Motions

Debate directly related to English Chess Federation matters.
Andrew Zigmond
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Re: Motions

Post by Andrew Zigmond » Fri Aug 18, 2017 7:18 pm

John Reyes wrote:All I want is that how did they made that decision and also how they will tight up the eligibility
and for the ecf to answer alan question in public!!

they no point of bringing this as a motion to the meeting as it will not been heard till april meeting as least
As I have said more than once already; you can tighten up eligibility rules as much as you like but if the eligibility or not of an individual player lies in the interpretation of legal documents dating back forty years then you still have that problem.

I have also said more than once that Alex Holowczak (already one of the busiest men in chess - if I tried to keep up with his work rate I'd probably collapse from nervous exhaustion, but that's an aside) has spent considerable time this year collating a bale of papers relating to this dispute. I am sure he could arrange for at least some of these papers to be released providing they are not deemed confidential; at which point interested parties could examine them. You state yourself that he answered your question on request. I see no reason why he should feel obliged to post on an official forum and face mob justice, as you seem to be suggesting.

Finally you might want to consider that with no controller there is no county championships at all. The new controller is one of the rising stars of chess administration and will do a great job (and certainly a better one than the slightly plodding current controller has done) but I rather hope he is not reading this thread.
Controller - Yorkshire League
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Nick Grey
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Re: Motions

Post by Nick Grey » Fri Aug 18, 2017 7:39 pm

Perhaps a few organisations need to bring a motion and ECF need to consider. If only for the health of it's competition.

I know that if our county joined another union we would lose players on travelling distances for matches.

Eligibility - ought to be defined but allow for counties not entering teams in competitions - may get more players if allowed to play for a near neighbour. Whether they want to is something else.

Something fundamentally wrong if the County itself cannot get match captains and therefore has a president stepping in.

Alan Walton
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Re: Motions

Post by Alan Walton » Fri Aug 18, 2017 7:45 pm

A controversial thought, get rid of the unions and make it a proper competition from day 1

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IM Jack Rudd
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Re: Motions

Post by IM Jack Rudd » Fri Aug 18, 2017 7:47 pm

It's usually not difficult to make yourself eligible for a near neighbour if you really want to.

Alan Walton
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Re: Motions

Post by Alan Walton » Fri Aug 18, 2017 8:15 pm

IM Jack Rudd wrote:It's usually not difficult to make yourself eligible for a near neighbour if you really want to.
Exactly, just certain people in Lancashire don't think greater Manchester exists, we need the ECF to man up a bit

Andrew Zigmond
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Re: Motions

Post by Andrew Zigmond » Fri Aug 18, 2017 8:30 pm

Alan Walton wrote:A controversial thought, get rid of the unions and make it a proper competition from day 1
There was a consultation about doing just this a couple of year. It was discussed in this thread here http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=7340 although so[me material including the responses from Alex and myself had to be posted on the official ECF forum of the time which has since been removed. There was a strong consensus against the idea, particularly from the Southern counties who didn't want the prestige of their internal qualifying championship diminished.
Alan Walton wrote:
IM Jack Rudd wrote:It's usually not difficult to make yourself eligible for a near neighbour if you really want to.
Exactly, just certain people in Lancashire don't think greater Manchester exists, we need the ECF to man up a bit
I have already stated that Alex compiled a bale of documents and consulted two great servants of the Federation before forming an opinion. Have you contacted him directly to ask whether any of these documents and the correspondence can be released (I suspect not)? There may have been documents Alex was not aware of but he can only make a decision on the information before him. In any case Alex has already earned himself a reputation as somebody who is never shy to enforce a rule if need be. `Man up,` is not helpful.
Last edited by Andrew Zigmond on Fri Aug 18, 2017 11:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Roger de Coverly
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Re: Motions

Post by Roger de Coverly » Fri Aug 18, 2017 10:55 pm

IM Jack Rudd wrote:It's usually not difficult to make yourself eligible for a near neighbour if you really want to.
The simplest rule is that which most other "sports" have evolved to, namely that you declare your squad at the start of the season or at an interim transfer deadline.

