News
Shortly every member of BMMC should receive an invitation to attend and vote at an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) to adopt revised Articles of Association and Club Rules; the club’s principles of Governance. The meeting will take place online on the 5th September and the invite will contain copies of the revised Articles of Association, Club Rules and a new Standing Order for BRMC together with instructions on how to join the meeting.
I urge every member to attend and vote, if only because this is your club and you should have a say in how it is governed.
So why are we having to change our Articles and Rules? To put it simply a number of contradictions have become evident, some rules said one thing but the Articles either did not allow that or they implied something else. In addition it was felt some Articles would be better expressed as Rules and vice versa. It was also clear that BRMC needed a set of Standing Orders that sat below the Articles and Rules and addressed matters relevant to them.
A Working Group was established to undertake a fundamental review both the Articles and the associated Rules and Marion Quarrington and my self were invited to be in the group. It was chaired by our National Secretary John Edwards ably assisted by Elizabeth Anderson, a professional Governance consultant and BMMC member who provided advice FOC.
It quickly became apparent that some changes were required in how the club was administered. Elizabeth initially felt that there were too many Directors and Executive Officers for a small company and that Regional Chairs could have a conflict of interest between their role as Director and head of region. The Group felt strongly, that members interests should continue to be directly represented at Board level so it has been decided that Regional Chairs should remain as Directors and be fully briefed on their responsibilities to the club as a whole and the region. As they are elected by members they are best placed to represent them. However, the “Executive Officers” are not elected, they are appointed by Council and the title does not reflect their role, which in most cases is to be a national co-ordinator for a function. It has been proposed that they are instead called Co-ordinators and although remaining on Council they will not have the same voting rights as Directors who will form the Board. So in essence the National Chair, Secretary, Treasurer together with the Regional Chairs and the Chair of any Special Interest Group (BRMC) will comprise the Management Board and Council will consist of the Management Board and the Co-ordinators.
Elizabeth also felt it is good management practice to have a process that requires a turnover of officials at governance level so that the company does not stagnate and is open to fresh ideas and initiatives. The new Articles/Rules propose that all officials are elected for a three year term and if willing to continue must offer themselves for re-election every three years but can only serve a maximum of nine years before they must stand down for at least a year.
So to sum up, BMMC will be run by a Board of Directors (The Board), supported by Co-ordinators for day to day management (Council). Regions and Special Interest Groups will be managed by a committee elected by BMMC Members and led by a Chairman who is a Director and member of the Board. The rules for electing the National Chair, Secretary, and Treasurer have not changed but they are also obliged to stand for re-election every three years with a maximum term of nine years. As always the devil is in the detail so read the new Articles and Club Rules carefully before you attend the EGM. If you have any questions please forward them to me or Marion in the first instance.
Chris Whitlock