AGM minutes 10th June 2014 ‐ At Hornet Services Sailing Club, Gosport

1. Minutes of the last AGM
The minutes to the last Annual General Meeting, held in London on 20th June 2013, had been distributed to all members and were adopted on the proposal of Mike Eckles, seconded by Clive Robinson. Mark Lockie abstained as he was not present at the last AGM. 

2. Election of any Nominated Fellows to Council
The President remarked that the makeup of the Council was one of the areas we wish to look at in the future, he commented that the present Council consists of 16 members the majority of whom are former Presidents who become automatic Councillors, in addition there are four other members.  

Those standing for re-election: 
Mark Borkett
Mike Eckles
Paul Johnson
Jim Lauder
Clive Robinson

Norman Finlay said that Jim Lauder does not wish to stand for re-election, he was therefore removed from the list.  

Although only one third of Councillors, who are not former Presidents, are required to be re-elected the President said that he is asking the AGM to re-elect the Council so that we have a firm mandate to proceed in the future. 

It was proposed by Mark Lockie, and seconded by Chris Fairgrieve, that the four named above be re-elected to Council. Agreed. 

3. Presentation of the Unaudited Accounts
The Secretary presented the unaudited accounts for the year ended 31st December 2012, full copies of which were made available to the AGM.  

Clive Robinson stated that although he saw nothing wrong with the figures he was not happy with the presentation of the accounts. He noted that there was a drop in the profitability of the Society from £25,000 to less that £1,000 in a year. He explained that this drop was partly due to expenditure of almost £17,000 and wished to ask four questions to clarify the situation for members. (Followed by the Secretary’s replies in brackets):

a. As the expenditure was more than 10% of the turnover was a risk assessment carried out
and the return on investment before the Society was committed to such a figure? (We are not necessarily expecting a return on the investment, it was carried out as a service to the members involved in MCA Coding, and it will also improve the efficiency of processing surveys in the office.)

b. Was there some reason why the expenditure was not capitalised, for four years say, to reduce the affect on the annual profit.
(The Society is a not for profit organisation and as such there is no profit and not necessarily any benefit in capitalising expenditure over a period of years. The Secretary added that he welcomed the interest now being shown by Council into the finances of the Society.)

The President described the new software application and how it is used. He further stated that he had used it to some extent. Of those present Mark Lockie stated that he had used it on at least 6 occasions, the only problem he saw was that at the moment it was only available for Workboats. The Secretary added that during a training seminar earlier this year for Examiners, those present had asked for the system to be extended to Small Commercial Vessels as well. He further added that, the software application had been extended earlier this year to be able to be used in Browsers, this had been introduced at the Training Seminar but had not yet been promoted to the Examiners.

c. There is a new Brown Code coming out,
what are the costs being put into this year’s, and following year’s, expenditure to cover running costs of the application and the inclusion of the new Brown Code. (This had not been costed yet.)

d. Bearing mind you cannot have Intellectual Property (IP) rights for someone’s knowledge,
could the developer sell the software product to our competitors in this market, what are the safeguards to ensure we get a return if he does sell it to someone else, could we sell it. (The Secretary agreed to look into this.)

Clive added that, in reply to a question from Mark Lockie, it was his view the Society should be more open on capital spends, especially when they were significant.  
Acceptance of the accounts was proposed by Mark Lockie and seconded by Richard Langman. A show of hands gave seven in favour, none against, two abstentions. The accounts were therefore approved. 

Benevolent Fund Accounts
The Secretary had distributed the Benevolent Fund accounts to all members. 
It was agreed that instead of using the word “audited” in future we should use “examined” in describing how the accounts had been verified. There had been no call on the Benevolent Fund by members during 2013. 

Acceptance of the Accounts was proposed by Chris Fairgrieve and seconded by Mark Lockie. The accounts were agreed. 

4. Appointment of the Society’s Accountants for the ensuing year
Menzies LLP was reappointed as the Society’s Accountants for 2014. 

5. To receive the announcement of office Bearers for 2013 / 2014
The list of office bearers had been distributed to all members.  

Close of AGM

There being no further business the President closed the meeting at 19:21 hours. 

Captain Paul Owen
Secretary