnesses, blocked her use of CCTV footage from the ice rink (which clearly contradicted other witnesses’ evidence and recollections), and when she lodged an appeal, an IHWA executive threatened her with further sanctions if she didn’t withdraw it. 

In the end, the association simply refused to allow her to appeal.

“It was a concentrated effort to remove me from the sport and they just didn’t expect that I would challenge them at this level,” says Ooi, who now, more than two years later, has stepped away from a sport in which she was heavily involved since her early 20s and to which she committed time and energy as a player, coach and referee.

“I was suspended because of the IHWA tribunal from coaching for the rest of the 2024 season, and given a deferred suspension for the entire 2025 season, as well as being suspended from representing IHWA in any capacity at national championships, development camps or with national teams until the end 2027.

National Sports Tribunal

“The threats and heat were turned up on me when I tried to appeal to IHWA, and when that process was blocked, I was left with no choice but to go higher to the national body – Ice Hockey Australia – whose integrity officer Catherine Arlove almost immediately referred it to the National Sports Tribunal,” Ooi explained.

Australia has an estimated 15 million active sports participants but few are ever likely to need the NST to resolve their disputes. The Tribunal’s annual budget, including a one-off special Budget supplement to ensure continuing operations and stability, is almost $4M for each of the next four years.

The NST’s appeals division members believe this recent determination will send all Australian sports administrators a strong signal about ensuring their tribunal processes and operating procedures meet the Sports Integrity Australia minimum requirements for procedural fairness and integrity.

Mediation expert and lawyer Marco Tomasello, who represented Ooi pro-bono, says the NST’s message is unambiguous.

Penalties and sanctions overturned

“Tribunals must afford participants procedural fairness, even if the tribunal and the sport are entirely run by volunteers,” Tomasello says. “Where tribunals are not conducted in accordance with the principles of procedural fairness, they risk having their sanctions substituted and their decisions overturned.”

Most of the IHWA tribunal penalties and sanctions against Ms Ooi were overturned.

The NST’s determination in Ooi’s case was clear: “The Respondent (IHWA) emphasised that it is a community sporting association whose tribunal and administration are run by volunteers, (and that) the informality of the … proceeding is extremely important.

“These arguments are not accepted … the informality … (does) not override the tribunal’s obligation … to provide procedural fairness.”

Furthermore, the determination found “the sanction imposed by the IHWA Tribunal – being a … suspension … for almost three and a half years – is severe on any analysis … the (IHWA) Tribunal’s decision is arbitrary and illogical, as well as disproportionately punitive.”

No apology

The known financial cost to IHWA is a burden likely soon to be reflected in increased membership fees; the unknown is what lies ahead in the event of any litigation and potential damages claim.

Inexplicably, there has been no apology to Ms Ooi. 

“I’m considering my legal options going forward,” Ms Ooi said.

IHWA secretary Jennifer Binetti said in a statement she could not comment on individual volunteers, officials, “or the conduct of confidential disciplinary proceedings”.

“The determination itself did not make findings of personal misconduct against any individual volunteer, tribunal member, or administrator,” she added.

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