The Australian Rugby Union (ARU) has implemented 15 recommendations made by former Federal Sports Minister Mark Arbib as it looks to keep pace with rival codes.

Two of the key recommendations enacted from the corporate governance review conducted by Arbib are changes to the ARU voting structure and a requirement that all directors on the ARU board are to be independent.

Under the current system, there are 14 member votes for the ARU constitutionally, and that will be increased to 16.

The current votes are mostly controlled by NSW and Queensland who have eight votes between them but under the new implementations each territory and state get a vote.

ARU chairman Michael Hawker admitted it was time for an overhaul and to have a governance that fairly represented the modern game.

“Our original constitution was in 1949 and we really (only) had NSW and Queenslanders,” Hawker said.

“Since then, the game has evolved quite considerably from an amateur code to a professional code from NSW to Queensland to a code that spans across Australia.