Eligibility Votes - March 2022

[Douglas Bryson]

I had not appreciated MT had been awarded SCO registration despite not meeting the national body's eligibility criteria. 

The allocation of the SCO registration in 2011 was made in the full knowledge it did not meet the published criteria. Those who encouraged the presentation of the transfer request were initially trying to assist a player who was at risk of being FIDE deregistered by England. There was also the belief that there would be a subsequent grandfather vote which would mean a full meeting of the CS criteria. CS officials may not have appreciated at the time the consequences of what they were proposing. 

However MT has at no time been pushing for international places or championship titles and had asked simply if he could be Scotland registered to continue being able to play FIDE rated events. The outcome of the 2019 Championship which included a share of the title has provoked the requirement to revisit the issue.

If members vote Yes they agree with the proposal then Matthew Turner will then have the same
rights as any other SCO badged player from the date of the completion of this vote.

If members vote No they disagree then Matthew Turner would retain his Scotland registration but
would only qualify for full SCO rights if he completed a two year period of residency.

[Willie Rutherford]

Very helpful post from DMB. I had not appreciated MT had been awarded SCO registration despite not meeting the national body's eligibility criteria. Of course, SCO membership, eligibility to represent Scotland and eligibility to compete for the Scottish championship should all be one and the same thing. If MT does not meet the criteria and if the membership prefer not to change the criteria, I would suggest MT must reconsider his position and reaffiliate with a country for which he is eligible. Given CS were in error allowing him to affiliate here in the first place, I would support CS covering his registration fees to whichever national body he chooses.

Likewise (I think) I understand it better now. Given the past "cock up" the options seem to be
1) Cancel MT's SCO registration, which may or may not be possible and also may leave him "stateless". I am not sure what the implications of that are, but probably not good for MT, who appears to have done nothing wrong.
2) Leave the status quo, unsatisfactory as it may be.
3) Adopt Proposal 2 and exceptionally give MT full eligibility. The only reason for this seems to be the past "cock up" which doesn't seem a good reason to me, compounding an error.

So I agree with George that 2) is probably best but CS should assist MT should he choose to switch to another federation. So I will vote against Proposal 2.

Typical of IM Bryson to come up with a move order finesse but yes maybe that does work.  

I also agree with Walter that the criteria themselves should probably be voted on, but it seems from DB's reply that has been done before. The option is always open for a counter proposal I suppose.

[WBuchanan]

This item of the MT vote wasn't on the 2011 Agenda, it was raised under AOCB. As it affects all members, this was surely not a competent vote.

Douglas Bryson: "The allocation of the SCO registration in 2011 was made in the full knowledge it did not meet the published criteria. Those who encouraged the presentation of the transfer request were initially trying to assist a player who was at risk of being FIDE deregistered by England. There was also the belief that there would be a subsequent grandfather vote which would mean a full meeting of the CS criteria. CS officials may not have appreciated at the time the consequences of what they were proposing."

Can I suggest these statements are too contradictory to be applied to indviduals.

The official who indicated his intention to move a grandparent vote (in 3 months time at an EGM that was expected to take place over another issue, I think it didn't happen) also then moved the motion to 'process the transfer'. This was to save MT from being left stateless for 3 months.
So one official at least intended, in a two-move combination, (despite not being an IM ) to make MT eligible despite his not currently meeting any criteria.
Surely we can also take it that others in management knew of the idea. Douglas, you wouldn't have missed the two-mover!?

The last part being pushed as a humanitarian option no doubt moved some of the members present. They were saving MT from being left stateless. It would have been all over in a minute.

In answer to Willie's final point, the eligibility criteria haven't really been put to the membership. They sort of were in 2015 - it was at the SGM about the new Constitution. It was Andy Howie's chance to star like Peter Snow on election night special, and I remember we were getting updates from his laptop. As a result we all knew that Section 16 was heading for defeat but it was controversially pulled from the Constitution. There...might have been legit reasons for that, I remember concerns that the whole Constitution would fail. Anyway, it was remitted to a working party.
The proposals in that Section 16 were a bit like Motion 1 and 2 together. There was a clause about SCO code giving all eligibility, and another adding a grandparent criterion. A third criterion was about residency for two years immediately prior to the competition. You just needed to meet one of those criteria, so long as you were a CS member.

Later at the 2015 AGM I tabled a motion asking members if they wanted to include the grandparent criterion and it was rejected.

Cheers

[Jim Webster]

Nauseated and Disgusted

 
Quote – George Neave – 28th March 2022
I would suggest MT must reconsider his position and reaffiliate with a country for which he is eligible. Given CS were in error allowing him to affiliate here in the first place, I would support CS covering his registration fees to whichever national body he chooses.
 
This is totally unacceptable – this then sets a precedent which I for one will not have any part off. No matter what – this is I my opinion immoral, unethical and simply wrong.
I looks to me that you have simply a basic case of personal vendetta – this is why we will let the membership decide

What happens, if future days, when one or two other individuals then decide to “kick” another Transfer from SCO out of our federation on some pretext or other. 
I will not allow, nor accept, ANYONE to transfer out of Chess Scotland for the simply for convenience of a few.
 
