A Special Council meeting was held 30 October 2025, with a quorum of Executive Members and Member Clubs, some Life Members were also in attendance.
The focus of the Special Council meeting was to consider changes to the Associations Constitution and Policies after extensive feedback and engagement with our Member Clubs and their / our members over recent months.
It was important to consider these proposed changes ahead of the 2025 netball season, so that all members registering into competitions and programs have visibility of the changes adopted.
It is important to know that all changes tabled were voted in favour in full, either by all voting members or the majority of voting members consistent with our Constitution.
The Special Council meeting also ratified two appointments to the Executive Committee, and we welcome Michelle Archer into the role of Secretary and Sue Xenos into the role of Admin Secretary. They will remain in these positions until the Annual General Meeting that will be held on Wednesday 12 March 2025. Soon we will open our nominations for all positions for season 2025 both for the Executive and Convenors and members of Sub Committees. We will let you know when we do this.
There were minor edits made to the readability of the Constitution and Policies that do not change the intent, and updates were made to hyperlinks and email addresses. There were other minor changes made to both documents that put in practice how we operate the business of netball that are considered good governance practice.
The key changes to the constitution included:
One change was made to the make up the Executive Committee, this is to remove the Admin Secretary and replace with a new role Vice President.
The following new Convenor roles were created to lead sub-Committees / and or particular programs that the Association wants to drive in season 2025 to create a greater sense of inclusion and accessibility to our game or to combine previous Convenor roles where it has been trialled in the 2024 season. They include:
Competition Convenor (replaces Grading and Fixtures Convenors into a single role).
Twilight Convenor who will support Term 1 and / or Term 4 evening competitions.
All Abilities Convenor will coordinate a program that encompasses an All-Abilities Program for people with disability as well as oversees the Walking Netball program.
NetSetGo Convenor who will promote the NetSetGo pathways of the Net program, Set U8s modified games and Go U10s modified games, they will also lead the Net Program during the main winter competition.
Boys and Mens Convenor will promote boys and men's netball pathways in all our competitions across a season. They would also in collaboration with the Rep Convenor identify and support Boys and Mens teams to participate in Netball NSW State Titles where there is the interest.
The key changes to our policies include:
Introduction of a day registration, this is intended to be applied consistent with Netball NSW intent which at a high level, is to enable people to 'try' netball before they commit or to allow a player to register in a competition for one day as a fill in player, where they do not currently have a membership. You can read more here about Netball NSW membership categories https://nsw.netball.com.au/netball-nsw-membership
Deferred games in Final Series if a game needs to be deferred in the final series (usually as a result of the Netball NSW weather policy being applied) the game will be played on the Sunday immediately following the scheduled Saturday of play, except where this falls on Father's Day. In this instance the game may be played mid-week, or the following weekends play of the final series may include Saturday and Sunday games.
Another important part of our policies changes impacted the Representative Program and the key changes include:
Reinforcing that players selected are registered players from within our Association (or will register as active playing members for the year ahead). This means that there will be minimum games played that must occur prior to State Titles or a selected player has not met their obligation to attend State Titles and another player from with the Association will be selected to attend in their place.
For Junior State Titles (12s, 13s, 14s) this means a player selected must be registered and play in 5 games of the winter competition before Junior State Titles.
For Senior State Titles (15s, 17s, Opens) this means a player selected must be registered and play in 3 games of the winter competition before Senior State Titles.
Members also sought to stipulate that the Representative Program must be built upon the basis of the program being a fun, learning environment for emerging athletes of the Association where forging positive relationships with the athletes' families was a key part of the Representative program.
If re-selections are called for at any time, previously trialled players as well as new athletes could seek selection.
Each Representative Team selected will be allocated at least one Canteen and /or BBQ duty each Winter Competition prior to the start of their State Title event as allocated. That selected players or their parents will need to for fill this duty.
Extra activities deemed outside of the standard Representative Program are to be agreed in consultation with the Team Coach, Manager and the Representative Convenor. In a practical sense this might be a team dinner.
Representative Players in the main will be accommodated by their parents / care givers for State Titles. Those players not able to be accommodated in this manner will be accommodated in the motel / cabin style accommodation with the Officials attending State Titles.
The full changes adopted this evening at the Special Council Meeting will now undergo the publishing process and will be published on the Associations website as soon as possible. A news alert will be provided to members when this occurs.
The final item for discussion agreed to by the members was to adjust the timeslots of the 2025 Winter Competiton. The key changes are:
Time Slot | Competition / Program | Why |
9am | Intermediate 1 (aimed at highest playing ability up to 17 years) Intermediate 2 (aimed at 14-16 years) | This is introduced to enable our NetSetGo kids and our all-abilities participants to aspire to the highest level of our Intermediate competition. It also enables our Representative players to play an early game at our Association, participate in a second game of Mixed later in the day, for a single fee to or to assist with umpire allocations or to play at another Association in the afternoon. |
9.15am to 10am | Net – Skills Development Program court 1 All Abilities – Skills Development Program court 2 Walking Netball Court 3 | A dedicated timeslot for inclusion and accessibility programs. |
10.35am | Go U8s Set U10s Intermediate 5 (aimed at 11-12 years) | Go and Set move to a new timeslot |
11.55am | Intermediate 4 (aimed at 12-13 years) Intermediate 3 (aimed at 13-14 years) | No change |
1.10pm | Boys/Mixed U14s Boys/Mixed U17s Senior 2 Mixed Senior Social | Introduces the opportunities for female Intermediate aged to participate in mixed game of netball and grows the participation of boys and men to netball. It also enables a social only no scores kept and no final series just fun and laughter. |
2.30pm | Senior 1 Senior 3 | No change |
Note: Member Clubs will be able to open their registrations for season 2025 from 1 December 2024.
We are really excited about the positive steps to drive grassroots participation in our local community with your help in season 2025.
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