Beakyboy wrote:An overseas membership at a cheaper price than the full because the insurance etc. would not be valid, would be a good idea.
.glueman wrote:John Catt wrote: However, in my experience, the groups are very proud of their independence and prefer to rely on their own resources, resenting any overt interference or attempt at control by National Office.
Do you believe all MGs should be independent in that case, or is there a place for a dedicated DA officer, expansion of the group network, inter-group exchanges, 'interference' for those who require promotion and central support, advice and resources for those less proud and keen to expand?
) under the CTC umbrella. What I am fairly sure is that trying to impose "initiatives" from the centre won't go down too well with many. So we have to be careful, otherwise we could demotivate some of our most loyal members. see http://www.ctc.org.uk/DesktopDefault.aspx?TabID=5365#eight.Since we started getting substantial funding from external bodies we have been able to divert more resources to support for CTC volunteers. Our Member group development officer’s post has become full time as has the Right to Ride Development post. (Both were previously required to carry out other duties as well as support for their networks.)
In particular Member groups are strongly encouraged to take part in activity which promotes cycling to new participants in order to attract new people to their rides or to get resources for their volunteers.
Groups can be supported financially and with staff time to put on a wide range of events and activities for new cyclists. Staff funded by external funders have helped support Member activities such as the York Cycle Show, Birthday Rides, Challenge Rides, CTC local groups conference, Wales Festival of Cycling and the CTC Scotland Members’ gathering.
Member groups are strongly encouraged to contact national office to request any additional support that they would find useful, CTC now has 30 staff whose purpose is to support local cycling champions; we want to hear from you!
The CTC Cycling Champions Development Officer will work with 35 community groups over the four years of the project. The groups will come from communities typically under-represented amongst existing cyclists. Beneficiary groups might include women’s groups, disability organisations, and members ofblack and minority ethnic communities. The project will be based at York House, Granby Street, Leicester LE1 6FB in the Sustainable Transport Team of the City Council.
Simon L6 wrote:have the CASS calculations of Gift Aid been published? My understanding is that we have to sign up as individuals, and given the rather dismal collecton of e-mail addresses, this might be a step too far for Arvato - has any allowance been made for administration? Was any thought given to the Royal Yachting Association model for Gift Aid? Will Life Members be able to sign up for Gift Aid, and how much will those Life Members be able to Gift Aid? Will non-taxpayers (as in retired members) be able to sign up for Gift Aid?
Simon L6 wrote:Management has been neglecting the club for years while chasing work for the trust. Might I recommend a read of the thread on membership services - and if you want a copy of the report I can e-mail it to you.
manybikes wrote: The link he provided also says.Member groups can currently claim 0.5% of the adult membership fee for each member assigned to their group by postcode or who opts to move their membership to another group. (regardless of participation rates)
Do MG/DAs know the procedures then? Do we know why only 48 claimed?
Our very long standing DA has not had its allocation for the last year (not something I recall over the last 25 years) and the omission was raised by the membership at our AGM, naturally because the accounts came under scrutiny.
We were told that HO have been asked why we have not had it but there had, at that time, not been a satisfactory reply or resolution. An isolated case perhaps?
Simon L6 wrote:.......and to state the obvious - if you can turn the Club in to a Charity - why the takeover?
I've read the draft mems and arts, John, and I read the version before that. It's as plain as a pikestaff that the 'charitable purposes' are the first priority
However, becoming a charity does not stop the activities of the Club from changing over time. The members will continue to have the same role in the governance of the Club - and will be able to change the way in which it operates if aspects of its activities as a charity are seen as undesirable.
The Club may also continue to deliver any activities the Charity Commission sees as non-charitable by using non-charitable subsidiaries (such as those which already exist).
In particular:
(a) The proposed charitable objects are broad, so there is considerable scope for the activities of the Club to develop over time in response to the views of the Membership as well as wider changes to the environment in which CTC operates.
(b) The Club is not obliged to undertake activities under all of its objects; if the Membership wishes to do so in the future, they can decide that the Club's activities should focus on a different range of cycling activities provided that those activities are consistent with at least one of the charitable objects. The scope of the charitable objects is being set up to include all CTC activities that were happening before the charitable changes.
(c) Other structures can be introduced for specific activities such as non charitable subsidiaries
Simon L6 wrote:John - I'm taken aback by the assertion that most of our member benefits are charitable
1. Which benefits?
2. Why?
3. Why are the revised Mems and Arts careful to make benefits discretionary?
I'm aware that there is speculation on the CTC website about this, but it all looks a bit far-fetched to me.
And, to state the obvious, if the Club can be turned in to a charity, why is it being taken over by the Trust? Gift Aid can be claimed within the present structure, as the Minority Report, which you will have seen, makes clear. What your saying is that the only reason for the Trust taking over the Club is that the Club is a cash cow........
