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04/07/2024 YCA AGM 2024
The 2024 YCA AGM took place on 29/06/2024 at Sheffield Chess Centre, Coleford Rd, Darnall, Sheffield, S9 5NF, starting at 2.00 p.m. 19 people attended.
There had been disgruntlement from various directions resulting from events in the Yorkshire League in 2023-24 season and well as with the unprecedentedly last-minute arrangements for the meeting. In the event, a number of disgruntled parties happened not to be available for the date of the meeting. These absences meant things were not as “lively” as they might otherwise have been!
Minutes: Nothing of substance was raised. Some “matters arising” which might have been raised were answered under later headings.
Reports: Officials’ reports seem to have been held up by waiting for proposed rule changes being typed out as late as the evening of the Monday before the meeting, one even not being received by some until immediately after the meeting. Anyway, if anyone wishes to read the written reports, links to them are provided here:
Regarding the Accounts, the low level of detail as compared with what members have welcomed over the decades is missed by some. Conversation with the Treasurer confirmed it was not to his own liking!
Verbal reports from Match Captains contained much already covered in the “Events” column of this website, but to summarise, the Yorkshire Under-1650 team (captained by Jacob Smith) is still in the national championships, playing in the final on 6th July 2024; juniors were an important part of the U-1650 team; juniors in the Under-1450 team are improving fast.
NCCU/ECF Delegates’ reports contained little. There had been only one NCCU meeting (reported here) in the past year, but there were two ECF meetings (reported here (AGM), and here (Finance Meeting)). In connection with the ECF, the President commented that few Yorkshire-based congresses and local leagues were organisation members of the ECF and so missing out on voting rights (a subject perhaps to be expanded on at a later stage on this website). The Sheffield & DCA once applied but got no response, but maybe the administration has improved since then.
The Website Controller’s comments offered little hope of an improvement of standard of maintenance, or of anyone with more time to attend to it being found to take it over. As a side topic to the absence of some clubs’ details, in was mentioned that it would be better to include captains telephone numbers besides their e-mail addresses in the document sent out by the Competitions Controller with the Rules (not initially on the YCA website) and club venues and captain contact details. That document picks up a function of the discontinued hard-copy Year Book to which the present writer used to devote much time.
Presentation of Trophies: It was good to see that an effort had been made to gather together the trophies, including NCCU trophies won by Yorkshire, listing who got what I leave to the YCA Secretary and his minutes, but the special item of the Hardcastle Shield merits particular mention, it being not for playing chess but organising it. This year the Committee had picked as the winner Stephen Greep of Hull who some will know and some will not. I’m not going to give his c.v. here, but besides being instrumental in the past in converting Hull & East Riding CA (formerly Hull & DCA) into a charitable trust, also has fingers in pies in the ECF. He has been chair of the Awards Committee and is now Non-Executive Director (one of three) and is also the ECF’s Sport & Recreation Alliance representative.
Fees and Subscriptions: There had been an idea of not charging the £1 Affiliated Member Fee. The Constitution (4b) is intentionally worded so that this can be explicitly set at £0 if seen fit, without stopping people attending the AGM, but presumably it was envisaged that 4b would be revised. Anyway, nothing was none on that idea mentioned in the 2023 Minutes, apparently because this coming season was Stephen Burton’s last year as treasurer. (See below.) So, fees remain the same as before. (What they are was not actually stated at the meeting. They used to be published in the Year Book). Setting the amount of the Individual Membership fee (4c) seems to had been bypassed in recent years since both the Bulletin and the Year Book (free to Individual Members) are no longer produced. Attending the AGM and voting there seems the only remaining benefit to Individual Members (which is relevant if they are not Affiliated Members).
Format of the Yorkshire League: This can involve a fairly lengthy debate led by the Competitions Controller. In the event, a staffing emergency arose were the Controller works, and all leave was cancelled, as the saying goes. The Controller had submitted an addendum to his above report giving his plans and a statement of progress to date with work on the coming season’s arrangements. This was accepted.
Proposed Amendments (to the Rules): A document consisting of the existing League Rules with changes shown in Word’s change-tracking mode, completed just after 9 p.m. on the Monday before the meeting, representing proposed changes to the Rules agreed between the Competitions Controller and President, had been circulated by e-mail. The view was expressed that far too little notice had been given to clubs, and that this was not in line with the minimum 14 days’ notice required for the notification of the meeting. Actually, the constitution is vague as to what has to be contained in the “notice” of a meeting, but hitherto details of such proposals have been included in or with the Agenda which is expected to accompany the notice of the meeting. It was further pointed out that all such amendments had to be submitted to the Secretary by 30th of April prior to the meeting, which clearly the document referred to had not been. However, the (retiring) Deputy President said he had separately submitted the proposal to abolish Rule A30 (re mobile phones) within the required time, so that one part was put to the vote, but the remainder was to be made the subject of consultation with clubs during the coming season. So that saved more of the meeting’s time.
Voting on abolition of A30 was 9 for, 7 against, with 3 abstentions, so the proposal was passed, which throws the Yorkshire League under the full force of FIDE Laws of Chess. Under the old A30, the sounding of a phone was what triggered the rule being invoked. Under the unmitigated FIDE Laws, simply having a mobile phone (etc) on one’s person in the playing area is a breach of the Law. The Law provides for mitigation by provision of event rules allowing phones to be placed in bags (like the ones chess sets are often bagged up in). Since the proposed rule abolition was submitted without being bundled with a mitigating “bag rule”, as is so widely used in congresses, implications may be harsher than anticipated.
