Cricket Victoria, CSB, ISEC and SECA sign Heads of Agreement

Since the release of Cricket Victoria’s “Melbourne Metropolitan Cricket” enhanced strategy in May 2017, CSB, SECA and ISEC (which includes the All Girls Cricket Competition – AGCC) have been working together to develop a structure that will deliver benefits for all member clubs, participants and the game of cricket across the region.

The result has been the development of a proposed integration plan for SECA and ISEC within CSB over a multi-year transitional period.

Deeds of Transition will now be developed with each of SECA and ISEC and CSB, covering items such as governance, financial models and historical records.

Following the signing of the Heads of Agreement, Cricket Victoria – with the support of Cricket Australia – will provide increased staff resourcing to support CSB.

The Heads of Agreement also provides immediate non-elected, appointed seats on the CSB Board of Management for both SECA and ISEC whilst the Deeds of Transition are completed with each association.

Upon completion, the Deed of Transition provides SECA, ISEC and CSB clubs with full voting rights to nominate, and vote on the six elected CSB Board positions.

President of ISEC and Chairman of the AGCC Iain Giles said although there was still a lot of work to complete, it was a significant step forward.

“Over the next 12 months the three bodies will develop Deeds of Transition to be presented to each membership base for approval before the commencement of the 2019/20 season,” Giles said.

“Should the Deeds of Transition be accepted by the membership base, the transition to a single governance structure will then take place over the following three-year period”.

President of SECA Phil Cox said the association was pleased to be involved and Clubs would have a say in how the Deeds of Transition evolve.

“There will be no immediate impact on the governance and operations of the three organisations for the upcoming 2018-19 season other than increased cooperation and the appointment of the additional resources from Cricket Victoria,” Cox said.

Cricket Victoria General Manager of Game and Market Development Rohan O’Neill said the signing of the Heads of Agreement with SECA and ISEC was a milestone.

“We have spent a year working together on the most productive way to deliver cricket at all levels for Melbourne’s inner south east and bayside regions. This collective approach to supporting local cricket will service close to 700 club cricket teams and I’d like to thank ISEC and SECA for their support and willingness to reach this outcome using the Cricket Southern Bayside model,” O’Neill said.

“Cricket Southern Bayside has been a successful change in the metropolitan cricket landscape and the feedback from the players, coaches, volunteers and other administrators speaks to that. As we’ve said from day one, our overarching principle is to work towards a set of common objectives for metropolitan cricket achieved through local ownership” O’Neill said.

Each of the three organisations will soon present the transition plan to respective members.