[shark]

Hi Dave

Yes would be nice to keep everyone in the same big tent as long as no one monopolises an unfair share of the space inside.

It’s already the case that the Board doesn’t understand competitions because the Board members don’t come from that background and each new member has to go on a crash course on everything involved ie selection rules and procedures, appeals, safeguarding, distribution and application of UKS and SE grants, IFSC Red S policy etc etc. The attempt to manage it by outsourcing to a sub board (the CCPG) and recruiting and trusting professionals from other sporting bodies has backfired spectacularly.

The subsidiary option is a compromise to provide some distance accountability and transparency. I’d much prefer if it was entirely independent. Do we really want the hassle, stress, distraction and expense of running an NGB especially when the Board for the most do not have the experience or genuine interest. For an insight into the difficulties at an NGB check this out: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2024/mar/14/swim-englands-toxic-culture-must-go-it-is-time-for-sport-to-prioritise-joy

[Offwidth]

I have been generally following the BMC threads here and on UKC and although I disagree with the idea of having GBClimbing as a separate entity I really do agree with the need for greater transparency and better communication in terms of finances. Yours and Simon’s debate here around what the actual level of the deficit is, was and should be just highlights this for me.

If the finances were open and communicated more clearly then there wouldn’t be the need for a discussion about how much the deficit actually was, this would just be a fact.

This is why I have signed the petition for more openness and transparency for finances.

I support the sense of the petition, just not the misrepresentation in the background (so can't sign it). In fact I've been urging more openness since I joined Council in 2021.

On the subject of having a subsidiary, nothing I have read has altered my viewpoint on this that it is a bad idea. I really think we need to endeavour to keep as much of the climbing and mountaineering activities in the UK within the remit of the BMC. I genuinely fear that by making it a subsidiary this makes it much easier for it to be completely separated at some stage in the future when the board of the BMC decides it really doesn’t understand competitions and doesn’t want to be responsible for them.

Just my thoughts as a BMC member

Dave

It's more than that it's a very expensive mistaken proposal at a time when we need focus on other serious and urgent issues that need fixing.

[mrjonathanr]

I believe the best solution is for the BMC to remain both representative and governing body, but I signed both petitions because I’d like the issue discussed for this reason: the BMC currently does not look capable of being the NGB. Does it have the capacity to remedy this?

[Davo]

Hi Simon

Thanks for the reply. To be fair I don’t exactly disagree with anything you have said it’s just I don’t like your solution!

I am not that bothered about the cost and time to the BMC of altering its structures as it is a member organisation and if the membership wish for change so be it.

My main concern is that I really don’t like the idea of segregating one part of what I personally consider the climbing and mountaineering world. I fear that the BMC and by inference climbers in general will lose influence in national discussions. I also fear that by leaving competition climbing to its own that both the comp climbing community and the usual climbing community will become divorced from each other. I understand that there is already a gulf between the two worlds but I am a climber and mountaineer who genuinely enjoys watching the comp climbing and finds it very inspiring (if a little hard to relate to). I also do the odd local casual comp and get my son to do the same. If it turns out he is any good at comps I think it would be great if he could do national comps etc and I don’t see a reason why we wouldn’t want national and elite comps to be governed and run by the BMC. As such I want the two worlds to stay under the same governing and representative body.

Personally I see this as a problem of management and personnel within the BMC and not so much a structural issue. If the board could get a few more people on it that had at least an interest in comp climbing I think this would help.

Anyway, I applaud your efforts here Simon. Maybe you should join the board of the BMC??

Cheers Dave

[Oldmanmatt]

I believe the best solution is for the BMC to remain both representative and governing body, but I signed both petitions because I’d like the issue discussed for this reason: the BMC currently does not look capable of being the NGB. Does it have the capacity to remedy this?

This.
With knobs on.

You really don’t need to know much more than the number of resignations and see the volume of chatter, to develop a cautious attitude to the BMC as an organisation. If we’d been presented with this kind of stuff, during due diligence, prior to entering into business with another party, I’m certain my entire board would have declined to proceed.
I hate corporate jargon, but the “optics” of this, uh, suck big ones.

