By Roddy Livingstone, Hon Sec – SPJA
The Solo Piping Judges Association held their Annual General Meeting on Sunday, November 16, 2025 at the Army School of Bagpipe Music & Highland Drumming, Edinburgh. Bruce Hitchings was re-elected as the Associations Chair with Euan Anderson and Roddy Livingstone continuing in their respective roles as Treasurer and Secretary.
2025 saw the retirement (by rotation) of committee members Logan Tannock and Jim McGillivray, whom the Association thanks for their commitment over the past three years. The resulting vacancies have been filled by Peter Hunt and Donald MacPhee. Remaining committee member, Derek Fraser, has a further period of his three-year tenure to serve.
The meeting was well attended both in person and via Zoom. No significant changes were made to the Association’s Constitution or Code of Conduct. Following amendments made in 2024, Bruce Hitchings emphasised the Association’s commitment to ensuring that teachers do not judge pupils. Judges should ensure that when accepting invitations to officiate at events in the UK, all adjudicators are drawn from the SPJA membership to reflect and support recent changes made by the Competing Pipers Association in respect of recognition of prizes awarded for grading and eligibility purposes.
Following the AGM, members of the Supplementary List of Judges (previously administered by the Competing Pipers Association but falling under the auspices of the SPJA from 2024) joined Senior and Approved Judges for an informal discussion seminar covering topics including use of recordings as an aid to judging, excessive tuning by competitors after the time allocated, and Gordon McCready (President CPA) led a session on matters of current interest/priority to competing pipers.
Bruce Hitchings reaffirmed that the CPA code of conduct states that its members are not to compete in front of their tutors. The SPJA code of conduct states that tutors are not to judge their pupils. The CPA code of conduct also advises that its members compete only in solo piping competitions that use properly accredited adjudicators (whether on a one-person bench or a multiple-bench of judges). The SPJA, CoC states that members must avoid judging alongside non-SPJA adjudicators at all competitions held in the United Kingdom.
The SPJA and the CPA are to send out a joint letter to the Highland Games and Competition organisers to reinforce these rules. If these conditions cannot be met, an application/notification must be addressed before the competition—judges to the SPJA and competitors to the CPA.