Swimming changes upset councillors

Press, 25 October 1980, Page 64

Swimming changes upset councillors

By

KEVIN TUTTY

Sweeping changes will be made to the. New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association’s administration on December 1, but some members of the present council (the association’s managing body) are unhappy about the changes. When the new rules are introduced the separate postions of chairman and president will be combined, and Maurice Duckmanton, the chairman of the association for the last eight years will be ousted. Mr D; L. Shaw* of Auckland, the president, will become the chief officer of the association. The structure of the council will also change. It.is the combining of the chairman and president’s positions, -and the dumping of Mr Duckmanton, that has upset several councillors and caused bad feeling within the administration. There is nothing that the council can do to change the new rules. They came from a resolution at the annual meeting of the association in August, which also gave the president power to implement the new rules.

One councillor* who wished to remain anonymous, said that he saw the changes as a means “for a clique to get rid of” the chairman, Mr Duckmanton. Other councillors were tightlipped when asked about the ill-feeling within the administration. The basis of the new structure was decided by the annual conference, and a special committee of five was appointed by the president to make amendments to the appropriate rules. . The committee met last month and the amendments were tabled at this month’s council meeting, with the recommendation that they be implemented on November 1. The council felt that centres should be given the opportunity to make suggestions on the changes however, and the implementation date was deferred to DecemHpt 1

Besides the president assuming the chairman’s. role, the residential qualification which applies to present council members has been dropped. Under the old rule, the administration was run by a

council of eight and a treasurer, all of whom had to be resident in Christchurch. The new council will comprise the president, two vice-presidents, the treasurer, and nine elected members of council, four of whom may be resident at the association’s headquarters, The remaining five councillors can come from outside Christchurch. There is nothing to prevent nominees unsuccessful in the ballot for the resident councillors’ positions to enter, the

ballot for one of the remaining five places. A long-serving councillor, Mr S. Williams, does not agree with the rule changes. He said that attempts to change the national swimming administration were not new. Several annual conferences in the past had talked of altering the administration. , , , “I repeatedly asked delegates to point out where the council had fallen down. I could see no need for big changes unless it couM w

shown wg Had not done had done a poor job, or failed to carry out the policies of the association,’’ said Mr Williams. “That hasn’t been shown.”

The council had done more than its task of administering swimming in the past. It had become an innovative body too, said Mr Williams.

“That has been shown at the annual meetings in 1980 and 1978, when workshops were introduced to give delegates the chances to

submit anything they wished for discussion, There was, a complete dearth of ideas from centres.”

With the new administration, the association would be faced with a considerable increase in expenses, money that could be spent on swimmers.Removing Mr Duckmanton from the chairman’s position would “toss aside” a great deal of experience, said Mr Williams.

"The real progress In itwtetttef tuu teas made

since the association appointed a chairman. The first, Jack Donaldson, served for 11 years, and Mr Duckmanton has had eight. That continuity will be lost under the new system.” The convener of the special committee which drew up the rule changes, Mr D. R. Truscott, did not agree that continuity would be lost.

Mr Truscott, also a member of the cotmcil, said that after the president retired at the end of his normal twoyear term he would be replaced by his senior vicepresident, who would have had four years on council

first as the. junior vice-presi-dent, and - then the senior vice-president. “The annual meeting thought that a regular change of chairman would be better than having one person holding the office for several years,” said Mr Truscott

He agreed that administration costs would be higher, but said that the annual meeting was warned of .that. "The changes have been coming for a long time, Cen* m Sm® waofed *

say in the administration of swimming. My feeling is that they should have it,” said Mr Truscott, when asked if he agreed with the changes. Asked if the new rules had created ill-feeling within the association, Mr Truscott said that Mr Shaw would end his term as president at the next annual meeting. “I think he wants the new system running smoothly, so the senior vice-president can take over at the next annual meeting.” Some councillors believe that the association might be unconstitutional in adopting the new rules. A clause in the association's constitution says that 40 days notice of intention to change rules must be given, and this had not' been done. However, Mr Truscott said that the resolution of the annual meeting which gave the president power to act overrides the clause in the rules. Some councillors are silently hopeful that once centres see the proposed changes they might not want them, particularly the (frwpfrg-cf Mr Duckmanton.