30-03-2022, 03:09 PM
I've had a read through it and it seems motion itself deals with a very limited subset of the Chess Scotland membership. It does seem a bit overly complicated as I'm having to crisscross via various documents but this is basically how I've interpreted the current state of play.
1. This only applies to people who are likely to win the Scottish Championship or represent Scotland internationally. This means it probably hypothetically affects maybe 50 people max.
2. The "Operating Procedure Selection Criteria" references Section 16 of the constitution that currently doesn't exist. It seems that all the documents provided are proposed documents but the current rules/regulations aren't so it's hard to tell without trawling through a trove of additional documents. The background documents aren't clear as to what currently applies and what is a proposal.
3. From what I can understand under the current selection criteria Matt Turner would be theoretically eligible to play for Scotland. The only reason he hasn't is section 9 of "Operating Procedure Selection Criteria" that basically allows the selectors to make alterations at their discretion.
4. Any rules that require exceptions are usually badly drafted. I'm assuming it was intended to make it a Scotland Fide affiliation and then someone brought up Matthew Turner and that led to second motion. I don't know exact details but if AGM where he was granted SCO designation was unconditional then he can play as he's been grandfathered in and if it was conditional then those conditions in the earlier AGM vote would still apply.
I will however note that criteria are a bit arbitrary. For example with Country of Birth you get a lot of stories about people being born while their parents were on holiday or on a military base abroad thus gaining an extra nationality. If you're really unlucky it's USA in which case the US government hunts you down for taxes under FATCA as US nationals have to pay taxes even when not resident in USA. Another scenario you could get is that a player's parents immigrated to Scotland when they were 6 months old, they spend their entire youth in Scotland, then go to University in let's say Newcastle, start playing chess at university and would be ineligible for Scottish nationality as they're no longer resident in Scotland (i.e. not immediately prior) at the time of application and similarly would also fail to qualify for English nationality under the same criteria. Personally I'm OK with anyone who identifies as Scottish to represent Scotland but this doesn't really affect me much as I doubt I'll win the Scottish Championship or represent Scotland internationally with my current playing strength.
I'll also note that changing the Chess Scotland Constitution requires 2/3 of the membership to vote that seems to be a high threshold to reach. Wouldn't a better method be to rely on the existing constitution where you can find:
2.2.2. Organise an annual Congress for the Scottish Championship tournament and other such tournaments and championships as considered appropriate.
10.5.1. The Adult International Board will be chaired by the International Director and include representatives as detailed in the appropriate Operating Procedure.
So in that case all your need to do is modify the Operating Procedure that I'm assuming would require a simply majority vote at most to specify eligibility criteria. In the same way organising a tournament as "considered appropriate" would mean that eligibility criteria can be added if it's considered appropriate.
Having said all that I'm not too sure how I should vote as it's hard to judge pros and cons of both motions. It seems to affect a very small amount of people so I'd probably just default to following CS board recommendations. That's assuming I can find voting links that I haven't located...
1. This only applies to people who are likely to win the Scottish Championship or represent Scotland internationally. This means it probably hypothetically affects maybe 50 people max.
2. The "Operating Procedure Selection Criteria" references Section 16 of the constitution that currently doesn't exist. It seems that all the documents provided are proposed documents but the current rules/regulations aren't so it's hard to tell without trawling through a trove of additional documents. The background documents aren't clear as to what currently applies and what is a proposal.
3. From what I can understand under the current selection criteria Matt Turner would be theoretically eligible to play for Scotland. The only reason he hasn't is section 9 of "Operating Procedure Selection Criteria" that basically allows the selectors to make alterations at their discretion.
4. Any rules that require exceptions are usually badly drafted. I'm assuming it was intended to make it a Scotland Fide affiliation and then someone brought up Matthew Turner and that led to second motion. I don't know exact details but if AGM where he was granted SCO designation was unconditional then he can play as he's been grandfathered in and if it was conditional then those conditions in the earlier AGM vote would still apply.
I will however note that criteria are a bit arbitrary. For example with Country of Birth you get a lot of stories about people being born while their parents were on holiday or on a military base abroad thus gaining an extra nationality. If you're really unlucky it's USA in which case the US government hunts you down for taxes under FATCA as US nationals have to pay taxes even when not resident in USA. Another scenario you could get is that a player's parents immigrated to Scotland when they were 6 months old, they spend their entire youth in Scotland, then go to University in let's say Newcastle, start playing chess at university and would be ineligible for Scottish nationality as they're no longer resident in Scotland (i.e. not immediately prior) at the time of application and similarly would also fail to qualify for English nationality under the same criteria. Personally I'm OK with anyone who identifies as Scottish to represent Scotland but this doesn't really affect me much as I doubt I'll win the Scottish Championship or represent Scotland internationally with my current playing strength.
I'll also note that changing the Chess Scotland Constitution requires 2/3 of the membership to vote that seems to be a high threshold to reach. Wouldn't a better method be to rely on the existing constitution where you can find:
2.2.2. Organise an annual Congress for the Scottish Championship tournament and other such tournaments and championships as considered appropriate.
10.5.1. The Adult International Board will be chaired by the International Director and include representatives as detailed in the appropriate Operating Procedure.
So in that case all your need to do is modify the Operating Procedure that I'm assuming would require a simply majority vote at most to specify eligibility criteria. In the same way organising a tournament as "considered appropriate" would mean that eligibility criteria can be added if it's considered appropriate.
Having said all that I'm not too sure how I should vote as it's hard to judge pros and cons of both motions. It seems to affect a very small amount of people so I'd probably just default to following CS board recommendations. That's assuming I can find voting links that I haven't located...