Equality

Scottish Athletics Ltd (trading as scottishathletics) endorses the principle of sports equality and will strive to ensure that everyone who wishes to be involved in athletics (in all its disciplines and forms), whether as athletes, casual participants, club members, officials, volunteers, coaches, office-bearers in clubs or those within the governance structure of scottishathletics:

• has a genuine and equal opportunity to participate to the full extent of their own ambitions and abilities, without regard to their age, sex, gender identity, disability, marital or civil partnership status, pregnancy or maternity, religion, race, socioeconomic status or sexual orientation; and
• can be assured of an environment in which their rights, dignity and individual worth are respected, and in particular that they are able to enjoy their sport without the threat of intimidation, victimisation, harassment or abuse.

You can also download:

• Our equality policy
• Our policy on non-binary athletes competing within Scottish National Championships
• Our equality guidance for clubs
• The Scottish Athletics Diversity Calendar 2024
• The World Athletics – eligibility regulations for transgender athletes March 2023
• The UKA Transgender and Differences of Sexual Development Principle-Statements – March-2023

If you have a query relating to equality at scottishathletics, please contact our equalities officer, Francesca Snitjer.

Certifications

scottishathletics is proud to have achieved the Advanced level of the Equality Standard for Sport.

 

 

scottishathletics is signatory of the Business in the Community Race at Work Charter. This provides a framework for employers to take practical steps to ensure that their workplaces are tackling barriers that ethnic minority people face in recruitment. With the support of BITC, scottishathletics as a signatory is committed to delivering the five principles of the Charter:

• Appoint an Executive Sponsor for race
• Capture ethnicity data and publicise progress
• Commit at Board level to zero tolerance of harassment and bullying
• Make clear that supporting equality in the workplace is the responsibility of all leaders and managers
• Take action that supports ethnic minority career progression

Equality and diversity advisory group

As part of our ongoing work to uphold the principles and values of equality across our sport, we have established a voluntary equality and diversity advisory group to assist us in leading the way.

The group has members from a variety of backgrounds, experience and perspectives who are passionate about equality and committed to pursuing it within athletics. The group’s remit is to provide advice and guidance on all equality matters; ensuring practical, strategic and operational support is sustained for the development and delivery of our equality action plan, in addition to supporting our equality working group and board members in relation to equality and diversity.

Cara Shearer
Cara is an accomplished and passionate sports development professional with over a decade of experience in successfully supporting innovative groups with an EDI remit, including Scottish Women in Sport, LEAP Sports Scotland and Scottish Sporting Futures. Embracing a holistic and evidence-based approach to sport development has given her a unique perspective and skill set in ensuring pragmatic, strategic, and operational support is accessible to groups striving to diversify the sporting system. She currently works for sportscotland as a Partnership Manager, and her experiences within the sporting sector are underpinned by a PhD from the Physical Activity Exchange, focusing on community participation and engaging underrepresented groups.

Alasdair Donaldson
Alasdair is an experienced leader in the sports profession with extensive knowledge in both performance and strategic management.
With experience primarily in the Paralympic sector, he has gained a great deal of understanding of the barriers which face people with disabilities in being able to access sport in general. Currently working for British Triathlon as Paralympic Talent and Development Manager, Alasdair has a good understanding of the Equality Standards for Sport required of the National Governing Bodies.

Noanie Heffron
A keen ultra-runner, Noanie is also race director for Jedburgh Three Peaks Ultramarathon and assistant race director for Highland Fling Ultramarathon. With a solid working knowledge of the various protected characteristics covered by the 2010 Equality Act, Noanie has a particular interest in the issues faced by non-binary people. This passion has led her to persuading the Jedburgh Running Festival Committee to add a third gender category to all of their events. Noanie has a proven track record of developing effective equality partnerships having worked collaboratively with various LGBTI sports groups and charities and providing assistance to Scottish Athletics with their proposal to allow for the inclusion of a third gender category in mass participation events.

John Owens
Throughout his working career, John has been a passionate advocate for those who find themselves impacted by discrimination or adverse childhood, adult, or community experiences. As a former Senior Social Worker and athletics coach John has dedicated his time, contributing to meaningful change within communities. His own life experiences have shaped and influenced his desire to challenge discrimination. During his time as volunteer and Club President with Springburn Harriers, John led a transformational programme that saw the club recognised by Scottish Athletics for its impact and work collaboratively with partners to ensure access to our sport for all irrespective or ability or background. John is currently a coach at Shettleston Harriers.

Graeme Stewart
Graeme’s role as Club Development Officer at Harmeny AC and his background in Equality Law, make him a great asset to this group. In his role as Club Development Officer, he has operated at both corporate and managerial level dealing with charitable organisations and community groups such as the Clovenstone Community Centre and SCORE Scotland. Together with the Club (who were voted Scottish Athletics Impact Club of the Year 2019) Graeme works hard to address areas of inequality and working with harder to reach groups; supporting disability athletics provisions at schools, establishing links with local disability athletics clubs, and providing accessible opportunities for adults to progress from inactive to active. Graeme has a keen interest in sports and has not only successfully completed the Scottish Athletics Coaching Assistant Course but is also a qualified Cycle Scotland coach.

Karen Millar
A qualified solicitor with over 20 years’ experience in the public and private sector, Karen supports organisations to embed diversity and inclusion. She is passionate about driving positive change and building respectful, inclusive cultures where everyone can thrive. Karen brings a blend of skills to the group, offering an inspiring, determined and strategically driven commitment to creating an inclusive culture, practice, and services. In her previous roles, Karen developed employee networks, established a successful Women in Leadership Network and lead ScotRail to achieve Leaders in Diversity. Since April 2023, Karen is the Diversity and Inclusion Manager at Barratt Developments.