NBFL signs up to Respect
 

North Berks Football League has signed up to the Football Association's RESPECT campaign

This section will give details about Respect, and how we intend to include it within NBFL                     .

                                                                                                            Respect - Football Association 

The Respect Programme

The Respect Programme is about changing mindsets, and making the game more enjoyable for everyone. One in three games of football played in England don't have a qualified, independent match official, and within the North Berks Football League we were able to appoint "league referees" to more than 95% of games, relying on clubs to provide their own referees (who do us proud).  Some similar leagues are unable to cover more than 50% of their games and we wish to maintain our excellent coverage of games.  It looks likely that we may well have more than 10% of our games without a referee this coming season. 

Respect is about educating people about what is acceptable behaviour towards referees and youngsters, and changing the mindset that is all too prevalent in football. "If he's going to ref, he should expect abuse", or "if he gets it wrong, what does he expect?" are all too common - no wonder so few people are prepared to referee.

 

 

What is Respect?

Respect is The FA's programme of activities to combat unacceptable behaviour in our game at every level - on the pitch and from the sidelines.

This was the No.1 priority emerging from the biggest opinion survey to date of grassroots football in England. It was carried out in late 2007 and directly informed The FA's National Game Strategy, published in March 2008.

We hope that Respect will ensure a safe, positive environment for everyone to enjoy football. From the start it will have an impact on the following areas:

Codes of Conduct: Introduction

Codes of Conduct aren't new and are already in use by some clubs (it is mandatory for Charter Standard clubs). Some are successful, some are forgotten and are not acted upon.

Respect brings them to life.

How? By supporting and strengthening the Codes of Conduct with possible consequences. There is little point in having a set of rules if no action is taken if and when they're broken.

The Codes are aimed at (click on any to link to the code of conduct):

Respect works on placing responsibility for their actions on individuals: break your Code, and bear the consequences.

Codes of Conduct - clubs' responsibilities:

Each Respect Code of Conduct explains that action can be taken for breaking a Code, so these are understood from the outset.

Your member clubs have two main responsibilities around the Codes:

1.      To ensure everyone within the club, whatever their role, has read, agreed and accepted their relevant Code - and understood the actions which could be taken if Codes are broken

2.      To deal fairly and consistently with anyone who breaks 'their' Code

The Charter Standard Clubs should already have their own club Codes of Conduct, so we would recommend that Charter Standard Clubs look at the Respect Codes and see if there is anything missing from these. They may want to replace the previous codes with the new Respect ones, or they may want to add some of the lines from the Respect Codes to these.

It is not advisable to use both sets of Codes as this could be confusing.

The important difference is ensuring clubs - and through them their own members - understand and appreciate what can happen if Codes are broken. That way, there should be no subsequent debate because they didn't understand the consequences of breaking a Code.

If a club hasn't used Codes of Conduct before - or has Codes without consequences - this needs discussion, so they understand how the Codes work and what their responsibilities are.