gaz wrote:Simon L6 wrote:Hot news! We (by which I mean Councillors, yrs truly and Colin) have all been invited to a meeting at National Office. Dates are being sorted out. This could be a bit of a breakthrough! Hope springs eternal!
Whilst appreciating that only Colin was expected to be able attend the meeting yesterday, did it go ahead and when might we hear more?
Colin went, John went and I was there for the majority of the time. I'm seeing Colin on Monday evening, by which time we'll have looked at the numbers that we were given. We look at these things in slightly different ways - Colin assess the numbers as numbers and I try to divine the character and value represented by the numbers. I'm reluctant to attempt to paraphrase the discussion prior to talking to Colin, but for now....
- a great deal of work has been done by Barry Flood and Kevin Mayne to ensure that there is internal consistency in the accounts
- there are clearly efforts being made to make the accounts of the CTC more appropriate for the present task - bear in mind that the activities of the Trust have grown rapidly in the past few years
- Kevin made the perfectly reasonable point that Council sets the priorities. My point was that Councillors (and in my case ex-Councillors) lack the time and the experience to exercise a sensible level of control over the finances of the Trust.
- I couldn't reconcile the way that costs were recorded and attributed with my experience in similar sized organisations, and expressed a hope that costs would be recorded against people and their activities.
There was an odd conclusion to the meeting - and not an entirely happy one. You could call it a frank exchange of views. Kevin believes that people will vote on the numbers. He wanted me to agree that the numbers were fine. I wouldn't do this, although, as I say, the thing is ongoing....
I told him that the impression that I get from correspondence with members is that the numbers are not a prime concern. I wasn't shy about accepting that the 'nay' vote will be a loose coalition of refuseniks. I made the point, and it wasn't one he appreciated, that the 'pro' campaign had repeatedly shot itself in the foot - the Great E-Mail Scandal being the prime case in point.
As it happens I reckon that the top item of concern is the membership system, which irks folk no end. Then, in no particular order, there are those that are concerned about risk, those that are concerned about support for volunteers, those that are concerned about the cost of membership and those that are just totally hacked off by the 'pro' campaign, seeing it as arrogant.
Now those campaigning for the Special Resolution could reasonably say 'this is irrelevant'. Which, of course, it isn't, because as any fule kno the best time to make a point to someone is when they want something from you (in this case a vote) and at the heart of the debate on the charity there is the concern that the Club has been neglected both by Council and Management.
I have a great deal of sympathy for Kevin in his particular predicament. For years Karen, yours truly, Greg, Phil Benstead and a couple more banged on about the Club at Council meetings - not just the membership system and the DAs, but the hidden potential. It was like trying to push a pea up the wall with our noses. Now a bunch of members are getting bolshy, Kevin's getting the stick, but, really, Council took the decisions. They (we) might not have been across the implications of those decisions, but there you go....