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Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 3:47 pm
by Carl Hibbard
John Reyes wrote:Fegan just gave a thanks to Alex
What role does Chris hold in the proceedings today then as the reporting is a little slim?

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 3:49 pm
by LawrenceCooper
John Reyes wrote:Fegan just gave a thanks to Alex
:shock: Has he joined the arbiter nexus?

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 3:53 pm
by David Sedgwick
Carl Hibbard wrote:
John Reyes wrote:Fegan just gave a thanks to Alex
What role does Chris hold in the proceedings today then as the reporting is a little slim?
He is the Representative Member for Chess in Schools and Communities (6 votes) and for the North Essex League (2 votes).

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 3:54 pm
by Carl Hibbard
David Sedgwick wrote:
Carl Hibbard wrote:
John Reyes wrote:Fegan just gave a thanks to Alex
What role does Chris hold in the proceedings today then as the reporting is a little slim?
He is the Representative Member for Chess in Schools and Communities (6 votes) and for the North Essex League (2 votes).
Thanks.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 4:00 pm
by Bob Kane
Chris has a vote, and an opinion

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 4:46 pm
by benedgell
NED results:

Julie Denning: 240
Stephen Woodhouse: 193
Peter Hornsby: 55
John Foley: 31

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 6:41 pm
by benedgell
We're done! Nothing exciting happened.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 6:47 pm
by Andrew Zigmond
benedgell wrote:We're done! Nothing exciting happened.
Well anybody sat in front of the EC forum with a tub of popcorn in their hands would have been disappointed. Otherwise the least contentious AGM for generations shows how much progress the ECF has made in twelve months.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 2016 7:31 pm
by John Reyes
Good meeting

Got told by one of the non exe people that why I move point 14 up the order and how many council meeting I have been to!

Re: ECF elections 2016 Boards report

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 7:42 am
by JustinHorton
Bob Kane wrote:Subject: C25.6.1 The Board’s Report ~communication improvement claims

Just for the record my comments in bold

much more use is being made of social media such as Twitter and Facebook ( not true since the Board got rid of the social media manager the tweets have drastically reduced in Quality and quantity)
This situation has recently been rectified, no?

Bob Kane wrote:an Ask the Directors facility has been implemented so that members (and indeed anyone else) can interact directly with Directors. ( so you can now send a private email to a director,(wow !) this effectively curtails any public discussion of contentious issues
The existence of this forum would seem to contradict this assertion.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 8:27 am
by Angus French
David Robertson wrote:
Angus French wrote:
David Robertson wrote:Did Angus French publish his statement outlining his fitness to be member of the Governance Ctte? Possibly I missed it.
He didn't - and nor did other candidates for membership of the Governance and Finance Committees as, I believe, is the norm.
Never mind norms; it's rules that count - especially in matters of good governance. Candidates for re-election are not required to resubmit a statement. But you have never been elected to the Committee. You were appointed, presumably by its Chair, to a casual vacancy. That's fine. But you are now formally a candidate for election at the AGM where Council members deserve to know what they are electing. A statement is required - unless, of course, different standards apply these days.
To which rules do you refer?
I was appointed by the Board on the recommendation of the Governance Committee Chairman.
I think the worst I could said to have done was to slight Council which I didn't intend. But I was at the meeting and could have been asked questions.
As to my suitability, I've now attended the last 11 Council meetings and was briefly a Non-executive Director. I would hope Council would know me and know that I'm independent, like to analyse and like to ask questions.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 11:39 am
by NickFaulks
John Reyes wrote:Good meeting
While John and I were generally of like mind on the issues, I thought the meeting was horrible. I can only hope that John's greater experience of ECF mechanisms means that his more optimistic view of how matters will unfold is justified.

I felt that there were three active factions at yesterday's AGM.

1. Those still trying to carry on unfinished business ( as they see it ) from a year ago. Phil Ehr unsurprisingly made the first contribution from the floor, lamenting the ECF's diminishing credibility and commending Malcolm Pein for his efforts to reverse this. They spoke to nearly every item on the agenda, saying largely the same thing every time. One topic which did resound was the failure of the Board to communicate with members, though their view that the old forum had been the solution was met with weary silence.

2. The Member Representatives, and a few others, who had to some extent managed to canvass their members. They had found that the Board's plan to expend far greater resources on international chess, funded by fee increases, did not command much support among club members. This was, of course, merely a confirmation of the last Finance Meeting, where this plan was given the thumbs down by Council, and there was disappointment that it had just reappeared almost unchanged.

3. The Board. They are absolutely determined that the Olympiad team is a top priority, supported as necessary by membership fees. We were told at length and several times over that club members "had to decide" what sort of ECF they wanted. Bleatings from the floor that they had been asked, and had expressed a different view from the Board's, were not even acknowledged. From some parts of the top table, I felt that the bringers of unwelcome news were pretty much being spat at.

As to financing of international chess, there was a very unsatisfactory divergence within the Board. The International Director, re-elected nem con for three years, has given his assurance that he has obtained very substantial sponsorship which he expects to be maintained in the future. There is, however, no mention of this in the financial plan, where increased international spending is matched by increased fees. This makes no sense.

note : the FD offered to change the presentation of the numbers so it would be less apparent that increased fee income matched increased international outgo. That is not the solution.

It was noted that the current year's Budget included nothing for the sponsorship support for last month's Olympiad campaign. The Director of Finance replied that he could not do that because he hadn't seen the money yet. During the stunned silence following that reply the meeting moved on to the next item, but it is extraordinary. If he is confident that the money will be received, then there is no reason for it to be left out of the Budget. I feel that we are missing some important piece of information.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 12:24 pm
by Michael Farthing
Not sure I quite like being promoted to part of a 'faction'.

I find it very hard to come to terms with Nick's faction no 1 and its continued campaigning in the light of increasingly clear rejection by Council is irksome.

Certainly the member reps expressed concerns to the Board, but on most matters there were no concerns. At a personal level I made it clear that there was no ill-feeling and that was reciprocated. That includes Malcolm Pein, who might, perhaps, be thought of as an honorary member of faction no 1, though I suspect he lacks the necessary thrust for full membership.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 12:44 pm
by NickFaulks
Michael Farthing wrote:Not sure I quite like being promoted to part of a 'faction'.
Perhaps you view the term as being more pejorative than I do. As to faction #1, I do not dispute their right to exist and to make their views known - I have too much personal experience elsewhere as an agitating minority myself to do that. I just feel that they are allowed to take up too much meeting time saying the same thing over and over again.
but on most matters there were no concerns
Indeed, but the whole meeting boiled down to one issue, which was not satisfactorily addressed.

Re: ECF elections 2016

Posted: Sun Oct 16, 2016 12:46 pm
by JustinHorton
NickFaulks wrote: 1. Those still trying to carry on unfinished business ( as they see it ) from a year ago. Phil Ehr unsurprisingly made the first contribution from the floor, lamenting the ECF's diminishing credibility and commending Malcolm Pein for his efforts to reverse this. They spoke to nearly every item on the agenda, saying largely the same thing every time.
Are any of these people employed by Malcolm in any capacity?