So, now, if a player enters the playing venue with a mobile phone on his person, whether it be switch on or switched off, then that player has violated 11.3.2 of the Laws, and (if detected) loses his game – even if it is before the start of playing their game, if late – but the Manual covers this! Effectively, this means people arriving by car need to leave their phones in their cars. For those arriving on foot, it is possibly expedient to leave their phones at home. Also, according to 11.2.3.2, while it’s your turn to move you may not leave the playing area (usually equates to room). Similarly, 11.2.3.1 implies going out into the car park to smoke would constitutes leaving the playing venue (as you are getting unsupervised access to your phone in your car).
Having a mobile phone on one’s person is not seen simply as an offence against the current opponent, as it could have been used to cheat against an earlier opponent or be later used to cheat against a later opponent. Thus, the opponent does not have the right to wave the penalisation of the person with the mobile phone.
The Laws are of course designed for top-level chess events with money at stake, supervised by appointed arbiters (not just anyone with some sort of arbiter qualifications who happens to be around). Over the years there has been guidance offered regarding who may act in lieu of the “arbiter” in the Laws. Things have progressed in professional chess to the level where such considerations largely fall out of consideration. Captains might agree that Dr. Fred Bloggs may have his phone on his person and have it switched on because he is “on call”, but in the Laws this is really a matter for the non-existent arbiter. The word “captain” does not appear in the Laws of Chess!
I’d suggest it would be expedient for the Competitions Controller to agree, with captains, guidelines or a “bag rule” to be in force as though it were a Rule.
Logically, there should also be provision allowing players to remain in the playing area after they have finished their game, otherwise 11.2.3.3 would require them to leave. (Under 11.4, once a player has finished his game, he becomes a “spectator” rather than a “player”.) This illustrates how in practice amateur chess routinely ignores such Laws of Chess without them specifically being overridden by “local” rules. To do the job properly, “local” rules would need to adopt a complete replacement for the whole of Article 11 or specific parts thereof.
Thus, in accordance with Rule 20, the now-abolished Rule A30 could have been replaced with something like, “Article 11.2 of the Laws of Chess (Playing venue and playing area) shall not apply. Article 11.3 of the Laws of Chess (Notes and electronic devices) shall not apply but instead the following shall apply.” The Rule would then continue with what was wanted to replace 11.3. (See below for suggestion.)
For reference, the whole of 11.2, 11.3 and 11.4 is shown below. Note the difference between “playing venue” and “playing area”, also the ubiquity of references to the (appointed) arbiter. See the FIDE Handbook at https://handbook.fide.com/chapter/E012023. For important elucidation of these Laws, it would also be expedient to consult the FIDE Arbiters’ Manual (page 35 et seq.) at https://www.englishchess.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/202210_FIDE_Arbiters_Manual.pdf.
The Congress to Host the Yorkshire Individual Championship for 2024 was decided should be Sheffield Congress, with the Yorkshire FIDE-Rated congress taking the function in 2025.
Election of Officers: The existing Officers were re-elected except for Steve Westmoreland who is cutting back on duties. He was replaced by Jonathan Arnott of Sheffield. It should be noted that Stephen Burton is continuing for one more season only, due to increasing responsibilities at home. 2024-25 will be Stephen’s 34th season in the post! This list thus is:
Election of County Captains:
Other Appointments: Delegates to NCCU (2) – Rupert Jones and Steve Mann Delegate to ECF (1) – Steve Westmoreland with Steve Mann as deputy Website Manager – Andrew Wainwright Auditor – Simon Watson Honorary Life Members – no new one elected
A. o. B: A sub-committee of five people had been appointed in connection with grass-root development funding believed to be available originally from government. Organisers of the Yorkshire Rapidplay which represented a re-badging of what had been the British (Individual) Rapidplay, of which ownership had been reclaimed by the ECF, are having to discontinue due to ill-health of some involved. The venue of the next AGM was fixed as Hull, which last hosted the AGM in 2018.
Geoff Brown of Sheffield drew attention to entry forms he had brought along for the Darnall & Handsworth (Sheffield) Rapidplay on 31/08/2024.
Illustrative suggestion for what could have replaced Rule A30
Here, the part headed “1 Notes, Advice and Analysis” is simply reproduced from the present FIDE Article 11.3.1, while the part headed “2 Electronic Devices” is a “bag rule” alternative to FIDE Article 11.3.2 (as permitted by 11.3.2.1).
At the same time this negates the strictures of Article 11.2, which led to a player (on board 13!) being defaulted by the arbiter at move 10 during the recent Northumberland v Surrey county team championship Open final.
The effect is also to remove the need to ask in this context which FIDE Laws apply and which are being ignored by unstated convention. At the same time, it avoids the question as to who is to act as “the arbiter” when mentioned in the above parts of the Laws which are not being ignored by unstated convention, such as FIDE Article 11.2.3.2 which requires a player whose turn it is to move to get the arbiter’s permission to go to the toilet, as this is outside the playing are, albeit inside the playing venue! (The opponent is not so restricted.) Instead, some trust is placed in those venturing to the toilets or out into the car park.
FIDE 11.3.4 is currently implicitly overridden by YCA Rule A29. Abolition of A29 would activate FIDE 11.3.4 with its reference to “the section of the venue designated by the arbiter”, potentially leading to disputes regarding smoking and requiring a mitigating “local” rule.
FIDE 11.4 would remain in force alongside the above A30, as the distinction between “player” and “spectator” is invoked by Article 12.7.
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