By signing this petition, we are expressing our concerns with the changes to the competition structure announced by Swimming WA in April 2022 (full details available on wa.swimming.org.au under Club Resources). We strongly urge Swimming WA to reconsider the proposed changes to the competition structure, specifically in relation to:

• The decision to discontinue Junior State Championships
• The decision to run end of season extravaganza at same time as Nationals
• The recommended duration limits to meets
• Recommendation to replace medals with ribbons
• Move towards swimming for a region instead of for the swimmers team at end of season event
• A program that appears on the surface to be designed with no thought for Country Swimmers, focused on creating opportunity/pathway for metro swimmers (i.e. travel, accommodation, meets outside of metro area)

We believe the proposed changes would have the following adverse effects on the sport:

• Lack of alignment with other State swimming organisations
• Decreased participation in meets by junior swimmers due to lack of "goal" or target times to work towards
• Decreased participation in meets by country teams due to travel time outweighing swimmer opportunities
• Increased risk of conflict between clubs within regions with higher participant numbers due to limited numbers allowed to represent at extravaganza meet
• Increased risk of "club hopping" swimmers to increase their chances of being chosen to represent region creating instability in clubs
• Potential for swimmers at Extravaganza to not be equally matched due to lack of qualifying times and vastly varying participant numbers in regions
• General decrease in junior swimmer participation, leading to lower numbers of senior swimmers
• Difficulty for families with swimmers across multiple tiers to attend meets, i.e. needing to choose between facilitating Nationals or Extravaganza, leading to decreased junior swimmer participation
• Lack of incentive or reward for coaches, who spend months/years training their junior squads, but will no longer have the opportunity to coach them at the premier event of the season if swimmers are representing their region instead of their club.