It's the worrying faces on the translators as they kind of start wondering, “Is my microphone working or not?” I can't do anything about it, I'm afraid.
I would like to share an overview of Rugby Canada.
Since 2016, Rugby Canada has implemented a player welfare program which targets all the pillars involved in sport, from players to coaches to parents to administrators to match officials, and tries to create an understanding that we all have a responsibility around player welfare in our sport.
Rugby Canada, like many sports, has developed guidelines. What has been critical in developing these guidelines is that they are not being done in isolation. We've developed our guidelines, or looked to harmonize our guidelines, in partnership with Parachute Canada through its harmonization program. We're also very fortunate that World Rugby is one of the five organizing partners of the international concussion event, so we're able to access the research that comes from that event. That does influence how our guidelines are created.
Rugby Canada and its 10 provincial unions must do concussion management training. That's an online module. Not just that, but we also have a rugby-specific module. We've been able to identify that in rugby there are five areas of concern where we can increase the likelihood of a concussion. There is training around the awareness of a concussion, the management and what to do to report a concussion, but it's also important that people are educated in how we prevent concussions as well.
They are two very different pieces. Along with our coaches, who have a direct influence with our athletes, we also focus on our match officials who have to manage the games. They have to be able to identify and know what to do in a game should an incident happen. Those are our two primary focus areas, although we do understand and are looking at how we support the parents and players as well, and not just work in isolation.
In rugby, we've also looked at the prevention piece and identified, through research and our evidence from injuries, that the tackle is where we see the largest number of concussion-related injuries. We've now developed a resource that looks at the introduction of tackling to young kids. In Ontario we'll be rolling out our tackle technique resource. Again, it's a prevention strategy that supports coaches as well as players on the introduction to tackling.
Another piece that we've implemented is a zero tolerance approach to contact to the head. There is zero tolerance at all levels of the game, from the professional and international end of the game to the community and domestic end of the game. Should contact happen to the head, there are sanctions. Should repeated contact happen to the head, there are more severe sanctions that take place as well, both on the field as well as off the field.
Because we're a large country, that face-to-face contact is very difficult, so we also provide webinars where we look to have ongoing education. This has been a primary focus for our referees on how to manage those dangerous tackles. Seeing examples of dangerous tackles and knowing how to manage those dangerous tackles is a way for us to provide them with the resources to support them in making those decisions in a game as well.
Along with the partnership with the Coaching Association of Canada, we have concussion training around the incidence and likelihood of concussion in the game at all levels of our training and education. That means that a two-hour slot in all of our courses is focused on the tackle, ruck, maul, scrum and jumping in the line-out. These are the five areas of the game where we see an increased likelihood of concussion-related injuries. When coaches leave any of our coaching courses, they have had the opportunity to practically try to coach in those areas.
The course I talked about previously that they have to do, the rugby readiness-specific, is the online learning piece. Before they go on the course, they must have done the online learning piece. Then, when they come on the course, there's the opportunity to practically apply that, as well as create professional development workshops around this area.
Another thing that we have is a free app that helps with the identification of signs and symptoms, and what to do should a coach suspect a concussion. It's available in a bilingual format—in multiple languages, actually—because we're fortunate to use World Rugby on multiple platforms. We know that players play a critical part. We know they're quite technology savvy, so we are trying to get something into their hands that can help give them some very accurate information around concussions.
We've also looked at promoting the provincial health lines. Often there are parents and players looking for somebody to speak to, and they're not sure whom to speak to, so we try to promote the provincial health lines as a point of contact. They can phone 24-7, 365 days a year, and there will be someone who can provide some help as well.
As an organization, we wouldn't ask our members to do something that we're not willing to do, so at all our AGMs and mid-term AGMs, as a player welfare piece, we have had speakers come in to educate our board as well as our provincial union executives. We have had Gord Stringer, the father of Rowan Stringer. We've had Parachute Canada come in as well, along with some neurologists and so on. We're just trying to increase the awareness of the decision-makers in our organization to make sure they do make player welfare a priority. Education is important right across the board.
We're also fortunate that we were the only national sport organization to be sitting on the Rowan's law advisory committee. Obviously, Rowan was involved in rugby, and we feel we have a lot to learn and share from that experience. We've been fortunate enough to speak at many conferences, including education conferences and World Rugby's medical conference. The focus on concussions in Canada most certainly has global attention, and collaboration has been key for us to develop the resources that we have.
On that point, I'm happy to take any questions or repeat it all again, whichever comes first.