Dear Touchline
In reply to Arthur Bowden, the Honorary General Secretary of the Dorset and Wiltshire Rugby Football Union.
In his letter, Mr Bowden refers to recent press releases from the Treasury and Charity Commission in relation to Community Amateur Sports Clubs (CASCs). In view of the valuable and important role played by CASCs in promoting the health and cohesion of their local communities the Charity Commission decided, at the end of October, that it will recognise as charitable purposes:
The promotion of community participation in healthy recreation by the provision of facilities for the playing of particular sports; and the advancement of the physical education of young people not undergoing formal education.
The Department of Culture, Media and Sport whilst pleased with the decision felt that it might still fall short of including all clubs they would wish to see benefit. As a result in November the Treasury launched a consultation document called ‘Promoting Sport in the Community’.
The aim of the consultation document is to seek views from interested parties on whether, given the Charity Commission’s decision, sports clubs agree with the Government’s assessment that charitability would appear to offer real advantages over and above the limited tax relief package. The document can be accessed
from the Treasury’s Internet site
http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk. The consultation exercise is an opportunity for all interested parties to help shape the future Government policy on CASCs and the Treasury are keen for as many sports clubs to respond as possible.
I hope Mr Bowden and your readers find this reply helpful.
Angela Eagle MP
Dear Touchline
I must express my surprise and appreciation at and of the quite outstanding account of one old man’s dedication to a single club.
I had no idea that anything of the sort was going on and to be confronted by the club chairman, David Shephard, triumphantly waving the January edition of Touchline was an experience which will be impossible to forget.
It would indeed have been difficult for me to resist the lure of rugby football, following, as I did, in the steps of an enthusiast such as father, who played for St Peter’s School, York (captain), Emmanuel College, Cambridge (captain), Liverpool RFC and Lancashire all in the first decade of the century. He was in the Liverpool team which included three current international captains simultaneously: Poulton-Palmer (England, Frank Turner (Scotland) and Dickie Lloyd (Ireland) not to mention the double Victoria Cross winner Noel Chevasse of the RAMC. Father went on to coach the most successful Uppingham School XV in the years immediately before the Great War and introduced the sport into St Aubyn’s School when he took the school over in 1922. But I digress and must return to my original project which was to thank you most sincerely on behalf of myself, and indeed of the Woodford Club, which has gained some useful publicity as a result.
With sincere thanks
Harold Colley |
