Great news for rallying in Scotland - the Scottish Government has agreed to drop the rule that only members of the same household could share a car for motorsport.
This means that rallying, trials, etc can resume almost as normal, but this applies only in areas at Level 3 or below, and there are still requirements, like face coverings in the car, and no spectators. Guidelines issued by Motorsport UK must be followed, an update is expected Friday 14th May
Read on for more details from Chairman Pete.
Hello again everyone
I last wrote just over two weeks ago with the news that motorsport would begin again from Monday 26th April and I know that events ran the following weekend and that others are set to go ahead in the coming weeks. At that time however I was not able to confirm that the Scottish Government had given agreement to allow two competitors from different households in a car.
I promised that discussions on this point were ongoing and I am very delighted to confirm that agreement has now been reached to allow motorsport competition with car sharing to go ahead for events running in Local Authority areas in Covid-19 restriction Level 3 or lower.
I know this is very welcome news for many event organisers and especially for the Glenrothes MSC Summer Stages at Crail on 12th June and the Mull RC Dunoon Presents Argyll Rally on 25th/26th June. Entries for both of these events opened last weekend, in anticipation of this news, and very quickly achieved full entries. But there are competitors all round Scotland waiting to get out on more local events from 12 Car Rallies to Cross Country Trials.
A further updated version of the Scotland specific guidelines has been agreed and will be available on the Covid-19 page of the Motorsport UK website. As I said before, clubs intending to organise events should read through all of the available material, not just the Scotland page, to ensure they meet all of the compliance requirements for running a Covid-19 safe event. There is still much work to be done and it has been suggested that SAMSC can play a role by enabling a small working group involving some of the event Covid-19 officers with a view to sharing best practice. More on this to follow.
Note in particular that spectators are still not generally allowed and total numbers on site are also limited. These points may change in future phases of easing restrictions. Clubs should also make sure they engage fully with the venues they want to use to make sure they comply with any local requirements which may be in place. Overnight stays are allowed within the guidelines applicable to the hospitality sector but please ensure that any local and/or national travel restrictions are still followed.
Finally, please engage fully with all your members and in particular, potential competitors and volunteer official/marshals. There are important changes to the way events will run under Covid-19 protocols including Covid-19 testing, signing-on, scrutineering, timing, incident handling and service area management. Information on all this is available on the Motorsport UK website and it is very important that everyone involved understands how these changes will impact on them. Motorsport UK have produced a video aimed at competitors which has already been send out to them but as a reminder, here is the link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYIbpEkm9-w
I want to commend again John Ryan, Technical Sporting Director and all the team at Motorsport UK, who along with the staff at Sportscotland, have worked together to gain approval from Scottish Government to allow our sport to continue. I repeat what I said last time that it is incumbent on all of us to follow all of the rules and guideline to show motorsport in a good light.
Regards
Pete Weall
Chairman
12/05/2021