As has been mentioned the local/national gradings system doesn't work, the question is what to replace it with?
The analogy with football is relevant, and for the same reasons. We all know there are 10-12 bands who are consistently "top class", just as there are 4-6 football teams who occupy the top 4-6 places in the Premiership each year, and there's a fair difference between those and the bottom of the Championship section, as there is in the Premiership (and for similar reasons, reputation and/or money attracting the best, etc).
This difference carries on through all sections (divisions), those at the top are a fair way ahead of those at the bottom. E.g. a top 3rd section band if promoted won't be bottom of the 2nd section, but above the middle, usually.
The implication for me is that promotion/relegation isn't fast enough, *but* if it needs to be faster, should it be down to just one contest a year (the Area)? This seems unfair. Anyone can have a bad day, but in the Premiership you have 38 chances, not 1. (more Areas a year? unlikely).
Also, local/national gradings seem ludicrous. As has been mentioned we are graded 2nd national, but 3rd local. Given that the other 2 we can enter that count are in Dukinfield and St.Helens (neither of which are a great place to spend a Sunday) and we are busy enough all year anyway we are unlikely to go, so under the NW area rules won't get promoted locally even if we win Preston and Fleetwood (the other 2 on the calendar) even if that means we have more points than the other bands in the section.
IIRC obviously, but I believe them's the rules.
There's been more than one occasion where bands have been graded 2 or even 3 sections different locally from nationally, which surely cannot be right. ( I remember well Rochdale Contest, 4th section a band played James Curnow's "Trittico" very well and won by a country mile - clearly a long way from their correct grading).
For me, why can't national gradings apply across the board? If you go up locally by winning local contest and are in a higher section for the Area, so be it, if it isn't for you, you'll come down again to where you should be.
Maybe some sort of weighting should be introduced according to the grading of the other bands you competed against at any contest (the "squash ladder" system, as used by 4barsrest to work out their rankings). Lot more complicated, but fairer, surely?