Sports England National Governing Bodies and Its Guidelines - Essay Example

National Governing Bodies and Guidelines of Sports England: A Report 0 Introduction: Sport England which was formerly known as the English Sports Council is the governing body that is responsible for the distribution of funds for all kinds of sporting activity in England. It also has the additional responsibility of providing strategic guidance to the sports clubs and other sports organizations. In the year 2003 Sports England identified thirty priority sports based on their capacity to contribute to Sport England's main objective of making England an active and successful sporting nation. Sport England is now working with these National Governing Bodies of these selected sports to promote their activities directed towards implementation of different sports plans. In order to eliminate the inequalities that exist within the sport traditionally Sport England has brought out the Equity Guidelines for the governing bodies which contains, apart from a five stage inclusion plan, specific advices on race, disability and gender to the effect that sports activities should be extended to all the people without any discrimination. The guidelines also deal with the provision of opportunities for ethnic minority communities, disabled people and women in sports activities. This paper envisages bringing out a report as to whether the National Governing Bodies formulated by the Sport England are following the equity guidelines prescribed by the parent body in the promotion of sports activities, specifically the National Governing Body covering the sport of Football (Soccer). 2.0 Sports Equity Policies: It is an established principle that all the governing bodies have ethical, moral and business responsibility to plan and provide equal opportunities to a wider range of participants. Keeping this idea in view Sport England has issued guidelines governing the sports equity to be followed by the governing bodies. According to Sport England Equity guidelines for governing bodies "'Sports equity' is about fairness in sport, equality of access, recognizing inequalities and taking steps to address them. It is about changing the culture and structure of sport to ensure that it becomes equally accessible to all members of society, whatever their age, ability, gender, and aspirations of all the different priority groups." As distinct from the 'equal opportunities' 'Sports Equity' covers a wide range of activities and issues connected with sports like participation and membership, service delivery, selection of voluntary committees and appointment of voluntary coaches. Sports Equity principles provide a number of benefits to the society in general. The Sport England Equity guidelines detail some of these benefits which are: Fair and effective employment practices to all segments of the society Enhancement in the revenue by increase in the number of members Provision of services to the needy customers and members Availability of an enlarged forum of professional assistance from able administrators, leaders. Coaches and managers Improved public image as a professionally organized and forward thinking organization Increasing the representation of all communities in the various positions of committees, volunteers, staff, management and executives 3.0 National Governing Bodies: As per the definition provided by Deloitte & Touche - Investing in Change p9 a National Governing Body is the one which carries out most if not all of the following functions: Sets out and implements the strategic vision and direction for the sport; Promotes the sport; Manages the rules and regulation of the sport, including anti-doping procedures; Manages the sports officials; Establishes and maintains links with the sports' international representative; Encourages participation; Develops talent, including elite athletes; and Organises and hosts competitions. 4.0 Stages to the Planning Process for inclusion of Equity Guidelines: In order that the Sports Equity Policies are effectively implemented the Sport England organization has prescribed five stages to be reckoned as essential parts of the process for inclusion of the sports equity guidelines by the National Governing Bodies. These Stages according to the Sport England Guidelines are: Stage 1: Demonstrating commitment - the statement Stage 2: Audit and information gathering Stage 3: Consultation Stage 4: Policy development and action planning Stage 5: Implementing the action plan, monitoring and evaluation. The first stage demands the demonstration by the governing body of its commitment to sports equity. This can be achieved by the governing body concerned by producing and publicizing a statement upon which the body's future plan will be based. This statement should exhibit the intent and the commitment of the senior representatives from the body to the sport equity policy. Apart from producing a statement the governing body should take other steps for implementing the policy measures like allocating resources, drawing up action plans, conducing workshops and organize a working party by including the representative of minority groups Audit and information gathering relates to the collection of accurate information to establish a database for planning the actions, monitoring and evaluation and also to get periodical advise on the progress of the action plans. The Third stage is the consultation process in which the governing body prepares a list of its current policies, conducts an analysis of the financial information to find out the adequacy of the resources and the effective use thereof and identifies the current polices to distinguish between good and bad polices for improving upon the bad ones. For this purpose the governing body should organize meetings and hold consultative discussions with member organizations, administrators, coaches, athletes, officials, major sponsors and others connected with the sports activity for which the governing body is responsible. Having ascertained the current position with regard to the implementation of the equity policy the next logical step for the governing body is to produce an equity policy supported up by a well defined and appropriate action plan which addresses the areas of specific need within the organization. This action plan should encompass the short and long-term goals, targets that have set as a result of the audit and consultation processes under stage two and three. The final stage is the implementation, monitoring and evaluation which ensure the success of the implementation of the sports equity policy by the governing bodies. This stage involves the following actions by the governing body concerned: Identifying and monitoring the evaluation methods Evaluating the data collected Monitoring the organizational procedures Conducting regular monitoring of progress Holding discussions about people's views on the success implementation of the plan. (Sport England Equity Guidelines) 5.0 Football Association and its adaptation to the Sport Equity Policy: The scope of the Football Association in adopting and implementing the Sports Equity polices is evidenced by the following actions in the different stages of the policy guidelines from Sport England. The key issue is that The FA is committed to implementing the strategy and is taking the lead in driving this area of work across football. The first stage of the guideline relating to the Sports Equity Policy is met by the following policy statement comprising of few key phrases: Fairness and respect for all people Equality of access and opportunity Recognising that inequalities exist and taking practical steps to address them Football needs to ensure it is equally accessible to all members of society and is encapsulated by the slogan "Football For All." Being a well established governing body the football association has a system of collecting all information and data relating to the activities of the association in implementing the sports equity policies. With the back up of the organized set up of the association the equity policies are well extended to cover the racial equalities and disability football. There is the additional initiative taken by the association in including the women's football. These are the key areas where the association is concentrating to spread the sports equity policies. With the publications like 'Football for All' -The guide, and video presentations like Football for all- Conferences, Disability conferences and Football for All panels go to satisfy the third stage of the implementation of the equity policy of finding out the adequacies and effectiveness of the implementation process. Well thought out action plans to implement the different programmes of the sport equity policies have been drafted and circulated among the member organizations and other professionals like coaches, athletes and executives which very well takes care of the fourth stage of the implementation process. The advanced stage of the implementation of the sports equity policies is met by the football association by carrying out different programmes in the areas of racial equalities, involving Asians in football, disability football matches and other equality programmes. The role of the football association in achieving the sport equity policies is more than evidenced by the recognition granted to the association by the presentation of a special award by Sport England for the association's continuing work in tackling racism in football. (Football For All-Equality) 6.0 Conclusion: It is interesting to note that sport play a major role in promoting the inclusion of all groups in society. Governing bodies of sport have a big part to play in this social inclusion because of their role in developing sport at all levels of participation and organization. Societal values with regards to the outlook in inequalities in all the sectors including sports are changing and with the result any exclusion is viewed as anachronistic and is increasingly unacceptable. This has placed an immense responsibility on the governing bodies to implement the sports equity policies with all intent. References: 1. Deloitte & Touche - Investing in Change p9 2. Football For All -Equality Football For All The FA.Com The Football Association Website http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/GOALChildProtection/ 3. Sport England Equity guidelines for governing bodies Making English Sport Inclusive: Equity Guidelines for Governing Bodies A Generic Approach to Sports Equity http://ftp.uksport.gov.uk/images/uploaded/sportenglandequity.pdf Read More