Cycling UK Forum

I haven't been able to follow all of the hundreds of pages of debate on this forum over several threads, so I apologise if I'm going over old ground.

I've just received the latest Cycle magazine, in which pages 6-7 have responses from the "pro" side answering some of the main points (presumably from Simon) against the move.

The answers seem reasonable. I can't remember off hand if there are any major questions that haven't been answered.

So, what am I missing? Without going ploughing through this forum and the CTC and SaveTheCTC websites, what are the major points that I should be thinking about when voting?

I'm someone who has paid some attention of the issue, so god knows that most "normal" CTC members make of it or how they make a reasoned choice when voting.

Thanks,

Mark

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The fact the yay side have chosen not to actually address the issues raised by the naysayers and have chosen instead to dismiss the concerns as, at best, unfounded and, at worse, some form of mischief making, and have engaged in personal attacks on the integrity of some of the individuals leading the no campaign speaks volumes.

In my judgement the nay side have the best interests of a 'national cycling club' and its individual members and its local groups at heart. The yay side don't. YMMV.

But I read the piece as specifically answering a set of questions e.g. what's the story behind the £388,000, whether the Trust takes over the Club or vice versa, etc. They seem relatively detailed (well, within the confines of space in a magazine, anyway) and not just dismissive.

The major point in my mind is do you want the CTC to be

A charity whose main commitment is to the general public
or a cyclists club whose main commitment is towards its members.

mark a. wrote:But I read the piece as specifically answering a set of questions e.g. what's the story behind the £388,000, whether the Trust takes over the Club or vice versa, etc. They seem relatively detailed (well, within the confines of space in a magazine, anyway) and not just dismissive.

I'm afraid that the article doesn't actually answer questions put by the 'nay' side. They are simply a reiteration of the spin and misleading statements (some might even say the lies) that the 'pro' campaign has been pushing for some time. If you look at the article again, you'll see that there is no evidence offered for what is simply a set of assertions.

Take a look at the Save the CTC web-site: http://www.savethectc.org.uk - and see how the bland reassurances and spin on the 'pro' lobby just don't stack up.

A charity whose main commitment is to all cyclists
or a cyclists club whose main commitment is towards its members.

Fixed that for you

EdinburghFixed wrote:

A charity whose main commitment is to all cyclists
or a cyclists club whose main commitment is towards its members.

Fixed that for you

Except that as a charity its main commitment wouldn't be to all cyclists - but as meic said, to the wider general public, including non-cyclists. That's what the 'public interest' requirement on charities, which was toughened up in the Charity Act 2006, is all about.

Odd. So should I be concerned that, for example, my support to British Heart Foundation is in fact being subverted to pay for better breast enlargements, or what?

Surely charities aren't beholden to the court of public opinion, they just have to justify themselves via the categories provided by the act - I did a quick wiki search and it seems to me that you could certainly fit bike advocacy into "health or the saving of lives", as well as "advancement of amateur sport", "advancement of environmental protection or improvement", just for starters.

Anyway, this is a bit of a digression, I didn't mean to drag the topic off into "what is a charity" territory.

EdinburghFixed wrote:Anyway, this is a bit of a digression, I didn't mean to drag the topic off into "what is a charity" territory

Not a digression at all. The failure to grasp the point you've made about this is a central weakness of the 'no' case.

ChrisButch wrote:

EdinburghFixed wrote:Anyway, this is a bit of a digression, I didn't mean to drag the topic off into "what is a charity" territory

Not a digression at all. The failure to grasp the point you've made about this is a central weakness of the 'no' case.

Not at all - IMO the point was well made by meic in the first place.

I have strenuously avoided any debate on this, but really it does appear to come down to a viewpoint of the CTC as "a club, for the benefit of members only" VS the CTC as "national cyclists' organisation, representing the interests of all cyclists". Which you prefer seems to account for a large proportion of where people stand.

This makes the whole debate over charitable status needlessly complicated IMO. The simplest thing to do would have been to first vote on whether the CTC is to be an outgoing advocacy/expert body, or not - because if not, it might have totally removed the need for this whole campaign.

The irony is, cyclists as a whole might be much better served if the CTC gave up advocacy and we had something like the RAC/AA to speak for us instead (without all this question of "what do we members get" to muddy it up). Probably the worst possible outcome will be if neither the "tourists" (tourers?) are satisfied, nor the campaign work able to continue as before.

Well, not long now.

If those are the two main options (club vs national organization) then the decision becomes much easier for me. Thanks.

(I won't say which one, just in case (a) I change my mind between now and voting and (b) I get lynched )

The 'No' lobby isn't saying that CTC should not be a national organisation for cyclists - or that it shouldn't campaign for cyclists. In fact, it supports both those things. We don't have to be a charity to do either of those things as we are already doing them - when we're not a charity.

What being a charity will mean is that there is the potential for our campaigning to be limited in its scope (see the Charity Commission guidance on that for more detail). It could also hamper our ability to stand up to the Government for the rights of all cyclists if we are dependent on public funding for much of our 'project' work (biting the hand that feeds us). At present, because the projects are undertaken by the Trust and the pressure on Government comes from the Club, there isn't an issue - this wouldn't be the case if we were a single charity.

And what many people seem to have missed is that the advice given to Council is that, if they merge the Club and the Trust, they'll still have to spin off trading activities to another company. So we'll be going from two to one and then back to two again...

For what it's worth, I'm against it. But not on the grounds that I think the CTC should be more about touring (in fact, as I have only once 'toured' in the traditional sense of the word, I'd be as happy for it to be called the NCA or NCC instead).