St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Ramblers Club

 

Minutes of Annual General Meeting held at St. Mary Moorfields, 4/5 Eldon Street, London EC2M 7LS.
Notes: This is the first AGM since 2019 due to Covid restrictions. The minutes are based on notes made by Patricia O’Callaghan as amended by current and retiring Members of the Committee. The Meeting followed the Agenda agreed by the President on the 21st October 2022 and emailed to Members with the notification of the 23rd October 2022.


1. Fr. Chris Vipers, as Chairman, opened the Meeting early at 1.15pm as the hall was required for an evening event. The St. Francis Prayer was said.


2. Members were asked if they had anything to say and Antoinette Adkins thanked Paul Connolly for keeping the rambles going through the recent tough times (Covid pandemic).


3. Committee Members in Attendance:


Fr Chris Vipers, President
Patricia O’Callaghan, Secretary
Paul Connolly, Ramble List Compiler
Antoinette Adkins, Membership Secretary
Maurice Hickman
David Crundall (joined at 1.25pm)
John Burbage, Treasurer (joined at 1.25pm)
Sheila Bravin was unavailable due to an emergency hospital call.


4. Following a brief introduction Paul Connolly was asked give his report on
rambles. He commented on the difficulty arranging walks during the Covid
emergency unlike previous emergencies like Foot and Mouth Disease. Paul said the Club would not have survived without the support walk leaders gave him and thanked them for their efforts.


5. John Burbage reported that the financial situation had not changed much since the last Meeting with total assets down from £5509 to £5337. Copies of the accounts were made available before the Meeting. He mentioned the Club had closed the Nationwide Trustee Account and opened a bank account with Metro Bank. This would allow Members to pay subscriptions
directly to the bank. He thanked Patricia and David for their support over the 9 months taken to complete the transfer. John mentioned that as most Members were now on e-mail resulting in printing costs reducing substantially, subscriptions could be reduced to maybe £10. In addition, many Members still think the subscription year starts in January and the
Committee will look at all options. It was also mentioned the difficulties in producing accounts to business accounting standards that most Members including himself struggled to understand. This was a legacy from the Constitution written in 1930 which should be looked at. No changes to the Constitution could be made until agreed by a quorum of the Members at an AGM or EGM, the earliest being in 2023. 


A question was asked why the NS&I account which had only paid 46p interest was not transferred to the new bank account. John explained that was due to the joint signatory being unavailable due to illness and holidays.


6. Questions were put to the Committee.


Patricia commented that there was a rumour that some Committee Members
wanted to change the name of the Club and remove the word “Catholic”. Fr. Chris confirmed that there would be no change to the name. No one wanted to remove ‘Catholic’ from the group as we are a Catholic club and always will be. When the idea to set up a Facebook page was discussed, there was a debate about using the name ‘St Francis Ramblers@ to keep it simple and welcome people of all faiths,


An idea was put forward by Patricia was for shorter walks. The first midweek
short walk was a success and further ones would be planned.


7. As all the Committee were up for re-election a new one was chosen. Patricia O’Callaghan, Antionette Adkins and David Crundall all withdrew from re-election. Paul Connolly, John Burbage and Maurice Hickman agreed to stay on. Antoinette Connolly, Margaret Brady and Robyn Lynch were proposed and accepted by the Members. The new Committee is therefore:


Paul Connolly, Ramble List Compiler
Robyn Lynch, Secretary
Antoinette Connolly, Membership Secretary
Maurice Hickman
Margaret Brady
John Burbage, Treasurer
Sheila Bravin
One place are still outstanding and Sheila Bravin and other Members will be
approached to fill the position.


8. The Meeting closed at 2.05pm