Alan Walton
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Re: Motions

Post by Alan Walton » Sat Aug 19, 2017 9:20 am

Andrew Zigmond wrote:
Alan Walton wrote:A controversial thought, get rid of the unions and make it a proper competition from day 1
There was a consultation about doing just this a couple of year. It was discussed in this thread here http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=7340 although so[me material including the responses from Alex and myself had to be posted on the official ECF forum of the time which has since been removed. There was a strong consensus against the idea, particularly from the Southern counties who didn't want the prestige of their internal qualifying championship diminished.
Alan Walton wrote:
IM Jack Rudd wrote:It's usually not difficult to make yourself eligible for a near neighbour if you really want to.
Exactly, just certain people in Lancashire don't think greater Manchester exists, we need the ECF to man up a bit
I have already stated that Alex compiled a bale of documents and consulted two great servants of the Federation before forming an opinion. Have you contacted him directly to ask whether any of these documents and the correspondence can be released (I suspect not)? There may have been documents Alex was not aware of but he can only make a decision on the information before him. In any case Alex has already earned himself a reputation as somebody who is never shy to enforce a rule if need be. `Man up,` is not helpful.
We sent these documents to Alex over about a month ago, and still not heard anything back; as these documents show that the BCF settled the case with those criteria I am expecting the BCF to have all documentation (especially since it was in relation to a court case)

The ECF have rules for a competition, these don't say anything about dual eligibility therefore he should really have not approved these players to participate; legal documents or not if this is an official rule for Greater Manchester it should be distinctly written into the rule

Michael Flatt
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Re: Motions

Post by Michael Flatt » Sat Aug 19, 2017 11:03 am

Alan Walton wrote:We sent these documents to Alex over about a month ago, and still not heard anything back; as these documents show that the BCF settled the case with those criteria I am expecting the BCF to have all documentation (especially since it was in relation to a court case)

The ECF have rules for a competition, these don't say anything about dual eligibility therefore he should really have not approved these players to participate; legal documents or not if this is an official rule for Greater Manchester it should be distinctly written into the rule
I think that this is barking up the wrong tree.

My reading of the situation is that Manchester Chess Federation (founded 1890 according to their own website, http://www.manchesterchess.co.uk/) have for some time been seeking admission to the Northern Counties Chess Union and the NCCU County Championship, but have been consistently denied.

Although admission to the NCCU is a matter for the NCCU membership in accordance with their constitution, the ECF do allocate two places to each of the Chess Unions for National (ECF) County Championship. Thus, it should be possible to approach the ECF and enquire why a long established county association is being denied entry to the qualifying competition of the National Championship.

It is within the ECF's gift to offer a wild card entry to their own competition where a county is being denied entry through the normal route.
ECF website wrote:The English Chess Federation (ECF) is the governing chess organisation in England and is affiliated to FIDE (the Fédération Internationale des Échecs)"
As the "governing chess organisation" the ECF have a responsibility to resolve matters such as this, especially where it relates to entry to the qualifying and final stages of its own competition, the ECF County Championship.

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Michael Farthing
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Re: Motions

Post by Michael Farthing » Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:03 pm

There is only one answer that the ECF could give to this which is to point out that Manchester is a member of the MCCU.

MartinCarpenter
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Re: Motions

Post by MartinCarpenter » Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:21 pm

Anyway, it isn't the qualifying matches they're after. Its rather more the potential matches vs Lancashire & Yorkshire.

Which we could of course play as 'friendlies' independently of the county competition.

Alan Walton
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Re: Motions

Post by Alan Walton » Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:39 pm

Michael Farthing wrote:There is only one answer that the ECF could give to this which is to point out that Manchester is a member of the MCCU.
This is nothing to do with where we play, it's about who's eligible to play

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Michael Farthing
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Re: Motions

Post by Michael Farthing » Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:59 pm

Alan Walton wrote:
Michael Farthing wrote:There is only one answer that the ECF could give to this which is to point out that Manchester is a member of the MCCU.
This is nothing to do with where we play, it's about who's eligible to play
My point was in response to a particular comment by Michael Flatt.

Michael Flatt
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Re: Motions

Post by Michael Flatt » Sat Aug 19, 2017 3:59 pm

Michael Farthing wrote:There is only one answer that the ECF could give to this which is to point out that Manchester is a member of the MCCU.
Does that necessarily prohibit them from also playing in the NCCU?

All Chess Unions seem to include a statement in their constitution about wishing to promote the playing of chess, as does the ECF.

Michael Flatt
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Re: Motions

Post by Michael Flatt » Sat Aug 19, 2017 4:47 pm

Alan Walton wrote:
Michael Farthing wrote:There is only one answer that the ECF could give to this which is to point out that Manchester is a member of the MCCU.
This is nothing to do with where we play, it's about who's eligible to play
It makes no sense to question the eligibility of players of another county's team unless your own team is disadvantaged by not having those players available to your own county's team in the same competition.

In any case, the players as individuals can exercise choice about the team they wish to support.

I think the argument has come full circle so I will stop here.

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