2011 AGM: October 15th

[Alex Holowczak]

If you do those things, I think we have a system that can work. I'm unsatisfied with it at the moment. I don't think OMOV is the answer.

If the ECF insist on changing its collection from "per event" to "per head", then it should base voting rights on head count. You might ask each individual to nominate an organisation (or representative) to exercise a Council microvote on their behalf. Perhaps you might do one vote per organisation (as at present) and one vote for every hundred nominations. Maybe you give Bronze members one nomination, Silver two (so the second is a Congress), Gold three (the third is an International Congress or the 4NCL) and Platinum four (maybe the extra vote is for an individual with voting rights to match leagues and counties)

If this were proposed, I wouldn't be opposed to it, so long as the number was readily available in the grading database. Number of players in each membership category should be easy, and thus so would the "nominations" variable you speak of.

e2e4 and Golders Green are considered to be series of congresses. That's fine. But you'd have to do the headcount for each congress in the series, and then add them up, rather than just counting them as one congress. I don't see that as a problem.

You won't find any opposition from me on this one.

[Roger de Coverly]

Currently, direct members get 8 votes. I can't remember them ever being filled.
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The eight votes are a bit pointless because they are swamped even by the proxies from non-playing organisations. If the Direct Member reps had a hundred votes between them, there would be a bit more point in listening to their views and for individuals to contact them to ask them to support particular propositions.

[Roger de Coverly]

e2e4 and Golders Green are considered to be series of congresses. That's fine. But you'd have to do the headcount for each congress in the series, and then add them up, rather than just counting them as one congress. I don't see that as a problem.

That wasn't quite the proposal. Under per head schemes, the ECF doesn't receive any more money if one player plays in 10 Golders Green events or just one. So the idea is one micro vote per distinct individual. It's not exactly OMOV, but it's a way of redefining Council structure in the context of where the money is raised.

[Alex Holowczak]

e2e4 and Golders Green are considered to be series of congresses. That's fine. But you'd have to do the headcount for each congress in the series, and then add them up, rather than just counting them as one congress. I don't see that as a problem.

That wasn't quite the proposal. Under per head schemes, the ECF doesn't receive any more money if one player plays in 10 Golders Green events or just one. So the idea is one micro vote per distinct individual. It's not exactly OMOV, but it's a way of redefining Council structure in the context of where the money is raised.

Well, the congresses could just as easy call themselves different things and affiliate as separate entities, and claim one vote for everything. So you don't achieve anything by splitting them up. So you may as well keep them together.

[Ian Thompson]

Maybe I'm missing something, but its not clear to me why a league would want to become an MO. It seems to place obligations on the league with no obvious benefits.

Keeping £1 of a player's ECF membership fee is a not a benefit. The league could just as easily collect £1 (or any other amount) from its players separately from the ECF membership fee if it wanted to, most easily by asking clubs to make a single payment on behalf of all their players.

The league could also not rely on raising funds from collecting ECF membership fees as it wouldn't know how many players would join through it, as its players might join the ECF directly or through another organisation. So what's the benefit of becoming an MO?

The reason for a County or League to become a MO is to collect the membership fees from its members and therefore avoid the higher level of game fees which non-members attract when membership is less than 85%

Wouldn't it be much easier for the league to introduce a rule saying all players must be members, but if any non-member does play the club will have to pay the league £2 per game (regardless of percentages)? That puts the onus on clubs to make sure all their players are members and avoids the extra work and obligations on the league management committee that would arise if they were an MO.

[William Metcalfe]

All the Mos in the North east are compulsary membership and it has never caused any problems or lost leagues any players.
So Roger i have a idea for you if the majority is in favour of membership and we get blocked by the minority surely we should all just walk away from the ECF and let the minority keep its game fee.

[Roger de Coverly]

All the Mos in the North east are compulsary membership and it has never caused any problems or lost leagues any players.
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How would you know? As far as I can see, the Northern Leagues are struggling for members and teams.

So Roger i have a idea for you if the majority is in favour of membership and we get blocked by the minority surely we should all just walk away from the ECF and let the minority keep its game fee.

If you look at the full price ECF membership, isn't most of it in the South, Midlands and West? Locally the leagues have about 30% ECF membership already. Admittedly this is mostly to play in e2e4 and the 4NCL, but there is a choice. Out of the 12000 players on the published grading list, how many are in the North East?

If you play a lot of chess, paying per head can work out cheaper than paying per game. The problem is that the evidence of the published grading list is that the numbers who will pay a lower price are out-weighed by the numbers paying a higher price. That's at an individual level. The same has to be true if you aggregate by club or league. If you don't believe me, try this test. A club approaches a league and asks what the costs of taking part are. It also says that it has twice as many potential players as it will field in individual matches. What are the costs (a) under a per head scheme and (b) under a per game scheme?