I think Simon is absolutely correct to be miffed and every “explanation” (official or otherwise) I’ve read has seemed hollow and insincere. In my opinion, with what seems like obfuscation and certainty incoherent, messaging from the body, it’s starting feel like something other than “mistakes”.
Why can’t it be laid out clearly and decisively? Mistakes happen. Lay it out and state what will be done to avoid it in the future. Did I miss that? Has it been done?
Nobody outside the inner sanctum can really say what’s happened, how bad it is or see what’s to be done and “better than it could have been” doesn’t help. Where I’ve read the opinions of “insiders”, who appear to have broken ranks with the sanctum, they are universally negative and appear accusational (but guarded) of something deeper and darker.
FFS, clear it up.
Or would that be the end of the BMC? 
It can’t be that bad, surely?
It was a massive undertaking and huge culture change, nobody should be surprised by even quite large screw ups.

[shark]

UKC news item linking an article on the the BMC website published on Friday with linked papers on a delay in reporting year end figures, plans to split GB Climbing in two and a paper specifically rebutting my proposal to place GBClimbing in a separate subsidiary.

The proposal to effectively split GB Climbing into two parts can be categorised as the bits that UKSport are interested in (and funds) and those that don’t effectively creates a UK Sport outpost within the BMC which obviously works well for UKSport to the point where we might as well hand them the keys IMO.

I currently think we are reaching a tipping point. The direction of travel seems to be towards becoming “any other faceless, CEO led organisation” as one ukc poster puts it.

Membership concerns and interest and democracy no longer feel to me like they are a priority and more of an inconvenience.

Time for a subsidiary split off for recreational climbing?

[petejh]

It was time 5 years ago. As I said back then - the incentives change when UK sport money gets involved. Change the incentives change the behaviour, doing the membership/recreational stuff well just isn’t incentivised as much as building an empire ‘team GB’ of managers and coaches 

[Davo]

Hi Simon

I’ve been generally following this stuff and I applaud you for your efforts. I think due to your efforts the BMC are attempting to make some significant changes and improvements. I don’t like the way your resolutions have been handled by the BMC and I think your resolutions should go to AGM. I’m a BMC member via a club.

I have read the latest BMC stuff and am just wondering what your specific objections to them are? I can appreciate that one of the documents would feel like a personal attack on your resolution but I don’t read it that way myself. I don’t agree with all that it says but I just see it as a different opinion to yours that needs to be put forward and discussed at the AGM.

The papers seem to give better financial accountability and to segregate financially comp climbing which doesn’t seem unreasonable. If you wouldn’t mind detailing your objections that would be much appreciated

Cheers

Dave

[shark]

Thanks Dave,

I need to go through it all properly (not sure when though!) but in general the rebuttal document is high on assertion and low on fact.

To quote a former Directors reaction: “Some of that is fundamentally incorrect and some just inappropriate”.

My gut instinct is that the CEO £200k in kind figure is highly questionable as it contrasts so starkly with the £81k shared costs figure provided by the previous CEO and I strongly suspect doesn’t subtract the £100k? or so of grant income that the BMC gets for covering GBC’s admin costs.

There is also the notion that it is acceptable to bake in a contribution of £386kpa to GBClimbing before extras!  whose participants are perhaps 1% of the membership. Elite mountaineers or elite rock climbers get buttons.

Also what is the money being spent on? In general empire building rather than direct support to athletes to gain comp experience - surely a priority in performing well in comps.

There are also references to problems with grant funding. I had a conversation with the BMC’s governance contact at UKSport and specifically asked her what would be problematic about moving to a wholly owned subsid set up and the only thing she raised was that it would be a nuisance reassigning the contracts to the new body. So things like the compliance with the Code of Spirts Governance objection I’m taking with a pinch of salt unless the BMC can identify which parts of the code and why and back that up with testimony from UKS.

As for keeping it internal I’d like to be trusting but it leaves far too much scope for funny business due to lack of transparency.

That’s just an initial brain dump and as I said I need to go through it more systematically and pick a few brains.

[Davo]

Hi Simon

I have read it again and I do agree that the figures seem very high and given the money doesn’t go to the actual athletes I am not sure where the money is going.

I still don’t want comp climbing split off completely from the BMC but I do want to understand better and more clearly where the money is going and what on. I think with good financial transparency and clarity would come better management.

Dave

[shark]

Don’t forget grant income. The expenditure and shared costs apportionment is in excess of £1million pa.

