Does your club representative truly represent you?

[Jack]

Does your club representative truly represent you on the boards they attend?

Do club committees give direction to the rep on items in an agenda of the meeting they are attending?

Do the club members give their thoughts to the committee on items in an agenda of a forthcoming meeting?

In other words do people who attend regional and access body meetings give their personal view and vote on their personal view or the clubs view, as a representative, of their club they represent?

Should the wider caving community have a say if they don't belong to a member club or live in that particular area?

 

[cap n chris]

No
No, most likely
No
Personal
How
(all the above imo, others may differ obv.)

 

[Judi Durber]

Is anyone going to the PDCMG meeting? 

If they are going as a club representative, have they consulted their club as to how they should reply on the agenda items listed?   

https://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=22994.250#lastPost

 

[Pitlamp]

Yes to most of the questions.

 

[Jack]

Interesting - Mendip view

No
No, most likely
No
Personal
How
(all the above imo, others may differ obv.)

Yorkshire view

Yes to most of the questions.

Does this mean the Mendip cavers aren't bothered about what their Committees and Access Bodies do in their name? 

 

[cap n chris]

Does this mean the Mendip cavers aren't bothered about what their Committees and Access Bodies do in their name? 

Certainly not. It means they don't appear to get approached or informed about what their Committees and Access Bodies do in their name, obviously.

 

[badger]

WSCC are a CSCC club and yes I do talk to the club but then we are only 20 so fairly easy. My other club which is 200 ish its a bit harder so one would hope BCA stuff is discussed at committee meetings

 

[cap n chris]

...have they consulted their club as to how they should reply on the agenda items listed?

Hi Judi, I've been in various clubs for decade(s) and don't recall being asked by any of them about forthcoming topics which were under debate. My presumption therefore is that any club rep(s) - assuming there is such a thing at the regional council - are doing their best to guesstimate how they should respond and most likely this is by putting forward their own considered view(s) on the grounds that it's better than nothing.

 

[Pitlamp]

Interesting - Mendip view

No
No, most likely
No
Personal
How
(all the above imo, others may differ obv.)

Yorkshire view

Yes to most of the questions.

Does this mean the Mendip cavers aren't bothered about what their Committees and Access Bodies do in their name? 

It's probably not great to draw conclusions from such a limited data set.

I feel I ought to point out I'm from Lancashire, not Yorkshire.
Such things are important round 'ere.   

 

[mikem]

Most clubs do forward agendas to their members, so individuals can approach their reps to discuss things they are concerned about. In bigger clubs it's not realistic for reps to canvas everyone, but hopefully they do discuss things at committee level.

 

[Ed]

Interesting - Mendip view

No
No, most likely
No
Personal
How
(all the above imo, others may differ obv.)

Yorkshire view

Yes to most of the questions.

Does this mean the Mendip cavers aren't bothered about what their Committees and Access Bodies do in their name? 

Or some people are in the wrong club / of a minority opinion

 

[Jeanrr]

As a member of 2 clubs in Yorkshire

Yes in one small club,  NO in the other.

Small clubs cam easily ask their members, larger clubs don't seem to

 

[molerat]

In bigger clubs it's not realistic for reps to canvas everyone, but hopefully they do discuss things at committee level.

It is realistic. Email and google forms exist, which allows my club to canvas its members. I understand from some cavers who are members of other clubs that those clubs do not bother canvasing their members. Club committees are not representative.

I suspect that, for club members who are not asked for their opinions before a club rep votes on their behalf, the answer to the question posed by the thread title is 'no'.

 

[PeteHall]

I think the distinction between large and small clubs is probably fair. My small club does generally discuss how the club should vote on contentious issues.

One particular issue we discussed was the CRoW ballot, which the club (Mendip based, I should add) supported. I was disappointed to see all club votes at a future CSCC meeting in favour of a motion to disrupt the CRoW campaign and did ask our rep why he voted against the club view. His justification was a technicality, I suggested he abstain in future or support the spirit of the club position. I am not aware of a club rep voting against the club position since, but I haven't scrutinised CSCC or BCA minutes to confirm this.

Other issues discussed, such as those at the recent BCA meeting had a less clear club position, I am not sure how our rep voted, but the outcome seemed OK regardless 

I've never been canvassed in either of my larger clubs, but then again, I don't go to the meetings, so I guess I have myself to blame...

 

[Badlad]

Who's your rep?

 

[cap n chris]

Most clubs do forward agendas to their members, so individuals can approach their reps to discuss things they are concerned about.

