NEWS: Plans for the restructure of the Sport

Bob Falconer, Cycle Speedway Commission’s Development officer, has issues the following:

Future Structure of Cycle Speedway in the UK – Draft

Proposal V2a

This follows the agreement with British Cycling for the sport to move to a more devolved structure as previously circulated (joint statement reproduced again below as a reminder).

In recognition of the operational challenges voiced by the CS community, a meeting was held on 16/06/25 between representatives of the CS Commission and senior staff at BC. The main concern expressed by the CS commission was the administration requirements, but also perceived lack of funding, relevant publicity, charges (both the complexity and quantum) and the “one size fits all” approach to disciplines by BC.

The BC representatives were sympathetic but outlined the reality of the financial position they face across domestic cycle sport competition and the aim to reach more sustainable solutions across disciplines- which is a challenge with Cycle Speedway. The size of the discipline, coupled with limited use of the Event Management System (EMS) and lack of levies/payments received makes this incredibly difficult.

The unfortunate reality being that staffing for competition needs to be relative and proportionate to the scale of the discipline and therefore solutions need to be explored that work for both Cycle Speedway and for British Cycling.

After discussion of the options it was agreed that a more self-governing option would likely work better for both BC and CS, giving more autonomy whilst remaining part of the NGB. That is devolution, rather than independence, or no change.

The CS commission took the action to take this back to the community and work up practical proposals for subsequent discussion that could work better for both CS and BC, with a view to these being fully in place for the 25/26 season. It was recognised that this was a significant task. British Cycling, and the Cycle Speedway Commission, are grateful for the support of the Cycle Speedway Community as we look to evolve the organisation of the discipline for the benefit of the sport.

The following proposal, having been discussed and agreed by the CS commission, is now being forwarded to clubs for agreement prior to discussion with BC. A webinar will shortly be organised to give opportunity for discussion and comment. It is worth noting that this proposal – together with any agreed modifications – will take some time and effort to be in place for the 2026 season as proposed.

For clarity, it is also worth emphasising that within this devolved plan it is the objective to maintain strong relationships with BC and, subject to it being economically sensible, to remain affiliated to BC (or indeed another relevant governing body).

Alongside the devolution objective, the change brings the opportunity to address some of the underlying challenges in the sport.

Underlying Objectives and Principles

1. The sport works well at a competitive level, with a well organised and adaptable competition structure for all – no fundamental change is seen as necessary to this as part of devolution.
2. The weaknesses are believed to lie in attracting and retaining enough riders at the grassroots level, having a sufficient pool of volunteers, and the continual erosion of the number of viable tracks. This structure is designed to take the opportunity to address this in a way that hasn’t been the case for a long time.
3. To take on the roles that have been provided by BC will need more volunteer effort. That effort cannot and should not reside in a small group of individuals in a central organisation and needs to be spread across the sport. This should simultaneously
   make it more transparent and democratic.
4. Financially, it is hoped that the sport costs no more to run than it pays BC today (around £80-90k pa – recognising that BC believes it costs then some 3x that figure). The principle is that the costs to clubs and individuals reflects the benefit received and is fully transparent.
5. That the sport pulls together as a whole and doesn’t fragment – which it can ill afford to do.

Governance

The proposal is for a not-for-profit structure – probably a charitable CIO – run by a small group of Trustees. This is an oversight and governance organisation and will give CS credibility and enable sponsorship etc. It should have the majority of its Trustees from
outside the sport, but able to add value to it. This will provide governance and financial oversight and establish and maintain relationships with external suppliers of, for example, insurance, safeguarding and the National Governing Body.

Competition Structure

The current competition structure, which it is proposed to remain unchanged for 2026, is below. To share responsibility, each competition – or group of competitions – will have a nominated manager to oversee the event(s). The managers will have a virtual co-ordination meeting if necessary pre-season to agree the timetable and the track and host club allocation according to any previously agreed principles of rotation etc. The managers will identify the budget they need, if any, for the event(s) and be responsible for co-ordinating officials, clubs, publicity, social media, results posting and ensuring that it is run to a high standard etc.

*Below shows where there is a suggested nomination/volunteer for the role. Not all have committed or agreed to this as yet: others may be interested and in some cases a small committee/working group may be needed.

Sport & Club Development Committee* – Craig Masson Rob Mawhood? Matt Parr?
Focussed on fostering growth at the grassroots level at local clubs, sharing best practices, encouraging and enabling schools’ competitions, linking with other cycling and sports groups etc etc. This is important and currently missing.

