THE tone of the press release bordered on the desperate.

It was issued on behalf of Lismore RFC and pleaded that one of the most constructive proposals to emerge from the strategic review of Scottish rugby did not get lost in the row over governance.

Ironically, the plan championed by the Edinburgh club could also go a long way towards resolving the utterly undemocratic way in which the game was thrown into its present turmoil.

Lismore are more aware than most of the benefits offered by dividing the country into 14 development areas. They have an excellent, local authority-backed, multi-sports project of their own under way at their ground at The Inch in Edinburgh, "It is club/community based and aligns rugby development with the national government strategy Sport 21 together with local and education authority strategies, " said Malcolm Gillies, Lismore's spokesman.

"It is achieved by splitting Scotland into 14 regions, taking rugby closer to the community through clubs operating within these regions growing the game in partnership with local authorities and local education authorities and with each other.

"Club-based following the existing pathway regions to a very close extent, with full-time staff co-ordinating, it is the most important strategy in the last 10 years for growing the game and, with it, the clubs."

The way those 14 regional development groups are broken down within the existing four district set up tells another story, though.

According to the chart in the strategic review document there would be a total of 44 clubs split into five development groups in Glasgow; 28 split into three groups in the Midlands; 30 split into three groups in Edinburgh;

14 split into two in the North;

and just one group representing 12 clubs in the Borders.

When David Mackay was forced to resign by the general committee, who claimed they were doing so because of an outcry against his leadership from clubs, representatives from Edinburgh, the Borders and the North all voted against him. Those from Glasgow and the Midlands supported him.

As referees are club members and the Exiles district, by definition, contains no Scottish clubs, the only other general committee member with a genuine constituency to represent was Iain Brown, the schools representative.

He voted against Mackay but, as subsequently resigned because, according to David Nicol, his erstwhile committee colleague, he knew his schools would not support his action.

Nicol decided against resigning himself because Midlands clubs approved overwhelmingly of the way he refused to go along with the majority when the no-confidence vote was issued. The Glasgow representatives who did likewise also had their actions heavily endorsed by their clubs.

Another key question is how the committee could claim they had a mandate from clubs to oust the chairman when the vast majority of clubs had expressed no such view.

Even setting aside any misrepresentation, not even a Standard Grade in arithmetic would be required to recognise what a complete abuse of a supposed democratic system it was when Mackay met the three committee men who told him his time was up.

The debate since has focused on the make-up of the executive board, but the way the SRU's general committee supposedly represents clubs must be overhauled.

It has been suggested that a vote of no confidence in the chairman at the time it happened, just three weeks before a special general meeting, was also a vote of no confidence in clubs' ability to assess the information in front of them and make the right decision.

Yet it is just as possible that the opposite applies and that more scheming committee members were fully aware that the clubs would not back their bid to sack the board.

Certainly, there are deeply contentious elements in the plans though it should not be forgotten, that they were proposed by the general committee after being presented to clubs by executives.

However, as The Herald advised long before this crisis erupted, the governance issue must be dealt with before there is any chance of worthwhile plans being properly implemented.

So Lismore may be right to try to force people to remember the good things within the strategic review.

But perhaps the most important thing they have done is remind us of the geographic framework it produced which can serve Scottish rugby well, since the 14 development areas are much more representative of the breakdown of clubs.

It is vital in the weeks, rather than months, ahead that the executive board is properly constituted and given the authority to run the game properly. But the general committee/ council, which oversees it, should also properly represent clubs in a way that it has manifestly failed to.

January 6, 2005, was the day democracy all but died in the sport in Scotland. The hope must be that a policy designed to bring new blood into the game can provide it with a life-saving transfusion.