For fellow Canadians, I received this news release today. When you read it, does it say to you that Lorraine Stubbs has been reinstated in her position? I would love to know what is going on behind the scenes.

Thursday, 15 December 2011

Report of Findings Related to an Appeal by

Lorraine Stubbs against Dressage Canada

Equine Canada is announcing the results of an inquiry the federation has conducted in

response to an Appeal filed by Lorraine Stubbs against decisions by Dressage Canada,

pursuant to our Appeals Policy.

Dressage Canada (“DC”) is a discipline committee created by Equine Canada to

administer our domestic Dressage system and our national Dressage teams, and to

develop Dressage athletes and the sport of Dressage. Dressage Canada is led by the

Dressage Canada board, composed of volunteers elected by those individual members of

Equine Canada who have exercised the option of becoming members of Dressage

Canada, and of volunteers named by some Dressage Canada board committees. The DC

Athletes Council is a standing committee of Dressage Canada, comprised of Canada’s

high performance (long-listed and short-listed) Dressage riders, and represents the views

of athletes in DC decision-making processes and to the Dressage Canada board. The DC

High Performance Committee is a standing committee of Dressage Canada, responsible

for the development, selection, training, and deployment of Equine Canada’s high

performance Dressage athletes and Dressage teams.

Lorraine Stubbs is a member of Equine Canada and of Dressage Canada. She is also

accredited by Equine Canada as a senior Dressage judge and by the International

Equestrian Federation as a 4-star Dressage judge. On 30 March 2011, the Dressage

Canada board ratified an earlier decision by the DC High Performance Committee to

name Ms Stubbs as chair of that committee.

On 24 August 2011, the DC Athletes Council met and adopted a resolution asking the

Dressage Canada board to remove Ms Stubbs from her role as chair of the DC High

Performance Committee, due to concerns by the DC Athletes Council that there is a

conflict of interest in having a Dressage judge serve as chair of the DC High Performance

Committee. There were no allegations of wrongdoing by Ms Stubbs.

During an in-camera session at its meeting of 25 August 2011, the Dressage Canada

board received the resolution from the DC Athletes Council. The Dressage Canada board

reminded Ms Stubbs that, as per the Equine Canada “Conflict of Interest Guidelines for

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Findings Related to an Appeal by Lorraine Stubbs against Dressage Canada Page 2 of 4

Councils and Committees”, she would be required to recuse herself from the vote on the

matter.

Equine Canada has received contrasting and irreconcilable accounts from those present of

how that meeting unfolded, how much prior notice Ms Stubbs’ received, and what

opportunity she had to participate in the process. Although minutes of the meeting were

produced, the meeting itself was not recorded. Subsequent events, however, supersede

the differences in those accounts.

It is clear that by the end of its meeting, the Dressage Canada board voted to ask Ms

Stubbs for her resignation.

Immediately afterwards, the chair of the Dressage Canada board telephoned Ms Stubbs

and informed her of the results of the vote. During the course of that conversation, Ms

Stubbs orally conveyed her resignation as chair of the DC High Performance Committee

and as a member of the Dressage Canada board. Ms Stubbs has subsequently stated that

she uttered her words of resignation believing that she had no alternative, that she felt the

Dressage Canada board decision was taken in response to a rushed process that did not

afford her sufficient opportunity to fully understand the concerns, study the situation,

review her options, and respond meaningfully.

On 29 August 2011, the Dressage Canada board issued a public advisory through Equine

Canada, “announc[ing] the regretful resignation of Lorraine Stubbs as chair of the

Dressage Canada High Performance Committee”. On 06 September 2011, the DC

Athletes Council circulated through Equine Canada an e-mail to its members, stating that

the Dressage Canada board had paid heed to the athletes’ concerns and had “fulfilled our

recommendation to have Lorraine Stubbs removed as chair of the High Performance

Committee”.

Ms Stubbs filed an Appeal with Equine Canada, asking the federation to invalidate her

departure as chair of the DC High Performance Committee and as a member of the

Dressage Canada board.

Equine Canada has come to the following conclusions:

1. Under the terms of the “Dressage Canada Board Member

Resignation/Dismissal Policy”, a resignation by a Dressage Canada board

member must be offered in writing to be valid. Notwithstanding Ms

Stubbs’ oral statement during her telephone conversation of 25 August

2011 with the chair of the Dressage Canada board – and irrespective of her

motivations or the background leading to that statement – all parties are

agreed that she did not and has not filed a letter of resignation. As a result,

she can not properly be said to have resigned. It is, therefore, the finding

of Equine Canada that Ms Stubbs remains chair of the DC High

Performance Committee and a member of the Dressage Canada board.

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2. In the absence of a written letter of resignation, the Dressage Canada board

erred in announcing that it had accepted Ms Stubbs’ resignation. In

consequence, the DC Athletes Council e-mail of 06 September 2011 was

also erroneous. Although these actions were taken in the good faith belief

that Ms Stubbs’ oral resignation was sufficient, that belief was mistaken.

It is, therefore, the decision of Equine Canada that this error be rectified by

the public issuance of this report.

3. The “Dressage Canada Governance and Policy Manual” is largely silent

on questions of how a motion of non-confidence in a Dressage Canada

board member should be managed: how much notice should the subject

receive prior to the motion being moved at a meeting; what information

the subject is entitled to receive; what are the duties and responsibilities of

the subject in co-operating with efforts to come to a fair and reasoned

decision; what are the subject’s rights in replying to the stated grounds for

removal. In Ms Stubbs’ case, this gap had no bearing on the ultimate

outcome of her Appeal, which was instead decided by the absence of a

written letter of resignation. However, this case does illustrate that this

gap in Dressage Canada’s rules of procedure can lead to confusion over

due process. It is, therefore, the direction of Equine Canada to the

Dressage Canada board to properly elaborate the process in writing within

ninety days of the issuance of this report.

4. The “Dressage Canada Board Member Resignation/Dismissal Policy”

states, “No member shall, [sic] discuss the reasons behind any resignation

of any member of the Board.” This appears to represent a well-intentioned

effort to uphold the legitimate expectations of privacy of volunteers who

resign for personal reasons. However, it is equally clear that the absence

of any substantive explanation for a resignation (or apparent resignation)

can feed uninformed speculation about the causes of a resignation, which

may in turn unfairly damage the reputations of the individual in question,

of the other members of the Dressage Canada board, and of Dressage

Canada as an organisation. It is, therefore, the direction of Equine Canada

to the Dressage Canada board to review this policy and report to the

Equine Canada Sport Council its proposed amendments within ninety days

of the issuance of this report.

5. As the body ultimately responsible for Dressage Canada, Equine Canada

expresses its regret and sincerely apologies to Ms Stubbs and to the other

members of the Dressage Canada board for any distress that precipitous

statements, errors in process, and public speculation may have caused

them.

To enable us to identify any errors or omissions in this report, Equine Canada shared

draft copies of our findings and directions with Ms Stubbs and with the chair of the

Dressage Canada board for their comments.

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