BCA AGM/Party Weekend

robinw

New member
BCA / BCRA Party Weekend ? Friday 9th June to Sunday 11th June 2017
The Castleton Rotary Centre, Robinlands Lane, Hope Valley, S33 8UB

Plenty of room to camp but a limited number of beds - to book e-mail l.barrett@british-caving.org.uk.

Beds - Friday & Saturday nights ?15 Saturday night only ?10 Camping ?5 per tent


Friday 9th June 2017

1900 ? Earliest arrival time please (if you get to Castleton earlier, there are plenty of pubs!)
2000 ? Bar opens
0100 ? Bar closes

Saturday 10th June 2017
0900 - 1030 Cooked breakfast items available in the Main Hall
1000 - 1600 BCRA Science Activities (see end page for details - places still available on most activities)
1930 ? Hot Food.
2030 - 2300 - Cavers Sing-along.  Session to be led by Rostam Namaghi (free) plus Bar (Not Free but at ?2.50 a pint for ?real ale?, not far off!)
2300 ? Late - DJ 99 Flake (CHECC resident DJ) offers a Techno/House Party (Free) with music to cater for everyone.

Sunday 11th June 2017
0900 - 1015 - Cooked breakfast items available in the Main Hall
1030 - BCA?s Annual General Meeting - Agenda, Reports etc available from BCA Website plus paper copies available on the day. Bring your membership card (usually red or green) to vote.
1430  (If we are lucky!!) BCA National Executive Meeting (Executive members and observers)

Payment: For much of the weekend a reception desk will be open to let you know where your sleeping, collect money for accommodation and generally answer questions. Evening food and breakfasts will be ?pay as you eat? and the bar staff will aim to take anything that?s left!

Accommodation: Anyone sleeping in a bedroom (there are still spaces by the way) will need a sleeping bag and pillow. If you?re a caver, that?s probably all you?ll need, but ?civilised? people may also want a toothbrush and a towel!

Anything else: If there?s anything else you?d like to know, just send an e-mail to secretary@british-caving.org.uk

Details of Saturday?s Science Activities

(All activities will start @ 10:30 in the Rotary Centre and run into the afternoon)

Workshop on cave biology led by Graham Proudlove.

This will be based at the Rotary club. There is no limit on numbers but it would be helpful if you would pre-register [see below].

Surface geomorphology / hydrology walk around the Peak/Speedwell catchment led by Paul Hardwick.

This will start from Perryfoot where there is limited parking so participants will need to share cars. The walk will take in several of the swallets in the allogenic catchment of Speedwell Cavern and then visit Eldon Hill Quarry where there will be a lunch stop (bring your own butties). From there the walk passes through the autogenic catchment to view dolines that have been traced to Peak Cavern. Then down the Cave Dale dry valley with an optional trek up to the top of the Titan entrance dig. Finally visit the three Castleton springs: Russet Well, Slop Moll and Peak Cavern Rising. Expected return to the Rotary club about 16:30. There is no limit on numbers but it would be helpful if you would pre-register [see below].


Workshop / practical on water tracing led by John Gunn

The programme is very weather dependent as if the present dry spell continues it will limit the possibilities. However, it is hoped that dye will be injected at two sites which, to date, have not been traced. Participants will view the dye injection and obtain practical experience of using activated charcoal and cotton wool fluocapteurs. It is also intended to deploy field fluorometers and automatic water samplers. THIS WORKSHOP IS LIMITED TO 10 PARTICIPANTS AND PRE-REGISTRATION IS ESSENTIAL [see below].

Registration for Science Activities

It would be very helpful (& essential for the tracing workshop) if those who are intending to take part in an activity would send an email to John Gunn (bcra-chairman@bcra.org.uk). All that is needed is your name and which activity you intend to join.

In addition to the above there will be
:

? Some guided trips (TBC) into local caves.
? Access to a selection of Derbyshire best caves all within 30mins travel (Bring your own gear and sort yourselves out on this one)
? And concessionary access (TBC) to some of the local show caves..

 

hrock

New member
Looks good.
To expand on the food avlible we are doing:
friday night
Pizza or backed potato
Satarday
Breakfast
Cold samwiches for lunch
bbq with Home made peak disrict lamb, beef or veggie  bergers (not the usual card board), or locale sosages
Sunday
breakfast
Cold samwiches for lunch

All this at very good prices cos we like to please and know cavers are tight
 

cap n chris

Well-known member
With just one weekend to go, separating now and the BCA AGM, is it unreasonable to enquire when/where/if the March meeting Minutes are likely to show up beforehand?
 

robinw

New member
The British Caving Library will be opened from 10am till 5pm on Saturday, 10th. June and will welcome visitors.

The Library is approximately 5 miles south of Buxton, the address is  The Studio, Glutton Bridge, Buxton, SK17 0EN.  To find it, take the A515 south out of Buxton (in the direction of Ashbourne), then after approx. 3 miles, turn right onto the B5053 (signposted to Longnor) and follow this for 2 miles.  The Library is on the lower floor of the large grey stone building on the right of the road, about 100 yards before the bridge over the River Dove.


 

Mark Wright

Active member
Whilst the opening times of the BCA Library on Saturday 10th June are very interesting, can somebody from BCA enlighten the membership as to when we can expect to see the minutes from the March Council meeting held 2 months and 5 days ago.

What?s really annoying is that in less than 12 days those who will be attending the AGM in Castleton will be asked to vote on which constitutional amendments and proposals they think are required to enable, amongst other things, our BCA CRoW Liaison Officer to continue his valuable work in following the will of the voting majority.

After the CRoW ballot, the decisions to be taken at this AGM will be the 2nd most important decisions the membership will have ever had to make and the BCA are not doing a very good job of providing us with the ?official? information required to make an informed decision.