While this sounds like a positive and helpful comment I invite you to have a look at any of the agendas available for download here and you'll quickly see that having a forwarded agenda is as useful as a chocolate teapot in terms of highlighting anything contentious about which someone might have input/opinion to offer and therefore take time out to attend or submit representations.

http://cscc.org.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=documents:start

So, thanks for trying to appear helpful but it's not.

 

[andrewmcleod]

Or from another point of view, clubs should abstain on any vote where adequate information has not been presented in advance to allow clubs to make a decision.

It is not possible for a club rep to make a definitely representative vote at a meeting for new matters only brought up during that meeting which the club has not previously considered.

This is of course silly, and so the true situation should be described - clubs vote at regional meetings for themselves - the club's interests (as understood by the committee) not being quite the same as the member's interests. This is not wrong as such, but the illusion that clubs represent individual member's best interests in the caving world at large is clearly not entirely true.

In fact as a member of a club committee I would prefer to make this distinction so that clubs can freely vote for what is best for the club (after all, club committee members and most far, far more than me put an enormous amount of effort into running their club), while individuals can vote freely as well.

If only someone could do something important to change the BCA policy to help this - oh wait, the AGM just did. Encourage your friends and clubs to vote for change in the upcoming constitutional ballots

 

[BradW]

The way a club rep acts at a meeting of any body where they are entitled to have a voice is entirely the business of that club and nothing to do with anyone else. If they choose to represent in way that bothers people, then it's down to the members of the club to either complain, or leave for a club they feel represents them better. I like the comment above that the CLUB interest might actually differ from the MEMBERS' interest, but my view is that on the whole they should be much the same. For example, a club's legal obligations (assuming they have some form of incorporation) will dictate how the club works, so the club cannot support anything that contradicts the aims and objects of the club.

 

[BCA Chair]

Thank you Andrew for this timely reminder to everyone about the pending ballot regarding the significant changes to BCA democracy discussed at the AGM.

Work is ongoing behind the scenes to get this ballot to happen (I would like to acknowledge the work that Cookie, Gary and Wendy are putting in here). More news in due course. If you have registered for BCA online to receive communications by email, then you will receive ballot information by email; if you have not then it will come by post.

Please register for BCA online and save us some postage: https://members.british-caving.org.uk/users/login

In the meantime for anyone who hasn?t a clue what this is all about, it relates to a proposal to remove the BCA?s current two house voting system, in which individual members (CIMs/DIMs) vote in one ?house? and BCA group members (clubs and constituent bodies) vote in another, both having to pass for motions to proceed. The proposal puts forward the necessary constitutional changes to remove the group vote meaning voting would be by all individual members only. Concurrently, it will become mandatory for the BCA to make voting more easily available to all individual members, involving an online ballot for all proposals run for a roughly one month period after the AGM.

Full details of the proposal can be found in the AGM agenda (page 28-34), and a discussion on the proposal (including arguments for and against) can be found in the AGM minutes (page 19-21), both of which are here:

https://british-caving.org.uk/wiki3/doku.php?id=about:documents:general_meetings:start

This proposal was accepted with high majority in the house of individuals and just passed in the house of groups at the AGM on 9th June (70% majority is required for constitutional changes). It must achieve 70% support in both houses in the pending member ballot too. We know that there are very mixed opinions on this, so we urge all groups and individuals to start considering this matter now and to participate in the ballot when it happens.

Of course, although the direct role of clubs in voting would be removed if this proposal were accepted, there is nothing to stop clubs educating their members on upcoming BCA proposals, and lobbying their members to vote in a particular way. In fact, this kind of engagement and discussion is great! Therefore clubs would still be able to exert influence on BCA democracy (and in a way that is more proportional to their number of members), but the final voting decisions would come down to each individual member.

 

[mikem]

Most clubs do forward agendas to their members, so individuals can approach their reps to discuss things they are concerned about.

While this sounds like a positive and helpful comment I invite you to have a look at any of the agendas available for download here and you'll quickly see that having a forwarded agenda is as useful as a chocolate teapot in terms of highlighting anything contentious about which someone might have input/opinion to offer and therefore take time out to attend or submit representations.

http://cscc.org.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=documents:start

So, thanks for trying to appear helpful but it's not.

Leaving your only solution as turning up for the meeting yourself!

As this discussion is about regional & access meetings, rather than BCA AGMs, I'm happy to have a club rep present, not just those individuals who enjoy committees & would turn up anyway - other individuals can still go if they want to...