Marketing & Sponsorship – Volunteer Manager & committee members
Whilst the competition managers are responsible for publicising their own events the Marketing and Sponsorship committee helps provide a common framework, messaging, branding etc for the sport as a whole helping secure sponsorship, working with Trustees etc.

Supporting Technology – Phil Clarke Nial Morton
Responsible for providing facilities for secure, accurate and timely data as necessary in support of the above (using as much off-the-shelf software as possible and adapting existing web and social media sites where appropriate). It is envisaged that there will be a single website (an adaptation of 3318?) for relatively slow changing data (including historical results and core club data and information about the sport) whilst social media such as Facebook can continue to be used for more transient material, chat, streaming, individual leagues etc as happens to a degree today (National Lague, Women’s League etc).

Rules of the Competitive Sport – Mike Hack + ?
These are only occasionally revised but this function, following input from the sport, considers, proposes or agrees changes aligning these internationally as appropriate.

Individual Roles
Referees lead – Dave Dart
National Coaching Lead – Phil Clarke

Standards and Discipline – Bob Prince: High sporting standards are important and Bob is fully committed to this
Facility Development* – Philip Wells + ?; The development or resurrection of our tracks sometimes requires expertise in negotiating with landowners and suppliers. Phil is a volunteer parent with much expertise in this area. (Note, we will lose access to the Facilities
manager at BC).

Other
Administration – given the workload there can be and the failures of the past it is anticipated that the sport should have a part-time paid administrator. Exactly what the JD would be needs further definition but essentially it takes on much of the administrative work that has been the responsibility of BC. This includes membership management and some management of the finances.

Insurance and Safeguarding – it is believed that these important functions can be “bought in” either from the NGB or elsewhere. The needs are common to other sports clubs and organisations exist to provide for the charitable and sports sector.

Fees and Membership

Fees:
The current fees gathered by BC amount to around £80k p.a., or around £2.8k/club on average, but from a plethora of different charges which create an administrative overhead and are open to potential abuse. The objective is to simplify that, whilst ensuring that fees, as far as reasonably possible, are fair and reflect the costs incurred.

Principles:

1. Individual fees should be set by and collected only by the club into an independent
   club bank account.
2. All Clubs pays a fixed fee for the core functions of the sport e.g. insurance,
   safeguarding, core IT, publicity, administration etc. This fee is TBA
3. There are then specific fees as required for competitions that the clubs enters. This is
   to cover the costs, such as medals and trophys, of running these competitions as set
   by competition manager (recognising that competitions can be profitable for hosting
   clubs).
4. For individual competitions, entrants represent their club, and the club pays for the
   individual entry (whether it collects that directly from the individual or not is down
   to the club).

This way smaller clubs that do not participate widely are not effectively subsidising those clubs that do.

{it’s not going to be practical for individual competitions to have a bank account each so the only independent bank accounts are likely to be those at clubs and one at the centre. Competition managers having set a fee structure- which is anticipated to be modest – that is paid by participating clubs to the centre, can then claim the monies up to that level from the centre upon production of receipts}

This replaces the current fees for club affiliation, rider membership, event registration, match levy, race licence for national competitions and separate charges for BC national and ICSF championships.

Any clubs that do not pay their fees will be deemed to be operating outside of the sport and unable to enjoy the benefits or participate in the competition structure.

Membership

Principles:

In terms of membership, there is merit in having that as wide as possible with different classes of membership as is the case with many other sports. This encourages loyalty and volunteers. The proposal is CS membership is in one of three categories:

i. Race rider member:
ii.Club Train members: are still able to compete in defined low level competitions.
iii. Support member: (club officials, volunteers, parents/guardians)

All these members will be able to vote at the AGM (above a certain age?). The club will register its members and their categories and other key criteria (gender, dob, location etc) on a central database. This will be necessary for insurance, administration etc.
This will give a wider voice beyond riders in the future of the sport and at the AGM etc. The club fee for each category will be decided by the club itself and take account of any payments under the above structure as well as its own costs).

Overall Management of the Sport

The above devolved structure does however leave a question over where the overall management of the sport lies? The Trustees will have an oversight function and the individual structures above will largely self-run. There will, however, need to be some
operational body. It is suggested that this is composed of representatives of the functions above (or at least some of them with a nominated chair). The positions in the sport are entirely voluntary (apart from possibly administration) and should be elected by a process to be agreed in the constitution and ratified at an AGM.

Bob Falconer (Current BC commission – Development) 08/10/2025