Committee Constitution

1) Who is the Committee?

1.i) During the interim between tournaments, The National Committee is made up of one Captain from each competing centre in the National Competition and the Tournament Co-ordinator.

1.ii) The Tournament Co-ordinator chairs all meetings. However, s/he only votes in the instance of a hung Committee.

1.iii) When the Tournament proper begins the Committee make-up changes slightly to include one Captain from each competing team. This may mean that some centres are represented multiple times, and others are not represented at all.

1.iv) Between tournaments, the team Captain’s are assumed to remain the same, until the Committee is informed by the applicable centre, that a new Captain has been elected, or that the centre in question shall not be competing in the forthcoming tournament.

1.v) No decisions should be made with any member of the Committee absent and unconsulted. If a Captain is going to be absent, they must agree to abstaining from all votes, or place proxy votes for all or some decisions.

2) What is their job?

2.i) The Committee’s job is to oversee the smooth and equitable running of the tournament in terms of rules, refereeing, player complaints and most other non-administrative concerns (administrative duties should be directed to the Tournament co-ordinator or the manager of the field upon which the tournament is being played).

2.ii) Typical jobs include:
- Deciding on/clarifying changes to the rules.
- Deciding on/clarifying changes to the playing conditions
- Dealing with player complaints of referee decisions; usually in the form of penalties or replays.

2.iii) Each Committee Member has a two-fold agenda. Firstly they must represent their own centre - making sure that any decision is not unfairly doing their team injustice. Secondly, they are expected to act for the good of the competition as a whole.

Each member must be careful to make sure that they do not only follow one of these agenda’s to the exclusion of the other. For instance, when representing a team’s complaint against a ref-imposed penalty, it is appropriate for that Captain to take his/her player’s statements on trust, and to advocate that position. When voting on such an issue however, it is inappropriate for Captain’s to represent their centres inasmuch as voting for whatever decision will ultimately benefit their own team. It is hoped that the distinction within this and other such cases will be readily apparent.

2.iv) Members of the Committee do not have a responsibility to "police" events, and to make sure that all general happenings are in accordance with the rules. However, they do have the right to call attention to, or question, any event that seems to them to be contrary to the rules or the constitution of the competition.

3) How do they make decisions?

3.i) All decisions are based on a simple voting system. Any changes of a permanent nature require an unanimous decision, while votes for most "one-off" situations require only a majority. Generally speaking, this means that all changes to the rules or playing conditions must be made by a unanimous decision, while complaints of erroneous penalty calls may be made by a majority decision. (The Tournament Co-ordinator is therefore only ever called to vote in the latter (majority) instances, s/he is evidently not needed in any decision that requires a unanimous decision)

3.i.i) Generally speaking, with an unanimous decision the Committee should be able to change any facet of the rules or playing conditions.

3.i.ii) It is the Committee’s responsibility to speak to everyone that it feels may have a valid contribution to make to the subject matter at hand. It should feel free to consult any member of the playing community or management that it feels might aid in its decision making. Like any democratic representative, Captain’s should consult their team about major (permanent) decisions, and explain carefully to their team why decisions were made. Players who are unsure of the reasons behind a decision should always endeavour to find out from their own Captain why decisions were made. Likewise, Captain’s should always be sure they have ascertained why decisions have been made.

3.ii) Once a decision is made, that decision is final. This means that if the Committee vote via a majority to uphold or dismiss a penalty call, then that decision may not be retaken to Committee, likewise, if the Committee vote unanimously to endorse a rules change, in a later tournament it will require another (unanimous) vote to rescind such a change. However, new evidence may provide reason for a new Committee meeting.

3.iii) The Committee can vote to postpone proceedings. This may be necessary if it needs to speak to a player or referee who is not present, or it may be desirable if the Committee decision-making process is holding up the rest of the tournament.