Simon L6 wrote:John - I'm taken aback by the assertion that most of our member benefits are charitable
1. Which benefits?
2. Why?
3. Why are the revised Mems and Arts careful to make benefits discretionary?
I'm aware that there is speculation on the CTC website about this, but it all looks a bit far-fetched to me.
And, to state the obvious, if the Club can be turned in to a charity, why is it being taken over by the Trust? Gift Aid can be claimed within the present structure, as the Minority Report, which you will have seen, makes clear. What your saying is that the only reason for the Trust taking over the Club is that the Club is a cash cow........
toontra wrote:I was always under the assumption that the CTC was an organisation primarily to benefit it's members. That's certainly why my father joined in the 30's and why I joined when I took up cycling recently.
Trusts are useful devices for certain activities, but members are not allowed to directly benefit from a Trust's activity (as Simon correctly states). That would therefore seem contrary to the very nature of the organisation, at least from my perspective. "Furthering the Cause of Cycling" is so general that, whilst maybe a noble stance, will inevitably include elements with which members may disagree. For example, I personally am anti-Sustrans, and any attempt to duplicate their work would be a complete turn-off for me.
If I want to make a charitable donation I'll do so. If want to join a cycle club it will be for a very different reason.
In my opinion this is a mess.
Sustrans aims to:
* reduce the environmental and resource impacts of transport
* enable people to choose active travel more often
* provide car-free access to essential local services
* create streets and public spaces into places for people to enjoy.
http://www.sustrans.org.uk/about-sustrans
thirdcrank wrote:John Catt
The following is from your link above, (which is why I have addressed this to you.)The average subscription rate for 2008/09 was £24.36.
Do you know how that is calculated? Is it simply total subscription income ÷ total membership? It does seem to be a lot nearer to the reduced rate than to the full adult rate. I do appreciate that a lot of OAPs are taxpayers (I am one myself) and that for a joint subscription a tax payer can Gift Aid the total sub, even if the partner is not a taxpayer, but such a low avarage seems to suggest that there may be a lot of non-taxpayers among the CTC membership.
At this stage of the process, Council cannot give a definitive answer, but the scale of possible Gift Aid annual income to CTC is shown in the table below. The average subscription rate for 2008/09 was £24.36. For the purpose of illustration, we have selected just 4 possible amounts that might be eligible for Gift Aid up to the current average rate. Previous publications relating to this review took a figure in the lower section of the table (£57,000) as a prudent estimate of the possible additional income to CTC, but higher figures are possible.
Simon L6 wrote:it has everything to do with it. This is where we started. The Trust has swallowed management time, while the Club has been neglected. The Council needs to get their head around this - stop, consider, work out what's gone wrong, fix it, make an offer that members can back.
Fonant wrote:The same way we get members to participate in other surveys, such as the one about the website, the regular membership surveys from the past, and the current one about lorries.
In fact past membership surveys are used as arguments in favour of becoming a charity, based on the result that most members think CTC should be "for all cyclists". But you can read that as either being "CTC should work for all cyclists, even non-members" or "CTC should encourage all cyclists to join the club". The former suggests a charitable organisation, the latter doesn't.
Simon L6 wrote:Sorry, but that's disingenuous. Discretionary grants are for projects, not communicating with members.
glueman wrote:It would be interesting to see what percentage of MG/DA funds go on marketing. Presently we are told a small ratio of CTC members attend group activities and I would imagine personnel turnover in groups is low - both incoming and outgoing. It continues to intrigue me that low participation is accepted as a fact of life without any obvious attempt to advertise runs or put money into developing best practice or increase attendance and diversity of participants.
A cynic might suggest social riding has been written off as an anachronism that belongs in the past, mainly because thinking about its future is hard work. I'm not surprised there's a cash surplus, even from a tiny pot, when the club's involvement in regional activity goes no further than allowing the title Member Group to people who fancy running a self-organised bike club.
Groups who do think outside the box (Si's night riders, the Stourbug women) seem to enjoy huge take-up, and from people who don't represent the usual constituency. The potential for local involvement via the medium of the social group has barely been explored but when it has looked to new communities the signs have been most promising. Individual zealotry is only half the story, the rest is central commitment to groups and advertising. A member of staff with a remit for group development would show a commitment from head office, especially when other specialisms seem to enjoy the backing of the club.
Edit: this subject is in danger of hijacking the urgent title topics, contracts et cetera, so it'll be worth continuing in the appropriate box.
Simon L6 wrote:Fonant wrote:Part of the problem with my understanding of the picture is that CTC donates to the Trust, who then provide CTC with staff and services. It's a confusing mess: it looks like the majority of membership fees get spent on charity work, but in fact a lot of the money donated to the Trust is spent on membership benefits.
I've heard this before, but there's nothing in the papers that I've received to suggest that this is the case. The (tiny) expenditure on RtR may be in the Trust accounts, and Campaigning is also in the Trust accounts, but, as a member of a DA committee that sees the service to member groups, and as an individual member I see no evidence that any amount of money donated to the trust is spent on member benefits.