strathspey@strathspey.org:27412

mlbrown

Re: RSCDS restructure AGM motion

Sept. 18, 2001, 6:27 p.m. (Message 27412, in reply to message 27407)

To reply to the 2 points that Jan has made:

1) She, and probably the majority of the members do not want the book or the
bulletin - but at least they do get something for the money, and the total
costs, including the postage are not much of the Society's budget. And we
are not talking about not producing the book and the bulletin, merely
producing a smaller number, with a corresponding increase per unit - say
2,000 books sent to 2,000 individual addresses, rather than 15 - 20,000 sent
to a few hundred addresses (say 1,500 because of the HQ members?)

Anyway it is not a case of getting bogged down in details of costing, but it
is a case of putting together a financial model and seeing how robust it is.
Annual members who pay their subs and receive two items they don't
necessarily want are I believe one thing ( and something which I can sell to
my branch members every year) - paying their subs and just getting a piece
of cardboard are something entirely different. What are the consequences if
we lose 50% of our annual members?

2) One of the major costs for the Society is the cost of the Exec Council
meetings - we hold 2 a year with over a hundred people present at each
meeting - most of the time it rubber stamps the decisions made by
sub-committees, and the time is spent in trying to find out why the
committees have made certain decisions, and then arguing about them - it is
a cross between a debate and a law court (with the conveners of the
committees feeling like the accused!) The majority of the people attending
say nothing, and those who do speak often wonder whether they are wasting
their time. The Society does not pay the first £20 of expenses, but with
some people having to stay overnight, and people travelling from the South
of England, some of the costs for individuals are significant.

With a much smaller group of representatives meeting the costs for such
meetings would be reduced - the costs / time for those attending locally
based area meetings would be much less (even from York it is an all day job,
whereas if the meetings were held in Leeds I could be there and back in an
evening) - with smaller groups attending each meeting more people would be
encouraged to speak (I think with area meetings the average attendance would
be between 10 and 20) -

In summary
a) the costs would be genuinely reduced,
b) the cost to the Society would be reduced, and
c) people would be much more actively involved.

Malcolm

(It would also be more democratic, in that at present the large branches
with hundreds of members have one voice on the Exec, as do those branches
with 30 or 40 members, but we don't want to bring politics into the
argument!)