I write to you as Chairman of Newbury Rugby club, a position I am very proud to hold having been involved as a player and member of the club for over 30 years.

Many of you will have read reports in the Newbury Weekly News about the financial state of Newbury Rugby Club which I am sure that you find upsetting. For me anything that puts into doubt the future of a community sport in the local area is distressing.

Firstly I would like to acknowledge that Newbury Rugby Club has made mistakes over a number of years. The details are too complex to go into here but as an example it was my mistake that we did not write to our debenture holders recently after the sale of a part of our land. I should have done this and the complications in doing so should have been addressed promptly.

We have now appointed a person who will in the coming months work with the debenture trustees to assume administration of the scheme and get the communication to the level it should be.

The club has faced significant financial difficulties and as pointed out in the paper has been very successful in working with our creditors to clear our outstanding liabilities with them. Whilst we do still have a significant way to go to clear this to zero for everybody, we are today operating day to day with a balanced budget. It is our commitment that we will pay all that we owe as soon as we can.

At the start of my Chairmanship I outlined a vision of sustainable community rugby, which was very different to where the club had been in recent years. The objective of Newbury Rugby Club is to provide opportunities to play rugby for the young people of Newbury and the young of heart. In order to do this the club must run its business affairs in a sustainable way, not just now but for many years to come. We have started on that path as tough as it is and we are determined to see that through.

We are very active in the community. We provide community sport coaches who go into local schools. This activity is funded by The Greenham Common Trust and by working together we are enabling more coverage of all sports not just rugby in local schools.

We put out every week over 30 sides which include senior men, ladies, over 350 children under 16, a girls side and our extremely successful Colts sides. It gives me a great deal of pleasure to see that these are local people who get enjoyment from our fantastic facility. Being a club run by volunteers we also give enjoyment to many people who do not play but without whom the game would not exist. We have a very loyal set of supporters of our 1st XV who have not had too much to cheer about in recent seasons but who still come to games week in, week out and cheer for “The Blues”.

Elsewhere in the club we have a lot of success, it often goes unnoticed by the local community but for those teams they don’t do it for any form of recognition but for the support of their teammates.

Our fantastic club house must pay its own way and to do that it has to appeal to the local community for events and conferencing. We have recently taken steps to ensure that it does. This is one simple lesson that we have learnt from the past and its one we now have a major focus on.

The important thing for me is that the rugby club is still able to function whilst we work out the issues of the past with the people whom it still affects. I don’t want past issues to impact the great potential we have as a community club. We can make it through these difficulties with the support of, our members, our debenture holders, the local community, our suppliers and our sponsors, all of whom are vital to ensuring that we deliver sustainable community rugby as per our vision.

Finally if anybody wishes to help us in any way at all, then please do contact me. Running a rugby club takes the massive effort of many volunteers and without help community rugby will cease to exist in Newbury , I for one am doing all I can to make sure that we have a rugby club in Newbury for many many years to come.

Regards
Julian Lewis
Chairman – Newbury RFC.