His Honour Judge Jeff Blackett once chaired a disciplinary hearingat which Martin Johnson was charged with kneeing and striking anopponent. "I gave him a homily about him being a captain of Englandand an icon of the game," Blackett recalls. "It was almost the sameas a court martial. I wasn't quite wagging my finger saying 'don't doit again' but it was like telling a young sailor he'd overstepped theline." Johnson appealed his five-week ban but gave the judge apositive write-up in his autobiography. Not long after, Blackett wasappointed the chief disciplinary officer of the Rugby Football Union.
The role is a voluntary and unpaid one which Blackett, 51, fitsaround his full-time occupations as Judge Advocate General for thearmed forces and a circuit judge in the south-east of England. Hebrings to it a sharp legal mind and a feel for rugby he earnedplaying as a centre for US Portsmouth, Hampshire and the Navy."Hammered the Army, 7-3 at Twickenham in 1981," he reports inconversation at his chambers in Chancery Lane. "Gave the scoring passfor our try." Duly noted, sir.
Without the need to don his day-job wig and gown, Blackett hasbecome a recognisably central figure in rugby's changing disciplinaryprocesses, which are almost all to do with the sport going open 11years ago. 'As soon as the old amateur era was over the playerswanted to contest the disciplinary system," he says. "They started tobring their lawyers along." In response, the International RugbyBoard directed that all disciplinary hearings would be conducted by alawyer, a senior ex-player and a rugby administrator.
Blackett, who also serves as a match commissioner in the HeinekenCup and a judicial officer for the Six Nations' Championship andWorld Cup, believes in summary justice. A red card offence in thePremiership is now dealt with on the following Tuesday, with anyappeal two days later, and a citing case is brought within 10 days.In high-profile cases such as the nine-week ban he gave France'scaptain Fabien Pelous for use of the elbow last autumn, Blackettlikes the written findings to be available to the press even as theyare being read to the player. "I know discipline is of interest," hesays, "and I would rather get it done quickly and openly rather thanhave weeks of speculation."
On behalf of the RFU this season Blackett has handed down three-week bans to Premiership players Stuart Abbott and Paul Hodgson forversions of the so-called spear tackle, which he would like to "driveout of the game". When it came to the allegations made by spectatorsduring a Premiership match last weekend that Northampton's NewZealander scrum-half Mark Robinson had been racially abusive toAndrew Higgins, a Bath player, Blackett decided within a quickfire 48hours that a hearing would not be necessary. "There was no prospectof a conviction," he says, and what's more he wanted the world toknow it. With expletives notably not deleted, his judgement waspublished by the RFU on Monday evening - with a series of asterisksinserted to get it past the Union's internet firewall.
Blackett makes repeated references to the players as role modelsand to looking after the image of the game. He has recently been tothe Football Association's headquarters to discuss the need forwritten reasons in disciplinary judgements but, at a time whenfootball's probity is constantly under scrutiny its overt chicanery -as in diving to get a free-kick or imploring referees to show theyellow card - has yet to show its ugly face in rugby. Blackett sayshe has only once been moved by that kind of cheating to write to aplayer who had clearly knocked a ball into touch and then raised hisarm to claim the line-out.
The greater challenge, it would seem, is marrying rugby'sincreasing public popularity with its inherent nature of multiplecollisions, legitimate contact and, for want of a better word,violence. "I'm not trying to change the robust and tough nature ofrugby," Blackett says, "because that's why we play it and love it,and the spectators love it. But it's a controlled and lawfulrobustness, not gratuitous violence. There is no need for most of thereal foul play - punching, stamping, turning players upside down inthe tackle. Most if not all of our players are responsible and do notwant to injure anyone. That doesn't mean they are not sometimesreckless."
Blackett was called to the bar in 1983 and served in guidedmissile destroyers and frigates before leaving the Navy in the rankof commodore to become Judge Advocate General in 2004. He is seen asa force for applying civilian standards to courts martial, and drewcriticism from the then defence secretary John Reid for appointing acivilian High Court judge to the trial of British servicemencurrently under way at Bulford near Salisbury. "In rugby we aretrying desperately to drive inconsistency away," says Blackett."There is a view from the grass roots that the RFU are soft oninternational players, and a view from the Premiership that we aretough compared with the southern hemisphere. Some of the disciplinarysanction entry points are, in my view, too low. An eye gouge or anintentional stamp on the head or a tackle spearing an opponent intothe ground should take a player out of the game for a long time."
The Robinson case, Blackett admits, raises a new question ofimpropriety. And, characteristically, the judge has wasted no time indelivering a verdict. "There has always been colourful language onthe rugby pitch and, the more players become role models, the morethey have to restrain that. We're not going to legislate that youcan't say 'bastard' or 'bugger'. What we will say is you've got to beaware of your surroundings. It's not sensible to give a tirade on thetouchline when there's mums and children sitting in the stands."
JUDGEMENT DAY
"I am not trying to change the robust and tough nature of rugby.That's why we play it"
Judge Jeff Blackett
RFU DISCIPLINARY CHIEF
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