Angry councillors call for intervention of Sports Minister

Published on Friday 30 March 2007 01:05

BORDERS councillors yesterday issued a scathing attack on the Scottish Rugby Union over its decision to scrap the professional team and called for the intervention of the Scottish Executive's Sports Minister.

An emergency motion (below left) unanimously approved at yesterday's full council meeting effectively issued a vote of "no confidence" in the management of the SRU over a sport it stated was crucial to the future well-being of the south-east corner of Scotland. However, David Parker, the council leader, emerged from the debate to insist that while his fellow councillors had agreed to take up the fight they could only provide a focal point for others to join and provide the substance.

But the Borderers are clearly wishing their voices to be heard, instructing David Hume, the SBC chief executive, and Parker to take "immediate action", in the form of sending the motion to and seeking meetings with the SRU, Patricia Ferguson, the Scottish Sports Minister, and other Scottish local authorities and public bodies, as well as sending the motion to the International Rugby Board in Dublin.

Professional players in the region were still trying to come to terms with the ramifications of the decision, many with young families and new mortgages still waiting to hear if they had a future in rugby when their contracts end on 31 May. Some are heading south next week for trials with clubs in England. The Scottish Professional Players Association issued another withering statement which encapsulated their anger.

How much the sabre-rattling, demands and bold action plans will achieve is debatable, but the degree of concern and unpopularity of the SRU's executive board in this part of the country is clear.

The debate has shifted since Tuesday's decision, away from the loss of the region's professional team to greater concerns about the future of the region's main sport. Bob Carruthers, the Edinburgh owner from Fife, and other individuals and groups pledged their support to the council as action plans were drafted.

He maintains that he could provide several millions of pounds to willing Borderers who wished to run the professional team themselves, while a bid by Hawick men Alastair Cranston and Murray Watson to develop a 'Supporters Direct' initiative, which has saved many football clubs from extinction, was gathering pace.

The SRU leaders felt they had no option but to close a professional team and the 23m debt supports such a decision. Many point to the fact more than 500 people watched a youth game in the Borders last week and over 1,000 attended an amateur club derby as evidence that the interest remains, but the SRU has failed to grasp it, and , rubbing salt in the wounds, opted instead for an area which has failed to generate any more support despite having four more years in existence.

For the SRU, the real challenge now is to hold on to the once-proud production line of great rugby talent. The change in governance of the SRU has left the Borders with no representatives on the executive board and just two involved on the 17-strong Scottish Rugby Council - one representing Scottish schools and the other district league clubs in the south. The board features five individuals with links to Edinburgh clubs, two with Glasgow connections, one linked to English rugby and two with no discernible links.

That structure and this week's decision, following last year's to move this year's IRB world sevens event from Melrose to Murrayfield - with McKie insisting he did not believe Melrose could attract more than 10,000 people - have created a chasm.

There has been talk of Borders clubs resigning membership of the SRU though that would be fraught with problems.

The loss of the Reivers dominated a Border League meeting on Wednesday night called to discuss sponsorship of the struggling sevens circuit. They agreed, however, to use the existing channels within the union to effect debate with the union hierarchy on the wider issue of the future of Borders rugby.

Parker stated: "I won't offer false hope; we have to be realistic about it. It looks like these decisions are made and it may already be too late, but we have had a lot of people coming to us asking what we can do - a whole myriad of rugby people and bodies, and some with offers of funding - so we feel a sense of duty to do all we can to bring them together and try to find hope.

"It is regrettable that the SRU did not come and speak with us about the problems they were having with the Borders.

"David Kilshaw, the Borders chairman, did and we agreed to provide help with marketing and facilities for next season, but had we known this was a matter of closure we could have looked at a much bigger picture.

"We are a local council and are not about to start running a professional rugby team, but there is immeasurable scope for working in partnership with bodies like the SRU to improve facilities for rugby which benefit the wider community.

"If the SRU are serious about rugby and genuinely did not want to make this decision there may be a willingness there to give us time to find a more positive solution."