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Viewpoint

The RA-FA Youth Council is now broadening its highly successful Referee Development

Fund to include County RAs and Local RAs, something which will give a real benefit to ALL

members at all levels. So together let’s make this work as together we will be stronger.

Over recent years, The RA Board has given extra tools to stimulate growth:

1) The excellent RA-FA YC Best Practice Guide;

2) Together with QUEST giving an operational framework;

3) The Development Fund gives access to resources for LRAs and CRAs;

4) New Member fee of just £4.

We continue working with third parties to give additional benefits which will bring real

financial gains to individual members, plus working towards the delivery of CPD events.

We are giving LRAs real tools to recruit new members and re-engage with ex-members.

So it will be very interesting to see the engagement from CRAs and LRAs with the RA-FA YC

Development Fund - this is an application-driven process with real Key Performance

Indicators, and only if all KPIs are achieved will the grant be paid. So The RA, with the

support of The FA, will be providing resources to all LRAs, subject to the defined

application process. See www.rafayc.co.uk/rdf

The official publication of

The Referees’ Association

The Referees’ Association

1c Bagshaw Close

Ryton on Dunsmore

Warwickshire

CV8 3EX

Tel: 02476 420360

Email: contact@the-ra.org

Web: www.the-ra.org

Viewpoint

Announcements

QUEST

A moment in

history

Events

What’s

inside?

The Referee

He who would a Referee be, fit for any occasion,

Let him in constancy support his Association;

Then no discouragement shall make him once relent

His very fixed intent to be a Referee.

Who so beset him round with dismal stories,

Do but themselves confound, his power the more is;

No team shall stay his might, he will be always right,

And will make good his right to be named a Referee.

The RA President - J Gilroy - 1945

The Voice of The RA

Supporting Referees since 1908

Did you know……?

is open for CRAs and LRAs

November

2015

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Announcements

Email addresses to the RA will be changing. The RA has

suffered from a lack of brand identity as The Referees’

Association or The RA, where these have not been part

of our email address. Effective business structure

requires strict email control, so that emails do not go to

private email addresses. Our thanks to Derek Mansfield

for facilitating this process, which will greatly aid the

automation of our Support Centre.

Going forward the following email address will be live:

contact@the-ra.org – all day-to-day communication will

be processed via this address

membership@the-ra.org – for all membership enquires

quest@the-ra.org – all QUEST applications/evidences via

this address

finance@the-ra.org – suppliers and vendors will be using

this address

The current ra@footballreferee.org email address will

remain open for a few months while the transition occurs.

Participant is now open for referees to join centrally.

We need to make the process easy to join The RA –

referees can now join the RA 24/7. This has recently

become more urgent due to a few LRAs folding, not

because of lack of members, but because of the lack of

Officers. So the real benefits are: making it easy to join

the RA at any time; availability of joining 24/7 across 365

days; extra International Members (reflecting our

current significant hit/strike rate from USA, Japan, Italy

and Africa; allowing Members to join who no longer

have an LRA but want to be/remain part of the RA. This whole process will be managed in accordance with

the Rules of the Association (Rule 4). The annual Website

fee will be a blanket £25.

To respect the fact that traditionally the LRAs have been

responsible for recruitment, the £4 fee for new members

remains, giving the LRA the opportunity to show them a

saving, i.e. join at your Local RA and save £21….

Urgent help needed

QUEST has seen a real growth in interest over recent months, and we are

extremely grateful to our current Audit Team of Bob Gahan, Sharon Smith and

Nick Taplin. We do however need to lighten their large workload and thereby aid

the overall process. We are therefore seeking additional suitable auditors, who

should ideally be qualified to internationally recognised standards, such as

ISO9000/ISO14001/ISO18001 or SMETA. If you are at all interested, please email

Lynn Harris at contact@the-ra.org in the first instance.

QUEST Award by John Key

We are delighted to announce that Sussex County RA have been awarded QUEST bronze, the first County RA to achieve

this award. Over the coming months we hope to see a continuing change as the relevance of our CRAs becomes more

important in the running of the RA.

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Brief moments in history

1915 - In his annual report from November 1915, A.H. Page, Hon

Secretary from Surrey, wrote: The seventh Annual Conference has been postponed indefinitely due to the European War; the annual report is not a happy one as, with the outbreak of hostilities, local football in many districts has been abandoned in its entirety.