[shark]

Annual report and Accounts now out. No sign of the detailed Auditors Report promised by the CEO,

First glance at the format is that little has changed and therefore no detailed breakdown of allocation of expenditure by GB Climbing or how grant income was allocated. So same old, same old ie clear as mud.

Plenty of excuses in the chair's report if you are interested.

Headline figure only of £950k by the BMC to support GBClimbing (ie above and beyond grant and other income) so little doubt of the scale of support there on £4.85m overall expenditure. No indication whether that includes the cited £200k shared costs in the rebuttal letter for example.

As for the £625k loss the annual report says this:
The BMC made a larger than expected loss of £625k in 2023. The main reasons for these losses are grouped as follows:
1. Reconciliation of grants relating to GB Climbing and poor controls of budgets resulting in additional cost to the BMC. £361,284
2. Inaccurate accounting of VAT resulting in additional cost to the BMC.£61,420
3. Profit reconciliation across several areas including bad debtors and fees for services owed. £62,037
4. Loss of insurance income in July 2023. £41,627
5. The costs of restructuring, redundancies, and staff departures due to not tracking ambitious growth targets. £102,816

https://www.thebmc.co.uk/bmc-annual-general-meeting

[fatneck]

Just clicked on the link  to vote ahead of the AGM to be informed that voting has been suspended! Seems weird...

[teestub]

Same here, when I looked yesterday there didn’t seem to be anything contentious, unless we can vote not to receive the accounts until we get some better ones 😂

[shark]

I’d promised myself to steer clear of BMC politics but I can’t let this one go….

Roger Murray is the BMC Chair, and arguably holds the most powerful post in the BMC. He is the lead person on the Board which which amongst other things oversees the BMC being well run and is a custodian of the Members assets and the Chief Executive reports to him directly.

He has served for nearly three years as Chair during which time the organisation has burnt through nearly £1million of Members money with little to show for it. One consequence of this is likely to be that we have to sell the BMC office. In my opinion he should have stood down at the AGM. 

Roger's term as Chair is due to end on 30th November. Despite everything that has happened in the last couple of years Roger has seen fit to stand for another three year term. Even more incredibly the Nominations Committee has supported this by recommending his reappointment. (BTW Roger is Chair of the Nominations Committee).

I’m told that this will be discussed at the next Board meeting in the third week of September. In the meantime the online Members Open Forum takes place on the 11th September and is an opportunity for members to express their own opinions that could potentially then be taken into account at that meeting. This is meant to be a member-led organisation after all

In my personal opinion it should be made crystal clear that we have no confidence in him continuing and that he must make way for a new Chair to stand now.

If the Board supports Roger remaining it means he is then in post at least 7/8 months more than expected up until the 2025 AGM. If anybody had anticipated he’d have the gall to stand again then there would have been greater efforts to get him to step down at the last AGM.

Whilst the 2025 AGM provides an opportunity for Members to overturn an appointment quite frankly it’s an unnecessary distraction and undermines efforts to turnaround the BMC from the brink having a Chair with so much baggage.

We have a new CEO, a new President and now need a new capable Chair.

Looking back at last year the Board under his and Andy Syme’s leadership were completely out of touch and oblivious to what was actually going on in the organisation they were supposed to be in control and in charge of. Asleep at the wheel doesn’t even come close. They were not only oblivious but in in denial.

When they were warned by National Council about finance they shut down criticism. When there was a critical report about GB Climbing they tried to block its publication. 

Roger helped appoint a Chief Financial Officer  and sung her praises even when she left despite her botched implementation of a new finance system which led to  £200k of liabilities being hidden until the auditors uncovered it. She and he over looked that a budgeted £200k of grant income never existed.
Roger told us at the start of 2023 that the BMC budgeted loss for the year would be £70k

In November Roger told members that the loss would in fact be £300k. He restated that figure in January at the Members Forum and then shut me down when I was trying clarify some figures with the CEO telling me I would have to “deal with it”. As we now know the loss was a mind bending £625k.

This is a Chair and Board that was not even close to being in control of the organisation.

He has played fast and loose with Board nominations at the last AGM trying to bypass the Articles to install new Directors he liked yet I was held rigidly to the Articles for the AGM resolutions.

I understand that Roger is currently lobbying so the Board has even less oversight than it currently enjoys. Given the history of appalling  decision making there is a case that it needs more.