Quote – Willie Rutherford – 28th March 2022
1) Cancel MT's SCO registration, which may or may not be possible and also may leave him "stateless". I am not sure what the implications of that are, but probably not good for MT, who appears to have done nothing wrong.
 
I will not even support this concept – the idea of leaving anyone stateless in totally unacceptable simply for convenience – Once again it for the membership to decide via the ballot.[/font]

[Alex McFarlane]

I agree that it is morally wrong to deprive Matthew of his SCO status simply because we got it wrong in the first place.  An AGM accepted him.  Once accepted, unless he does something wrong, then that is the only position that should be adopted.

I am slightly concerned with the impression given by the phrase that he was about to be 'deregistered by England'.  Whilst this is strictly speaking true (and several English players were 'deregistered'), if my memory is correct, the reason for the deregistration was that they had refused to renew their ECF membership at a significantly high level.  Both England and India used this as a method of punishing players who did not take out the required membership.  FIDE now charges federations which adopt this method of gaining enhanced memberships.  If there was another reason for the threatened deregistration I apologise.
(The ECF Director who introduced this 'system' failed to be re-elected.)

If a motion was passed to compensate Matthew this could be quite expensive. There is an annual fee for those registered as FID in the normal way. A FID player does not provide alternative nationalities for title norm events. This would deprive Matt of invitations to such norm events.

[Willie Rutherford]

I didn't advocate my option 1 ("kick him out"), but option 2, the status quo, with some support for MT should he decide he would prefer to transfer (provided any support isn't prohibitive cost-wise, as per Alex' point).

Not sure why the language has suddenly become heated. I thought it had been a reasonable discussion up to now, and certainly clarified the situation for me. It's a pity it has descended into an emotional personal attack. Not the best way to encourage transparency and discussion. Can't engage with that.

[andybburnett]

I didn't advocate my option 1 ("kick him out"), but option 2, the status quo, with some support for MT should he decide he would prefer to transfer (provided any support isn't prohibitive cost-wise, as per Alex' point).

Not sure why the language has suddenly become heated. I thought it had been a reasonable discussion up to now, and certainly clarified the situation for me. It's a pity it has descended into an emotional personal attack. Not the best way to encourage transparency and discussion. Can't engage with that.

I have to agree with Willie here re: the reasonable discussion. I fear someone may have misinterpreted what was actually being said, so the personal stuff isn't called for. I could be wrong though, so maybe we should have a vote on it...  (De-escalation through humour, Psychology 101)

[Matthew Turner]

Hopefully, this might add some context which I hope will address what I think are some misconceptions.

Imagine that, in 2011, I was a new player to tournament chess. When I entered my first (FIDE) tournament I could put my nationality as SCO, ENG, or any other nationality for that matter, and that would become my FIDE code. There were no status requirements.

Back in 2011, I wanted to transfer my FIDE code to SCO. Whilst I appreciate that I was an unusual case in a number of respects, I don't believe that I was asking for special treatment, on the contrary I believe the vote in 2011 just confirmed my right to be treated the same way as everyone else.

[andybburnett]

Hopefully, this might add some context which I hope will address what I think are some misconceptions.

Imagine that, in 2011, I was a new player to tournament chess.  When I entered my first (FIDE) tournament I could put my nationality as SCO, ENG, or any other nationality for that matter, and that would become my FIDE code.  There were no status requirements.

Back in 2011, I wanted to transfer my FIDE code to SCO.  Whilst I appreciate that I was an unusual case in a number of respects, I don't believe that I was asking for special treatment, on the contrary I believe the vote in 2011 just confirmed my right to be treated the same way as everyone else.

Hi Matt,

Are you saying that in 2011 there was no FIDE rule governing registration? Here's the current one (afaik)

1.7
A player may be registered under a Federation if he or she has citizenship, naturalization or residency in the country of that Federation.

[Matthew Turner]

Hopefully, this might add some context which I hope will address what I think are some misconceptions.

Imagine that, in 2011, I was a new player to tournament chess.  When I entered my first (FIDE) tournament I could put my nationality as SCO, ENG, or any other nationality for that matter, and that would become my FIDE code.  There were no status requirements.

Back in 2011, I wanted to transfer my FIDE code to SCO.  Whilst I appreciate that I was an unusual case in a number of respects, I don't believe that I was asking for special treatment, on the contrary I believe the vote in 2011 just confirmed my right to be treated the same way as everyone else.

Hi Matt,

Are you saying that in 2011 there was no FIDE rule governing registration? Here's the current one (afaik)

1.7
A player may be registered under a Federation if he or she has citizenship, naturalization or residency in the country of that Federation.

I don't know, if was certainly not enforced.  This created problems when players competed in their first tournament abroad and were automatically registered with the country the event was played in.  I know things have changed somewhat with players having to now request PINs from the national FIDE rating officer.  Quite what this means in practice for CS or SCO registration, I don't know.

There is of course an additional problem because what does Scottish 'citizenship' mean?