The ECF CEO states above in the thread that it's not the intention of the proposals to make it compulsory to become an ECF member to play club chess. Do you agree or disagree with this statement?

[Alex Holowczak]

All the Mos in the North east are compulsary membership and it has never caused any problems or lost leagues any players.
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How would you know? As far as I can see, the Northern Leagues are struggling for members and teams.

He would know because he is from the North East, which is involved in an MO. That makes him far more likely to know what he's talking about on this issue than you.

The North has always had fewer players than the South. This is hardly some new revelation directly attributable to them being pro-Membership.

[Roger de Coverly]

He would know because he is from the North East, which is involved in an MO. That makes him far more likely to know what he's talking about on this issue than you.

By the same token, he has no knowledge of how Southern players react to universal/compulsory membership. We've rejected it often enough. If leagues in the North East want to collect payments for the ECF by head, I really don't object. I suspect it's a barrier to new players, but that's their problem. What I do object to is the attempt to force it by stealth or otherwise on the rest of the country.

[Alex Holowczak]

He would know because he is from the North East, which is involved in an MO. That makes him far more likely to know what he's talking about on this issue than you.

By the same token, he has no knowledge of how Southern players react to universal/compulsory membership. We've rejected it often enough. If leagues in the North East want to collect payments for the ECF by head, I really don't object. I suspect it's a barrier to new players, but that's their problem. What I do object to is the attempt to force it by stealth or otherwise on the rest of the country.

On the contrary. If they do so because the majority of Council said so, then that has to be accepted, just as it would with any other proposal.

[Roger de Coverly]

Wouldn't it be much easier for the league to introduce a rule saying all players must be members, but if any non-member does play the club will have to pay the league £2 per game (regardless of percentages)? That puts the onus on clubs to make sure all their players are members and avoids the extra work and obligations on the league management committee that would arise if they were an MO.

That's certainly a proposition. On balance, the likely effects of such a change would be to make clubs more cautious of entering additional teams and for club treasurers to nudge match captains towards defaults in the event of no ECF members being available to play. Neither of which is good for the health and growth of the league. But we know that anyway as a consequence of membership compulsion.

As worded, the three game non-member no charge concession seems to be per league (per competition per league possibly) and regardless of whether the player already has a grade. Some leeway there looks possible. Not that it helps for the fourth match.

[Sean Hewitt]

By the same token, he has no knowledge of how Southern players react to universal/compulsory membership. We've rejected it often enough.

Roger - I'm not sure who you refer to when talking broadly of 'Southern players' but didn't the SCCU vote in favour of membership at the AGM? Without the support of Southern bodies I doubt that the membership proposals would have much chance of success.

[Roger de Coverly]

Roger - I'm not sure who you refer to when talking broadly of 'Southern players' but didn't the SCCU vote in favour of membership at the AGM? Without the support of Southern bodies I doubt that the membership proposals would have much chance of success.

Berkshire (the adult association) and Oxfordshire are no longer part of the SCCU. Other leagues and counties in the Southern area are reported as being anti compulsory membership and anti per head funding. If the SCCU Exec support these, I would suggest they are out of touch with the sentiment of counties and leagues in the area.

Kent are mentioned in passing in this rant by you-know-who

http://stevegiddinschessblog.wordpress. ... e-british/

It was always reasonable to allow a draft individual membership scheme to be presented. Even Martin Regan should have been given a chance to flesh out his ideas, which I don't think were anything like the current plan. I think he wanted a membership cost of at least £ 20 for playing a league game or entering a Congress even with the DCMS grant still in place.

The current scheme, if you set aside neo-compulsion, and the near quadrupling of league Game Fee, is not so very different from what could have emerged from an Option 2 vote at the April Council and subsequent consultations. Congresses in particular can continue to run domestic events without having to insist on membership and, with the exception of Scottish players, the surcharge on entry fees of £ 6 (in practice less than that) for non-members and league only members has attracted little adverse comment.

[John Upham]

Berkshire are no longer part of the SCCU.

This is not correct. The Berkshire Junior Chess Association is. The BCA isn't, currently. BCA has recently endorsed its relationship with BJCA.

I thought you were a stickler for being factually correct?

I anticipate a reply arguing the status of the BJCA membership of the SCCU.

[Sean Hewitt]

Berkshire (the adult association) and Oxfordshire are no longer part of the SCCU. Other leagues and counties in the Southern area are reported as being anti compulsory membership and anti per head funding. If the SCCU Exec support these, I would suggest they are out of touch with the sentiment of counties and leagues in the area.

According to the SCCU website "The Executive decided, with 1 dissenting vote, that the Union would support further work on Membership-based funding." I would expect that they would ignore the views of non-member counties, but it's hard to believe that the executive would pursue a course fundamentally opposed by the majority (ie 50%) of their membership