It has been announced today (Wednesday Jan 9) that sportscotland is to merge with the Scottish Institute of Sport to create a new national organisation. The full press release is here. 'New Dawn for Scottish Sport' is the headline.Sport Minister Stewart Maxwell said that the new organisation would be "leaner and more efficient, removing the layers of bureaucracy of the previous structure, while making sure the interests of sport remain paramount." However, no redundancies are expected.
The new organisation will retain the name sportscotland but the headquarters will move to Glasgow. The Boards of sportscotland and the Scottish Institute of Sport are to merge. The new body will be responsible for overseeing the development of sport at all levels in Scotland, dispensing both Government and Lottery funding.
The Scottish Institute of Sport as an entity will apparently remain intact at their Stirling HQ. The SIS supports the 'elite' curlers in Scotland.
The ramifications of the announcement and its effect on our sport of curling, which receives considerable funding from sportscotland for many purposes, remains to be seen.
However, Mike Ferguson, the Royal Club's Chairman said, “The Royal Caledonian Curling Club has been involved with the consultations which have been taking place over the last few months regarding the future of sportscotland. We are pleased that the Scottish Government have listened and that the views of the Scottish Governing Bodies of Sport including the Royal Club have been taken into account when shaping the way forward for sportscotland and that a National Agency has been retained. We look forward to working with the merged sportscotland/Scottish Institute of Sport to ensure that curling remains one of the most prominent sports for the nation and for the delivery of national sports policy in Scotland. To this end meetings have already been arranged with senior figures to discuss matters in greater detail.”
There is a thread on the topic on the Scottish Curling Forum here.
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