I could go on.

It is pretty clear from his mealy mouthed collective apology for toileting virtually all our reserves,  and from the fact that he didn’t resign and now sees fit to stand again that on an individual level he thinks he’s done absolutely nothing wrong. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Board has the power (primacy) for the running of the BMC. With that power comes responsibility and accountability for the outcomes of their decision making or failure to make decisions. Or is meant to. Accountability means consequences.

Roger Murray being recommended for a second term is an affront to those fundamental principles of good management. He’s done a bad job and so far largely got away with it. Now the BMC Nominations Committee by recommending him has effectively patted him on the back and told him he’s done a jolly good job so far and should continue.

I don’t know what basis Nom Com has recommended him. Just how inconceivably bad does an incumbent’s track record have to be for them to rejected?. The independence, judgement and processes of Nom Com need reviewing.

If you share some of my views and anger I urge that you should join in and speak up at the Members Forum on Weds Sept 11th. It will be better to have some fresh faces and voices and more likely to have an impact on the Board discussion about whether Roger should renew his term or not.

Link to register for online Members Forum

[Davo]

Hi Shark

Thanks for raising this. I have registered for the members forum and will submit a question about this. Personally I think he should clearly have stepped down and don’t understand why he hasn’t.

Dave

[shark]

Thanks Dave

The more questions sent in advance on the topic the better as it will form a theme that will rise to the top of the list.

For anybody else the email is: events@thebmc.co.uk

[abarro81]

 I look forward to Offwidth coming along and assuring us he's a great bloke and nothing was his fault and it's all basically fine...

[Stabbsy]

I look forward to Offwidth coming along and assuring us he's a great bloke and nothing was his fault and it's all basically fine...

I look forward to Offwidth coming along and assuring us he's a great bloke and nothing was his fault and it's all basically fine...

Can someone with better tech skills than me stick Offwidth’s head over David Mitchell’s?

[galpinos]

He has played fast and loose with Board nominations at the last AGM trying to bypass the Articles to install new Directors he liked yet I was held rigidly to the Articles for the AGM resolutions.

What did he do here?

[galpinos]

It may be fashionable to "Offwidth bash" on UKB but it does a massive disservice to someone who has contributed and continues to contribute so much to the running of the BMC on a voluntary basis. I just makes you look a bit of a d**k

Just because he's not as keen on hyperbole and rumours as Shark doesn't mean he's not doing his best via National Council to hold those in power to account.

A passion for the BMC isn't something to be ridiculed for.

[Johnny Brown]

Agreed. People bring different things to the table and Steve has a lot of experience at pulling the levers from within a large organisation. We are as lucky to have him on the inside as we are that Shark is prepared to take the flack from shooting from the sidelines.

[Tony S]

I further second galpinos comments and would add, unless one has formally submitted one’s candidacy to volunteer one’s time to act in these roles (acting in good faith, to propose solutions, do the work, and not simply to moan or disrupt) then maybe one might wish to consider the depth of one’s convictions.

It’s easy to criticise from an armchair.

[Oldmanmatt]

I further second galpinos comments and would add, unless one has formally submitted one’s candidacy to volunteer one’s time to act in these roles (acting in good faith, to propose solutions, do the work, and not simply to moan or disrupt) then maybe one might wish to consider the depth of one’s convictions.

It’s easy to criticise from an armchair.

So…
Members of a membership organisation, who have not actually sat on or volunteered/applied for board or national committee roles should not criticise those who have?
Gotcha, understood.
Seems legit.

As an aside, Offwidth takes too much flack for someone who seems to be honest and dedicated. We all benefit from his like and their passion for the organisation. I apologise for my part in that.

[Snoops]

I further second galpinos comments and would add, unless one has formally submitted one’s candidacy to volunteer one’s time to act in these roles (acting in good faith, to propose solutions, do the work, and not simply to moan or disrupt) then maybe one might wish to consider the depth of one’s convictions.

It’s easy to criticise from an armchair.

So…
Members of a membership organisation, who have not actually sat on or volunteered/applied for board or national committee roles should not criticise those who have?
Gotcha, understood.
Seems legit.

As an aside, Offwidth takes too much flack for someone who seems to be honest and dedicated. We all benefit from his like and their passion for the organisation. I apologise for my part in that.

Good post