The merger between the Southwest Peninsula League and the Western League was given approval by the Football Association’s League’s Committee last month.

John Pool the Chairman of the Toolstation Western League and Phil Hiscox, the Secretary of the Southwest Peninsular League, joined Ian Nockolds on the Toolstation Western League Podcast to discuss what this latest announcement means for Project South West. The full interview is being serialised in The Journal and in this second episode, Phil Hiscox explains how promotion and relegation will work to populate the new five division structure.

PH: The answer to your question in two parts. The first part, the reason why it's five divisions is that was the primary object of the proposal that we developed over the last year is that the main issue that needed to be addressed is the travelling at Step Five. So, that's why there's a creation of two Step Five divisions and still retaining three Step Six divisions, so that's the big change.

As far as what they're playing for this season: at Step Five in the Western League, they are playing for exactly the same as they were playing for last season in that the champions will be promoted to Step Four, the runners up would be, all things being equal, invited to play a playoff game against a low team from Step Four. Obviously, in the case of Exmouth last season that [wasn't] actually required, but that's ultimately the prize for whoever finishes second at Step Five this season, unless circumstances dictate a change.

Now, as far as playing at Step Six and Step Seven, that is something worth changing for this season. At Step Six, remember there are three Step Six divisions; Peninsula East, and West, and Western League Division One, clearly there are going to be extra teams elevated - upward movement, the FA call it, you're not allowed to call it promotion, upward movement. And what the proposal documents suggested, and the FA Leagues Committee have ratified, the first priority for those upward movement clubs will be four clubs from each of the three Step Six divisions, so that would be 12 clubs in all, those four spaces would be exclusively for the leagues that they're individually playing in, so they can't be transferred.

You can't say, 'Well, we're going to take an extra club from Cornwall or an extra club from Bristol.' There’re four spaces for Peninsula East, Peninsula West, Western League Division One, with the only slight asterix on those is they've got to have both a 'G' ground grading in place on the 31st of March, which the vast majority of clubs have. And even if they haven't, they've still got that deadline. And secondly, they've got to give a written commitment to reach grade 'F', which is the highest standard, within a year's time.

So, that's up to a club individually to make sure that they're aware of what they're letting themselves in for. I would expect pretty well every club to do that, you know, to just go forward with that. But it's a decision they have to make, and they have to confirm in writing that they're prepared to do that at the end of the season. That, as I say, creates 12 clubs, there are going to be additional spaces, and that's when the waters get a little bit more muddied. They can come from one of two places; first of all, clubs playing in any Step Five league, or any league in the National League System have a right to apply for a lateral move from one league to another. And the system to doing that is to put it in writing to the FA by the end of the calendar year, and then the FA Leagues Committee will make a decision. As we had more recently with Keynsham, a club can appeal that decision, should they so wish. Now, the last couple of years, all of those cases have been clubs from the Western League asking to leave to join a different competition, mainly the Hellenic League.

What we would anticipate is that there are some clubs that have gone to the Hellenic League, who may now, seeing the new proposal, the new geographical footprint, want to make a similar application to come from the Hellenic League back into the new league, the Step Five division that will cover the Bristol area. The FA would have an absolute duty to, at the very least, listen to those proposals. Any they grant would be automatically at Step Five, because they would be lateral moves of clubs already playing at Step Five, unless of course they're in a relegation position, but let's not muddy the waters too much on that. So, that could fill the remaining spaces. I say could because on that one there's a large number of unknowns; how many will apply? What will the FA's views be on those? Will the FA grant them? Will those clubs even appeal where they would have a right of appeal? So, let's assume that it doesn't quite fill everybody up, and then that comes into our third category, which is not dependent on each individual league. It basically says if there are additional spaces, they will be offered to the clubs that have missed out at Step Six on a points-per-game basis. And that could be any club in any of the three divisions, it can be more than one club across the three divisions. We basically use points-per-game until we've got 36 clubs at Step Five.

IN: Dare I ask a question about the dreaded R word? Has relegation featured in the arrangements that you're considering for next season?

PH: The answer is in two parts, because there are differences. It wasn't specifically in the proposal about relegation from Step Five, and myself and John have queried that and I'm talking here slightly off the record in that we haven't got a written definition of this. But we are told that the national rules apply, and that clubs who finish bottom of a Step Five division would be relegated and can't be reprieved.

Clubs who finish in other relegation positions should be relegated but could be reprieved as they have elsewhere in the country last season.

My advice to anybody in the Western League at the moment would be not to finish bottom because that's the obvious danger spot. Now, at Step Six it's different because that is specifically mentioned in the proposal. And what it says is; because populating three Step Six divisions having lost clubs upwards to Step Five is going to produce a large number of vacancies, that relegation can be reduced at Step Six this season in order to protect the numbers. And again, my advice to clubs there is, people like Sidmouth and Bishop's Lydeard were reprieved last season, technically in a relegation position, but with quite a few points on the board - and I would imagine that it's quite possible that they will come to the similar record and be reprieved this season. Equally, Devizes and Stoke Gabriel had very much poorer points-per-game and were relegated.

In an ideal world, we would hope that whoever's in the relegation positions isn't cast adrift.

Next week Phil and John explain how consultation has featured in putting the merger proposals together. The full interview can be heard on episode 4 of the Toolstation Western League Podcast, available to listen at http://toolstationleague.com/podcasts/