British Parachute Association

The National Governing Body for Sport Parachuting

The British Parachute Association was founded in 1961.  It is a democratic, not-for-profit organisation of individuals whose purpose is to organise, govern and further the advancement of Sport Parachuting in the UK. The BPA is has no shareholders - it is owned and run by its Members.  The BPA is incorporated as a company limited by guarantee. Its governing instrument is the BPA Articles of Association.  

Updated Articles of Association were adopted by special resolution of the AGM held on Saturday 28 January 2012.  They are shown as the 'Proposed new BPA Articles of Association' (pages 9-15) after the former BPA Memorandum & Articles of Association, which they replaced, on this link:  BPA Articles of Association with additional wording to Article 97 also approved by the above AGM.

Aims and objectives

The BPA maintains and promotes the highest standards of safety and training in the sport. It encourages participation and promote excellence at all levels of skydiving from novice to world class competitor. 

For more see BPA Form 224:  About the BPA on the Forms page.  Also see  BPA Annual Report and BPA Accounts.

Minutes of BPA Council and Committee meetings are published regularly.

Each year sees publication of a BPA Action Plan, which runs for the financial year from 1 July to 30 June. 

Membership and Affiliated Centres

The BPA has a membership of more than 40,000.  There are a number of different categories of membership. In addition, there are around 27 BPA Affiliated Parachute Clubs & Centres.  

Click here for BPA Facts and Figures.

Governance

The BPA is run by a governing Council of Management. Council Members are drawn from, and nominated and elected by, the voting Members of the BPA.  Council Members are the Directors of BPA Ltd. The Council controls all aspects of skydiving on behalf of the Civil Aviation Authority. Unlike some sports, which may suffer from fragmented and divided governing bodies, the British Parachute Association represents most UK skydivers and the majority of skydivers within the UK are members of the Association.

Funding

The Association is funded mostly by membership subscriptions.  See the BPA Accounts (pdf, 140 KB). These accounts were approved at the General Meeting on Tuesday 7 December 2010.  The draft accounts 2010-11 will be put to a General Meeting on Tuesday 6 December 2011.

AGM

The BPA AGM is held on a Saturday in mid-to-late January each year. Chairman's Review of 2010 (pdf, 502 KB)  minutes of AGM 2011  (pdf, 27 KB)  The Review for 2011 will be posted here in late February 2012.

See the diary of events page for date and venue of the next AGM (to be announced in late summer 2011).

Staff

The Council employs a small staff to help to carry out its policy. Safety, training, competitions, finance and development are administered by the full-time officials of the Association who include a National Coach and Safety Officer, Technical Officer, and financial and administrative support staff.

Links

British Parachute Association is a Member of the of the Royal Aero Club of the United Kingdom, which is the UK National Aero Club (NAC) of the World Air Sports Federation (Federation Aeronautique Internationale).The BPA nominates the UK Delegate and UK Alternate Delegate to the FAI's International Parachuting Commission.  See the links page for more sport parachuting-related links.