World Sailing Presidential Newsletter – Council Decisions & Governance standards

The following article is from Kim Andersen at World Sailing:

The last month has been marred by a lot of misinformation being circulated around one decision voted on at the recent World Sailing Annual Meeting in Sarasota, Florida. I would like to take this opportunity to ensure that the entire World Sailing family is fully briefed and informed on this situation so that there is no further misunderstandings.

Proceeding of submission 037-18:
At the World Sailing Annual Conference, the World Sailing Board made a late submission regarding the Mixed One-Person Dinghy Event, Submission 037-18. The reason for the late submission came from the expressed concern of the Member National Authorities (MNAs) and a detailed explanation was clearly outlined to Council and Committee members. Many of our Member National Authorities expressed concerns that the Mixed One-Person Dinghy Event would not work as a format and the selection of the Equipment would not be possible. The MNAs, therefore, asked the Board to give guidance to Council in order to resolve this matter.

The World Sailing Board made this a priority. On the first day of the Board meeting, ahead of the conference, the Board spent one day going through all the options available for the Events in question, which resulted in the Board agreeing to a late submission. The late submission was then made available at the earliest possible time, immediately after the Board meeting that same day, which was the start of the 
Annual Conference. The submission was launched at that time in order to make sure that it could be a part of the 
full Committee process leading up to the Council meeting at the end of the week.

During the week, no Committee reached a solution on what Equipment was suitable for the Mixed One-Person Dinghy Event, nor the format that it would take.

At the Council meeting, submission 037-18 needed 75% of votes to be passed: it received 79% and was approved by Council. It was then submitted at the Annual General Meeting and required only a simple majority to pass – it received 78% of the votes.

After the meeting, World Sailing made public all voting results for each vote in Council and the requested votes at the AGM.

Summary of results
Submission 037-18 had been carried forward. As per the World Sailing statutes and regulations, this submission has received the required number of votes both within Council and at the Annual General Meeting.

While some individuals may not like the outcome, it is important that the entire sailing family understand the facts and transparent processes that have been followed which have led to this result.

It is very clear that the minutes in question reflect the true actions and decisions from the meeting, in particular the actual voting at the meeting, and not the intentions of individuals before or after the voting process. Therefore, I would like to refer to the minutes of the World Sailing Council and Annual General meeting: http://www.sailing.org/meetings/2018-conference.php.

Furthermore, I believe that given the situation, this overview shows that the way that we deal with difficult situations (in this case the difficult situation being an outcome of a compromised decision from the Mid-Year meeting in May 2018) in our existing decision-making process is done in an open and transparent manner.

While some individuals believe that the intentions of the Board are not in the best interest of sailing, I would like to say that if the intentions for the late board submission were as bad as some of the accusations, an alternative route for the submission 037-18 could have been to make it only available for the AGM vote. This would have bypassed the Committee structure and Council in the process, avoiding the 75% majority vote in Council – personally I don’t think this would have been an appropriate or transparent way forward.

Lastly, in the event that submission 037-18 had not been approved in Council, some of the MNA’s in favor of the proposal would have carried the submission forward to the Annual General Meeting. For example, the French MNA had already made a submission to the Annual General Meeting before the council meeting. Nonetheless, the results of the vote at the Annual General Meeting was clear – 78% in favor when only a simple majority vote was needed, the majority were clearly in favour for the submission and it has been approved.

Comprehensive follow up & transparent audit
World Sailing prides itself on being a transparent organization, which is why any suggestions of voting fraud or conflicts of interest are allegations which are taken very seriously.

This is why when individuals made public claims about flawed voting systems and the Board being conflicted, the Board gave this accusation its full attention and launched an investigation. Any unidentified technical problems with the voting system would have affected not only the vote for submission 037-18 but all the voting over the two Council days and at the AGM.

Based on the investigation launched, the Board has since received a technical report from the supplier of the voting system, a report from the Chairman of the Audit Committee, a detailed analysis of the votes cast during the Council meetings and a report of an independent firm of auditors. The results concluded that no failures were detected or indicated.

Therefore, after the review of the investigation, the minutes were signed by myself as President and approved by Council on a Council call held on December 21st 2018.

Furthermore, I would like to say that whilst this one vote has been the centre of many misinformed discussions, there were also a lot of other decisions that were made at the annual meeting in Sarasota. For those interested in those additional decisions, they can be read in the published minutes from the Council meeting. In addition, more background information for the selection of Events and Equipment for the 2024 Olympics can be read in the “Report from the President“.