3.iii.i) The Committee can also make provisional decisions. For instance, if it cannot get in contact with a certain player, it may, on the evidence received, decide to provisionally uphold a ref’s call. (Though in this case perhaps a simple postponement would be more politic)

3.iii.ii) The Committee may also make decisions with a temporary aspect. For instance, it may decide, for the purposes of one particular tournament at one particular field, to modify a rule for the duration of that tournament only.

4) When do they meet?

4.i) Between tournaments, the Committee meet and discuss proposals whenever necessary and possible. Meetings should be placed at times convenient to as many members as possible.

4.ii) All tournaments should begin with a Committee meeting, to allow any present or potential problems to be dealt with.

4.iii) During the tournament, Committee meetings may be held whenever necessary to solve problems/make adjudications as necessary. However, care should be taken that a Committee meeting disturbs the competition as little as possible. History as shown that Committee meetings always take far longer to complete than expected, and thus it is preferable that they occur outside scheduled playing time (ie they should happen before play begins, or after it finishes, on any given day)

5) Procedures:

For the adjudication of a referee’s call, particularly penalty-calls, but also including replay adjudications:

Notes:

- The Committee is required to make a majority decision.
- In this particular case, and only in this case, the two opposing Captains in the match in question sit out of the Committee. They take no part in proceedings except as outlined below. They do not sit in on proceedings as other Captain’s/players/referee’s are being questioned, or as the Committee deliberates.

Procedure:

- The Captain of the team with the grievance puts forward the reason why they believe the call may be disputed (see appendix 1 below). They then leave.
- The opposing Captain enters and gives their reasons why the call was valid. They then leave.
- The referee/s in question enter and describe the incident as they saw it and why the penalty was called. They then leave.
- The Committee then speaks to any other players (on either side) who may have been present at the incident or anyone else they feel might be able to contribute to their decision.
- The Committee then calls in the Captain’s and gives their decision.

Appendix

1: How may a ref’s decision be disputed/overturned? (Important!)

A1.i) In all cases the Committee is obliged to believe the referee’s version of events over the player’s. The reason for this is simple: if the player’s view has as much validity as the ref’s then every penalty would be taken to Committee and overturned merely on the basis of the infringing player claiming, "I didn’t do it." No matter who happens to be the ref or the player concerned, the Committee is always obliged to trust the description of events given by the ref.

A1.ii) This may seem to make it impossible to get a penalty overturned, but this is not so. It merely means that a team that has suffered what it perceives as an incorrect call should consider carefully whether or not it is worth taking the penalty to Committee. Generally the Committee will only overturn a ref’s decision if:

- The ref’s version of events is not disputed, but the player believes they nevertheless acted legitimately. This should be a simple situation for the Com to resolve, merely by a careful study of the rules.
- The ref’s version of events is not disputed, but the player believes that the amount of the points allocated, or the type of penalty was too severe. This would be possible in the case of a player believing they were guilty of Dangerous Play, but not of Physical Contact, or of a player thinking that a three-grand Conduct for a given infraction may have been appropriate, but a five-grand Conduct was not. In this case, as in the above one, the referee should merely tell the Committee what happened, and why they called the penalty they did. The Committee should then make its own decision about what seems justified, and consistent with both the rules and with similar calls.
- The ref’s version of events is disputed. The infringed team believe they can show the referee was not in a position to see the entire penalty, and therefore should not have made the call. In this case the Committee should focus on where the ref was standing, and how much of the penalty s/he believes he saw.
- The ref’s version of events is disputed. The infringing team believes that if the Committee questioned the other players (of both sides) and any other ref’s present, that they would all agree on the same version of events, contrary to the ref’s version. In this case the Committee may decide to over-rule a ref’s version of events, if players from the opposing side agree with the story given by the "infringing" player. If two refs were in dispute over whether a penalty should have been called, then the Committee may also have to make a similar decision. However, any decision that puts greater credence in the perspective of a group of players, rather than the ref, should be made only with the utmost caution.
- The ref’s version of events is disputed. The infringing team believe they can show objectively that the ref was mistaken (eg, the ref states that one player shot another, when a print-out shows that they did not).