The 8 hour March meeting and the 8 pages of discussion about it on here clearly demonstrate there was a lot to be said about all the proposed constitutional amendments and proposals but for the vast majority of members who didn?t attend, it is essential they have sufficient time to read and digest those minutes before casting their vote.

Maybe it should be in the constitution that minutes have to be posted within 30 days of the meeting date. Maybe that?s for next year, there is enough constitutional gobbledygook, amendments and proposals at this AGM to last everyone a lifetime.

Is there any wonder members are feeling disillusioned with their national body at its lack of communication with those it is supposed to represent. Excuses of email glitches and officers holidays just aren?t good enough.

Can we have the minutes without any further delay please?

Maybe ukcaving should be our national body, it appears to be doing more for British cavers than the BCA appears to be doing.

Mark 

 

Cookie

New member
The Party Brochure with everything you need to know about the weekend; location, accomodation, trips, etc is availble for download load from the website. BCA Party 2017.
 

bazdog

Member
Any interesting news or do we have to wait 4 months for the minutes to find out what happened?
Ps I did ask for the day off but was turned down due to insufficient cover so it's not that I couldn't be bothered to turn up myself
 

Pegasus

Administrator
Staff member
bazdog said:
Any interesting news or do we have to wait 4 months for the minutes to find out what happened?
Ps I did ask for the day off but was turned down due to insufficient cover so it's not that I couldn't be bothered to turn up myself

I'm sure Badlad will post something later - he's just back home  :)

 

Badlad

Administrator
Staff member
A big THANK YOU to all those who turned out for the AGM.  It was refreshing to see a number of youthful faces taking an interest.  The major motions received the following results.

"This general meeting confirms that there is no impediment in the constitution to prevent the BCA campaigning for the Countryside and Rights of Way Act to apply to caving"

PASSED with significant majority from both houses.  This vote stands as there is no requirement to go to a further postal vote.

There was then a vote to choose between two conflicting motions;

a) The first line of section 4.6 reads, "that the owners and tenants of property containing caves have the right to grant or withhold access" be deleted and replaced with with, "that the legal right to control access to and within the cave held by the holder of that right shall be respected"

Or

b) "This motion proposes that the first sentence of Section 4.6 of the BCA constitution be removed"

The meeting decided that a simple majority vote of those in the room would choose which motion would go forward to formal voting.  There were 8 votes for motion (a) and 38 votes for motion (b)

Formal votes then took place on motion (b).  As this is a change to the constitution it requires a 70% vote from both the 'house of individuals' and the 'house of groups and clubs' if successful it must then go to a further vote of the entire membership. 

The house of individuals voted 42 for and 3 against. 
The groups and clubs voted 17 for and 3 against. 
(Figures are from my notes and may not be exact)

This motion, together with a couple of others which survived the day, will now go out to the membership for another vote in both houses where again a 70% majority in each will be required.  There were other elections, motions and issues attended to but I haven't time to write them up just now.
 

bazdog

Member
Thanks for the info Badlad (and all your hard work too). Glad some positive news came out the meeting.
  If view of the first vote, is there still a need to go through with the expense of a vote to change the constitution at this time?

 

Bob Mehew

Well-known member
I have been asked by several people as to the outcome of the vote relating to Section 4.6 of the Constitution.  The Agenda item was divided into three parts. 

Part a) related to "That this general meeting confirms there is no impediment in the constitution to prevent the BCA campaigning for the Countryside and Rights of Way Act to apply to caving?.  This was passed by overwhelming majorities.

Part b) related to three alternatives of which one would replace the sentence of concern whilst the other two would remove it.  The meeting favoured the approach of deleting the existing sentence "That the owners and tenants of property containing caves have the right to grant or withhold access" and it was passed with sufficient majority that it now goes forward to a ballot involving all members.

Part c) on adding a new sub section on permitting BCA to campaign for changes in the law whatever the constitution said, was withdrawn.

For information, several other amendments were also passed.  The one on introducing proxy voting failed.  The one on amending postal ballots was passed following assurances that postal ballots would remain available.

Information was also supplied to the meeting that BCA now holds the email addresses of over 70% of its membership.  The Executive is now looking at ways in which it can make use of that information to conduct the ballot which may involve both use of post and email methods to make contact with members.  The desire is to get the ballot started before the end of July so the results can be announced at the Council meeting on 7 October.  Updates will be posted on progress.

Bob Mehew
BCA Legal & Insurance Officer


 

Bob Mehew

Well-known member
bazdog said:
If view of the first vote, is there still a need to go through with the expense of a vote to change the constitution at this time?
Simple answer - yes.  Apart from it is still possible that the ballot of all the membership might not reach the required margin of 70%, the change to expand the way of balloting would be most welcomed.  We can go some way down this path with the current constitution where at Section 13.3 it states ? ?postal ballot? can mean an online ballot for those members who have elected to receive communications by email. ? But the revised wording will give BCA more flexibility in this area.

PS - I don't have time for the long answer.
 

badger

Active member
now time of everyone who wants change to vote and make sure all those you know who want change vote
don't blame bca if you don't vote.
I shall be encouraging all of my club members to vote
 

andrewmcleod

Well-known member
The proxy voting proposal passed in the house of individuals but failed in the house of groups (which is possibly a little bit cheeky since group members effectively vote by proxy!) but it was a very watered-down version of the one from last year anyway (no postal voting this year).
 

mch

Member
andrewmc said:
The proxy voting proposal passed in the house of individuals but failed in the house of groups

But it only just scraped through in the individual vote, hardly an indicator of massive support. I think that the point made by Jenny P (what happens to your proxy vote when a motion is amended at the meeting?) was a very valid one.
 
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