Nominations deadline for the AGM closing midnight Sunday 19th March

[nearlywhite]

I find it remarkable that an organisation who has multiple vacancies, with a deadline for nomination of candidates and Submission of proposals (apparently on Sunday!) hasn't advertised on UKC, Facebook or their own website! I can't even see any minutes from this year.

It genuinely makes my blood boil to see how badly the organisation is being run, the posts have time limit when the people are elected so it's hardly a damn surprise.

I only found out as multiple members of council reached out to me to see if I knew anyone interested in running for the '6 or 7 vacant positions'. Sadly the answer was no despite being very actively involved (behind the scenes) in checc and multiple caving clubs.

The organisation needs some people with basic competency to run it and have an approach that doesn't force anyone under 55 out.

Rant over. I hope this prompts some action and causes them to advertise. The BCA is a wonderful opportunity to make a difference and my 7 years there gave me the opportunity to help out a lot of fellow cavers. Please please please don't let any of this put you off!

 

[Badlad]

The membership had a choice when they voted on a new chairman. An elderly gentleman or a dynamic youngster (nearlywhite). The elderly gentleman lobbied hard and won. The consequence appears to be a status of nothingness and an inability to attract volunteers. It was a massive missed opportunity and a shame, a real shame.

I understand they don't even publish actions at meetings anymore.

 

[Pegasus]

The organisation needs some people with basic competency to run it and have an approach that doesn't force anyone under 55 out.

Those over 55 with basic competency were forced out too. A lifetime in Sales and Marketing, 30+ years caving experience, the free time and will to want to make a difference - but no, not good enough and so the P&I position (which should be renamed marketing) remains vacant.

Members of BCA are paying a subscription, some basic communication from their organisation is surely not too much to expect? The excellent newsletter is no more (we had a journalist, a proper journalist writing it for goodness sake!). I'm no longer a member of BCA, however not one single communication to promote rejoining. A plan to promote caving, encourage the next generation of cavers + many other new ideas would be welcome, wouldn't it? Maybe there is one, could we hear about it??

Or maybe cavers just want to go caving, use BCA mainly for insurance and let our sports future bumble along heading wherever it is heading....

 

[cap n chris]

Like you, Jane, I'm no longer a BCA member. It may be the case that BCA plods on mainly because you're not allowed to be a club member unless you have BCA membership. If the monopoly over insurance ceases I suspect a rocky road lies ahead.

 

[andrewmcleod]

Perhaps someone should organize a coup? I don't think most of the people reluctantly filling (or, after the AGM, not filling) the positions would object very much... if anyone wants to take over my group I would even buy them some cake or something

 

[aricooperdavis]

if anyone wants to take over my group I would even buy them some cake or something

I'll raise you 2 cakes and a lion bar

 

[JoshW]

Like you, Jane, I'm no longer a BCA member. It may be the case that BCA plods on mainly because you're not allowed to be a club member unless you have BCA membership. If the monopoly over insurance ceases I suspect a rocky road lies ahead.

I think it's a great shame that all the BCA is now known for is insurance.

Amazing things can be achieved by having a collective, but at the moment we're not good enough at publishing the work we do. Their also doesn't seem to be enough of a plan as to how we're a) going to continue to promote caving as a sport, and b) change 'public'* opinion of BCA.

*noting that sometimes this forum has the ability to amplify a smaller group of voices.

Overall I find it quite depressing that the BCA is just (at best) plodding along, particularly when it's potential is so high.

 

[andrewmcleod]

maybe we need to tabulate the level of cakes required to convince someone to take on a BCA position. I reckon Treasurer has to be worth at least a three-tier wedding cake plus a party-size portion of profiteroles...

 

[aricooperdavis]

I think it's a great shame that all the BCA is now known for is insurance.

Overall I find it quite depressing that the BCA is just (at best) plodding along, particularly when it's potential is so high.

There is still a lot going on that is much more than insurance, but it feels like it's the individual volunteers making this happen rather than the organization itself.

If the BCA wants to own the work it does it needs to spearhead it, shout about it, and reward the volunteers doing it.

Volunteering for the BCA is great, but it needs a loud and confident executive if it wants to stay relevant for individual cavers. Phil was great at this, which admittedly made volunteering under him quite hard work, but we got a lot done and it felt very rewarding.

Does anyone know why we have such a hard deadline for nominations/proposals for the AGM? Is it just to make administering the AGM easier? It feels like it does more harm than good at the moment.

 

[nobrotson]

I agree it is more than insurance. There are parts of the UK caving scene, such as CNCC and CHECC, who are doing plenty of good work on behalf of the people they represent, with the help of some inside the BCA who are good at what they do, like Josh in Y&D who has been instrumental in keeping student caving a success during and in the aftermath of covid.

