by Tomasz Delega
Dear colleagues, dear arbiters,
I don’t like to use big words, but this time something important happened for chess society, especially for chess arbiters in Europe. During the European Chess Union General Assembly in Batumi, Georgia (26 October 2019), the delegates unanimously approved the proposal by ECU Arbiters’ Council regarding the system of appointments of arbiters for the ECU events. According to the new regulations, the ECU Arbiters’ Council will have a right to appoint foreign arbiters (20% of all match arbiters) for each ECU events. It means that first time ever (as fas as I remember) a part of arbiters’ team will be nominated directly by the Arbiters’ Council. It gives us a possibility to create on European level a nomination system for arbiters, based on qualification, experience and evaluations of arbiters. Then, we will announce the call of interest for the arbiters, who are interested to be appointed for any ECU event.
What the ECU Tournament Rules (the new version valid from 1 January 2020) exactly says:
B.10. Arbiters and other officials
B.10.1.1 Each organiser of an ECU competition may propose persons for the position of Chief Arbiter, Deputy Chief Arbiter and Pairings Officer. This proposal should be sent to the ECU Arbiters’ Council at least three months before the start of the competition and all proposed persons should be FIDE licensed arbiters.
B.10.1.2 The ECU Arbiters’ Council can make their own proposal and will present it to the ECU President together with the proposal of the organiser.
The ECU Arbiters’ Council may also put some remarks on the proposals of the organiser based on previous performances of the proposed arbiters.
B.10.1.3 In case of lack of proposal from the organiser in the term mentioned above, Arbiters’ Council will make their own proposal to ECU President.
B.10.2.1 The Chief Arbiter, one or two Deputy Chief Arbiters and the Pairings Officer (Annex 6) shall be appointed by the ECU President. If deemed necessary the ECU President may consult the organising chess federation, the ECU Board, ECU Arbiters’ Council and/or the ECU Tournament Director(s).
B.10.2.2 The 20% of the arbiters other than principals mentioned in B.10.2.1 shall be appointed directly by the ECU Arbiters’ Council. The 20% appointed by the ECU Arbiter Council shall be foreigners arbiters not belonging to the hosting federation. This doesn’t prevent the organiser to appoint extra foreign arbiters out of the above mentioned quota. In case of any objection to the arbiters proposed by the ECU Arbiters’ Council the Organizer should inform the Council immediately.
B.10.2.3 Every year the ECU Arbiters’ Council will announce the call of interests for European arbiters. After receiving applications from arbiters, the ECU Arbiters’ Council will publish the list of interested arbiters. The arbiter’s federation has a right to send to the ECU Arbiters’ Council a motivated request to delete arbiter from the list of interested arbiters in two weeks after publishing it.
B.10.3 The organising chess federation is responsible for the expenses of appointed arbiters and pairings officer mentioned above (travelling costs – either air travel or first class rail travel with sleeping car – living expenses and pocket money) and shall also foresee a stipend.
B.10.4 The organising chess federation will appoint other necessary FIDE licensed arbiters and other officials. The minimum of male or female arbiters in each European Championship is 25%. The total number of arbiters to be appointed for each Championship is Annex 6. The final list of Arbiters, including the proposal from the organizer, which shall be sent at least two months before the start of the tournament, shall be approved by the ECU Arbiters’ Council.
Apart from that, we will follow of course the FIDE regulations regarding appointments of arbiters, according to their categories.
At present we are working on the complex system of appointment of arbiters. In simple words, our idea is to collect applications from arbiters, grade it giving points (for example for arbiters category, languages, etc.), then make “a queue” for ECU events. We would like to start the system running from the beginning of 2020. The details will be published soon.
We would like to thank all delegates for their support.
Chairman of ECU Arbiters’ Council
Tomasz Delega