Suspending Geoffrey Boycott a big own goal and why Scarborough must call a SGM - Chris Waters
THERE was a Halloween party at Scarborough Cricket Club yesterday. The ghoulish theme was not inappropriate after what might be called “a week from hell”.
It was one that began, as revealed by The Yorkshire Post, with news that the club’s members are being denied a Special General Meeting in apparent contravention of their constitutional rights.
The club’s constitution seems clear enough: “The board or seventy-five or more members entitled to vote may require in writing the secretary to convene a Special General Meeting of members within twenty-one days. Fourteen days’ notice shall be given to the members of all Special General Meetings and the notice shall specify the place, date and hour of such meeting and the business to be transacted…”
On September 9, a letter was sent to the club, backed by 91 members, to formally exercise this right in writing. The signatories included three of Scarborough and Yorkshire’s most famous players: Adam Lyth, Craig White and David Byas.
The business to be transacted highlighted “the board’s poor performance in several key areas” and outlined, in brief here, the loss of the first team from the Yorkshire Premier League North and associated financial costs; two successive annual losses amounting to almost £175,000; ticket price rises of 50 per cent to watch Yorkshire at North Marine Road; declining facilities which now mean that one of the ground’s stands has to be demolished, and perceived disregard of members per se, proposing a major overhaul of the board with named replacements.
The response? A legal letter on the board’s behalf - at a cost unknown - which claimed that such business to be transacted was “devoid of fact” and seemed only to represent “the misguided beliefs of a number of members”. It said “we do not consider that your letter properly constitutes a valid notice to call a SGM” and, by way of claiming its deficiency, cited another constitutional line which referred to the board properly having “the entire management of the funds and affairs of the club” which include “the specific matters set out thereto (in the SGM letter)”.
In other words, the board - by seeking legal protection in this way, and whether they realise it or not - have essentially said that they cannot be challenged at an SGM on any subject.
If that was not bad enough, with the SGM proposal raised only by members as a last resort, following a fractious AGM in March and declining relations between the two parties, the board suspended Sir Geoffrey Boycott, the club president, for alleged gross misconduct and referred him to the Cricket Regulator.
Unaware that a virtual board meeting on October 6 was still being recorded (why was is still being recorded?), Boycott allegedly rang Robert Harrison, one of the prime movers behind the SGM, and shared “confidential and commercially sensitive information”.
Although you could see why the board would be unhappy about that, and without wishing to prejudice the outcome of investigations, to escalate it in such a way seems petty in the wider context and self-defeating given Boycott’s iconic reputation and everything he has done as president, while it was born out of sympathy and solidarity with members.
As PR own goals go, it was a bit like a centre-forward, faced with a gaping opposition net, turning round and running the full length of the field before firing past his own bemused No 1.
Harrison, too, has been suspended for alleged gross misconduct, his crime, in effect, that he had the temerity to answer his mobile phone.
Following Boycott’s suspension, Laura Edmunds, the Scarborough chief executive, wrote to the club’s members claiming that it would be “premature to convene an SGM” while these cases were ongoing as they have “the potential to compromise the integrity of SGM discussions”.
As a non-member of Scarborough CC, just a deep lover of cricket at a ground which one has tried to champion at every opportunity in these pages, one can only say that her claim does not stand up to scrutiny – it’s a side issue that has next-to-no bearing on the main points at hand.
That board meeting on October 6, after all, was four weeks after the SGM letter was submitted - in other words, well after the constitutional deadline to hold it had passed, and it was only after another board meeting on October 15 that the suspensions were agreed. To suggest otherwise is disingenuous and smacks of a delaying tactic as, indeed, does the club’s decision to bring in the lawyers.
It’s difficult, quite frankly, to see what the board/executive at Scarborough are seemingly so worried about.
If they are doing such a great job, as Edmunds claims, then they should really have the confidence to say that at an SGM and to Halloween hell with those who say otherwise.