Minutes of the Branch Meeting held on 4th April 2016
at the Royal Oak, Eydon
A. CHAIRMAN’S OPENING REMARKS:
Russ thanked The Royal Oak and the Eydon RBL Members for welcoming us to their village. He said we had enjoyed the pre-meeting get together and hoped to continue afterwards, and that we would be back.
A.1 Induction of New Members. With the Branch Standard paraded, the Chairman introduced two new members, Joy and Laurie. He then conducted the appropriate ceremony, and both were formally accepted and welcomed by members.
B. MATTERS ARISING
B.1 Eydon Branch Amalgamation: This has now taken place; Eydon’s funds have been transferred to this Branch and Tony W formally welcomed everyone from Eydon into the Byfield & District Branch of the RBL. Alan W explained that he now needed to ask those ‘silent’ Eydon members if they wished to remain so, or be on the meeting minute distribution. It was pointed out that minutes were published on the Website after approval, so would be accessible to anyone with access to the Web.
B.2 Recruitment Poster: Eydon agreed to display posters wherever possible. Alan W explained that he had modified the Welcome to Eydon pack to show that Byfield and District was now the nearest RBL Branch.
B.3 Outing: Russ announced that the visit to RAF Cosford would depart at 10.30 am on Thursday 12th May. Transport would be in members' cars, details to be decided at the May meeting.
B.4 Rose Plaque: This has now been received. Russ said that he felt it might be more appropriate to plant the rose with the plaque in the War Memorial garden. All felt this was a good idea but thought the family should be approached first to obtain their agreement.
B.5 Women’s Section: Russ explained that he had emailed a set of questions and answers prepared by Haig House to everyone about the changes to the Women’s Section. It had been intimated that the Byfield Women’s Section had decided to close, so Russ had contacted Aylesbury to ask them if a lady member wished to continue their membership of the general Women’s Section at the end of the year rather than joining a speific branch how would that be adinistered? To which, the reply was ‘we have not been told that they (the Byfield Womans' Section) were closing.’
Russ said (and the meeting agred) that should any member of the Women’s Section wish to attend our meetings they would be made most welcome. It was believed that they would continue to collect for the Poppy Appeal, whether members or not.
B.6 Donation to the Battle Back Centre: Graham said he had presented the cheque to Chris J of Battle Back at the last Banbury Supper Club meeting.
C. CORRESPONDENCE:
C.1 Branch Financial Statement: Alan reported everything was healthy and in the black but it was agreed to wait until the May meeting before deciding whether to make a further donation to the Battle Back Centre.
C.2 Election of National Vice Chairman and 3 Trustees: Russ reported that he had received voting papers for these positions but the deadline for returning them precluded any discussion with Branch members. He had therefore selected who he felt to be the most suitable candidates himself and hoped this was acceptable. The meeting agreed.
C.3 Annual Conference 21st/22nd May: The provisional agenda had been received.
C.4 Membership Update: A list of all those who had not renewed their membership had been received for review by Russ, who would contact them; should they decide definitely not to continue, their membership will be recorded as having lapsed from the end of April 2016.
C.5 Event Funding and Membership Handbook: Updated documents on these two subjects have been received.
C.6 Community Lunch: It has been suggested that Branches might like to host a Community Lunch on 9th June, the Queen’s Birthday, as a fund raiser, but after discussion it was decided not to progress that.
D. POPPY APPEAL:
D.1 John reported that there was no update to the figure reported in February.
D.2 Alan W asked John whether he had heard anything yet from Lewis Cooper on the question of which County should be credited with Eydon’s Poppy Appeal sum? John replied that he had not.
E. ANY OTHER BUSINESS
E.1 Chris announced he would be on holiday for the first two weeks in May, so would make arrangements for John to hold the Branch Standard for that period.In addition to Chris, Tony W and Terry tendered their apologies for the May meeting.
F. SPEAKER:
Graham Pattenden gave an illustrated talk on Colonel Fred Barnaby, a Victorian Soldier and Traveller. However this turned out to be only the first part of a description of a fascinating life; Part 2 is eagerly awaited. At the conclusion Graham asked that the monies collected for speaker’s expenses during the evening be donated to Branch funds, for which he was thanked.
G. FLAG FLYING DAYS: April 21st Queen’s Birthday
April 23rd St George’s Day
