English Chess Forum

Neill Cooper wrote:Lots of interesting comments from both sides of the argument since I last posted. I think that there at least 5 issues, and it would be best if they became separate discussions:

5) How the ECF make decisions

To kick this off, it was completely wrong for the Board to make a contentious decision, as evidenced by the other thread, and then not mention it at all at or before the Council meeting.

It could have made an announcement of its policy change or brought it up as a point of relevance to the discussion on exemptions. As it was the first knowledge of the change came from Neill's resignation and the belated publication of the March Board minutes.

It doesn't seem to matter who is on the Board. They, or an individual Board member, take a decision which will be contentious if made public and then try to keep quiet about it.

Roger de Coverly wrote:They, or an individual Board member, take a decision which will be contentious if made public and then try to keep quiet about it.

If you really think that the Board was trying to keep it quiet, they didn't do a very good job

Roger de Coverly wrote: As it was the first knowledge of the change came from Neill's resignation and the belated publication of the March Board minutes.

Sean Hewitt wrote:If you really think that the Board was trying to keep it quiet, they didn't do a very good job

On the contrary they did a very good job of ensuring that the topic was not discussed either at the April Council meeting or on the forum before the meeting. I presumed that was the point of delaying the release of the Board minutes , or not drawing attention to them until after the April meeting. I agree it's not quite in the same league as keeping quiet about the CAS action not just for one Council meeting, but also the next one, six months later.

I would have thought it a precaution for every voting member to ask the ECF Board what had been decided but they hadn't been told about it, as it might influence votes or discussions. No wonder there's a traditional lack of trust between Board and voting members.

Roger de Coverly wrote:On the contrary they did a very good job of ensuring that the topic was not discussed either at the April Council meeting or on the forum before the meeting.

I've been led to understand that the junior team were fully aware of the Board decision (having been briefed by the Junior Director) prior to the Council meeting.

Roger de Coverly wrote:I presumed that was the point of delaying the release of the Board minutes , or not drawing attention to them until after the April meeting.

The minutes are approved at the next board meeting after which they get published. On this occasion, the next board meeting was on the morning of Council. It would be naive in the extreme to employ the kind of delaying tactics that you describe.

Sean Hewitt wrote:[On this occasion, the next board meeting was on the morning of Council.

The practical effect is to deny the Council meeting knowledge of decisions reached at the March board meeting. Whilst convenient for the Board to run itself in that way, it denies the Council meeting the opportunity to review and challenge the Board on recent decisions. In particular, Council might have wished to consider why, if it was right to exempt 4NCL wildcard players from membership requirements, a similar concession was not on offer to players in the National Schools.

To suppose that the ECF Board is engaging in Machiavellian practices is very unfair. They are two directors short. This is putting the Board under considerable strain.
When I was chairman of the BCF, DRAFT minutes were published as soon as possible. They were published with the waiver that they might not be accurate. That was before the days of the ECF website. This could be done nowadays, but possibly the Board feels that would be too dangerous.
The Board also considers matters that are confidential from time to time.

Tucked away on the ECF website (no actual announcement) is news of the appointment of Dave Thomas as Director of Membership and Marketing.

Thanks to Dave for taking on this challenging role. Good luck to him.

In the post above, Stewart Reuben attributes the Board's secretive nature to there only being eight Directors. We can but hope for an improvement now there are nine.

Edit: An announcement has now appeared.

David Sedgwick wrote:Tucked away on the ECF website (no actual announcement) is news of the appointment of Dave Thomas as Director of Membership and Marketing.

Thanks to Dave for taking on this challenging role. Good luck to him.

In the post above, Stewart Reuben attributes the Board's secretive nature to there only being eight Directors. We can but hope for an improvement now there are nine.

Edit: An announcement has now appeared.

Dave Thomas, the arbiter, with the circuit board clipboard?

I'll answer my own question: yes, it is. (He now has a picture on the ECF website.)

Angus French wrote: the arbiter,

I'd suspect a record for the number of arbiters on the ECF Board. It would be easier to count the non-arbiters, which I make two, three if you include Nigel as an elected but non-Board position.

Roger de Coverly wrote:I'd suspect a record for the number of arbiters on the ECF Board. It would be easier to count the non-arbiters, which I make two, three if you include Nigel as an elected but non-Board position.

Isn't it 6 - 3? I don't think any of Phil Ehr, Chris Mattos and David Openshaw are arbiters.

Stewart Reuben wrote: The Board also considers matters that are confidential from time to time.

Who decides if it should be confidential and are minutes kept of any confidential meeting?

Peter D Williams wrote:

Stewart Reuben wrote: The Board also considers matters that are confidential from time to time.

Who decides if it should be confidential and are minutes kept of any confidential meeting?

That's confidential.

Sean Hewitt wrote:That's confidential.

A key test of that was the decision to authorise the CAS action in the ECF's name using Kasparov's lawyers and financing . Although it can be accepted that this was a decision approved by a majority of the whole board rather than the President acting on his own, reports of the Board meetings of around that time are as silent on the issue as if a super-injunction had been placed on even mentioning it.

Roger de Coverly wrote:
A key test of that was the decision to authorise the CAS action in the ECF's name using Kasparov's lawyers and financing . Although it can be accepted that this was a decision approved by a majority of the whole board rather than the President acting on his own, reports of the Board meetings of around that time are as silent on the issue as if a super-injunction had been placed on even mentioning it.

Was no minutes of the board meeting kept about this decision?

Peter D Williams wrote: Was no minutes of the board meeting kept about this decision?

That is unknown as far as publicly released. All that is known is that the published extracts or summaries from minutes of meetings at around the relevant time don't mention the issue, let alone the decision.