On a happier note, branches have been formed in Wiltshire, Northamptonshire, Sunderland and Lincoln, and the Union has accepted memberships from Spain and Argentina. While membership has generally decreased, there are many older members not away on military service who are still not renewing their RU membership.

The Union has taken up grievances with success, particularly the publication and removal of the names of referees, with promises obtained from prominent leagues that this will not occur in the future.

The “Football Referee” was again published during the season without much support by the members. Regrettably we will have to suspend publication until further notice. [The next publication was 1920]

November/December 1945 – When the Second World War broke out in 1939, one of the first casualties

was Association Football. During the long and anxious following six years, the game’s lingering became evident as history repeated itself. After a transitory period, sport (and football in particular) will see a boom, just as happened after the Great War. There is now a great demand for referees, BUT we are most concerned about the supply of efficient officials, where there is likely to be a shortage. It was reported that on August 24th a meeting was held at noon in the Royal Hotel at Paddington between The FA and The RA, involving Messrs. W.C.Cuff, A.E.Spring, and S.F. Rous, where the following was agreed: 1. the FA asked for RA help in organising instructional classes for refereeing candidates; 2. a uniform system of examination to be prepared by the FA and the RA; 3. grading of a referee by a County Association to be accepted by all other Associations;

4. uniform fees agreed of 7/6d for Class 1; Class 2 & 3 would receive 5/-; only one registration fee across all CFAs;

5. Associations or Societies of Referees should be represented on their County Football Association Council;

6. professional players should be encouraged to become candidates for examination;

7. worthy referees should be offered accelerated promotion, whether or not they apply.

The Football Association also noted that referees should consider the Game as a whole, being the most important person on the field; that referees should form a National Association for mutual help; and that every Referee should join that Association. Referees must not only know the Laws of the Game thoroughly, but must use common sense in applying them. And finally the Football Association must trust referees for the proper ruling of the Game, and will support them and protect them to the limit of its power.

Membership Fees

Please ensure that payment for membership is efficiently paid. We are currently having to chase LRAs to process

payments in a timely manner – failure to do so could impact on your members in a negative way.

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Website developments for your

LRA’s benefit - report by Derek Mansfield

Since the start of the summer, several enhancements have been made to the RA Website. There is still

much to do, but at present it does give all LRAs the opportunity to display their meeting details plus other

news and event items. Every LRA can now update their own page - we just need a recognised Officer to

contact itsupport@the-ra.org to request a login, and you will then receive login details plus some short

instructions on the update procedures. Maintaining your details through this site will help us to ensure

that we have up-to-date circulation details for all our LRAs.

Some of our LRAs have pictures of their meeting locations, most of which have been gathered from

Google’s Street View. But if you have better pictures, please submit them to the same email address.

The RA Website also has back copies of “Referee” magazine available, in both PDF and ebook formats. But

to use the ebook format, you will need to have flash player installed on your computer.

We welcome any news from LRAs and CRAs, plus any suggestions you have about other items for inclusion.

Appeal for articles

Do you have any training or interesting news articles? Then let’s spread the word that the RA is open for

business. Let others know how you are leading the way in the development of your RA and enhancing

the performance of your members!

Please send your articles in word/images as jpegs to contact@the-ra.org - thank you.

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County Liaison Meeting 2016

This annual event is to be held at the Abbey Park

Hotel in Redditch on Sunday 10th January 2016. It

will be a forward-thinking get-together where CRAs

will be required to bring along someone under 25.

There will be focused work-shops to develop this

Association, and every CRA will be asked to bring at

least one positive and deliverable idea to show that

our CRAs have a fundamental role in the turn-

around of this organisation.

Such events are all about being a united association

with a common aim, development of Membership

in terms of numbers, all-round friendship, plus

achieving a relevant organisation for everyone.

Events Team report :

County RA Liaison Meeting on Sunday 10th January 2016

Abbey Park Hotel, Dagnell End Road, Redditch, Worcs, B98 9BE

Eve-of-Final Rally

Meet the 2016 FA Cup Final

Match Officials:

Friday 20th May 2016

One Great George Street

Westminster, London

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The RA Conference 2016

Hinckley Island Hotel, Leicestershire

Saturday 16th & Sunday 17th July 2016

There really is something for everyone….