It is pretty frustrating that, despite the efforts of these organisations and individuals, the failures within the BCA mean that there have been and will be losses to UK caving and beyond. One example that many on here likely won't know about is the decline of student caving in Ireland: it seems very likely right now that the entire Irish student caving scene is about to disappear, because universities there are trying to enforce the presence of qualified instructors on student caving trips (a completely ridiculous and inappropriate proposal). Myself and Josh did try and do something about this in the case of UCDCPC when I was in CHECC without much success (partly because the SUI, who we were working with, is a similarly disfunctional organisation, despite having some good people inside it - BCA is not unique in this regard), and if we had had more people to fall back on we might have been more successful. Instead, once the universities saw one of the clubs fail to put up appropriate resistance, they formed an offensive against student clubs across Ireland, meaning that when the next student forum occurs in 3 weeks, I predict most of the people in attendance won't actually be sanctioned to do what they went there to do - go caving.

In my view, BCA needs to be totally redesigned as a bottom-up enterprise with an entirely different structure and set of rules , which encourages and facilitates anyone getting involved in whatever capacity without having to seek information and approval from a committee at the top. As long as there is a clear, transparent framework with good documentation, it should be possible for people to dip in and out, contributing where they can.

Given no one seems to want to be part of the BCA anymore, maybe we could just form a new organisation that does what we want it to and supercede the current set-up? This approach has some risks, but it would allow new, young people to get involved, and would definitely be less boring than trying to fix what currently exists, which past experience suggests would make everyone lose the will to live.

 

[Badlad]

When I stood down as CNCC rep to BCA there were working groups looking at both 'vision' and 'constitutional change'. Did anything happen with either?

 

[Pegasus]

I agree it is more than insurance. There are parts of the UK caving scene, such as CNCC and CHECC, who are doing plenty of good work on behalf of the people they represent, with the help of some inside the BCA who are good at what they do, like Josh in Y&D who has been instrumental in keeping student caving a success during and in the aftermath of covid.

It is pretty frustrating that, despite the efforts of these organisations and individuals, the failures within the BCA mean that there have been and will be losses to UK caving and beyond. One example that many on here likely won't know about is the decline of student caving in Ireland: it seems very likely right now that the entire Irish student caving scene is about to disappear, because universities there are trying to enforce the presence of qualified instructors on student caving trips (a completely ridiculous and inappropriate proposal). Myself and Josh did try and do something about this in the case of UCDCPC when I was in CHECC without much success (partly because the SUI, who we were working with, is a similarly disfunctional organisation, despite having some good people inside it - BCA is not unique in this regard), and if we had had more people to fall back on we might have been more successful. Instead, once the universities saw one of the clubs fail to put up appropriate resistance, they formed an offensive against student clubs across Ireland, meaning that when the next student forum occurs in 3 weeks, I predict most of the people in attendance won't actually be sanctioned to do what they went there to do - go caving.

In my view, BCA needs to be totally redesigned as a bottom-up enterprise with an entirely different structure and set of rules , which encourages and facilitates anyone getting involved in whatever capacity without having to seek information and approval from a committee at the top. As long as there is a clear, transparent framework with good documentation, it should be possible for people to dip in and out, contributing where they can.

Given no one seems to want to be part of the BCA anymore, maybe we could just form a new organisation that does what we want it to and supercede the current set-up? This approach has some risks, but it would allow new, young people to get involved, and would definitely be less boring than trying to fix what currently exists, which past experience suggests would make everyone lose the will to live.

That's such sad news about student caving in Ireland, I didn't know. Hope it can be turned around...

 

[ChrisB]

Does anyone know why we have such a hard deadline for nominations/proposals for the AGM?

I didn't know we did, until this thread. The notice on the website doesn't say, and (as an individual member) I haven't had any emails. But is there a deadline for nominations? Looking at the Constitution, the deadline for "matters to be raised at a General Meeting of the Association, including all proposals for constitutional change" is 84 days before the AGM, which was 19th March (yesterday). I can see nothing in the Constitution about a deadline for nominations, and since the Constitution itself says that one of the purposes of the AGM is to elect officers, that's not a "matter to be raised".

The Manual of Operations says "Deadline for receipt of nominations for Executive, Officer (Standing Committee Convenors) and Club/Individual Representative posts by Secretary, as well as any items or proposals to be raised at the AGM" is "Midnight on Day of Council Meeting Preceding AGM" and "This is a Constitutional requirement" - I can't find anything about that in the Constitution, which also says only that Council shall meet twice per year, and not when (so it could, constitutionally, meet the day before the AGM).

 

[cap n chris]

Y&D and CHECC should run BCA.

 

[aricooperdavis]

Y&D and CHECC should run BCA.

I would much rather they keep doing their excellent work in the background without having to worry about all the other organizational stuff!

 

[Pitlamp]

Nobrotson - just to put on record; you wrote: "no one seems to want to be part of the BCA anymore". 'Fraid that's just not true; I'm a satisfied member and I know plenty of others who are.

That doesn't mean I don't take your point though.

Forgive me for being uninformed but why can't students just go caving anyway, without all the unnecessary mather of paid minders? We always did. I agree it would be far better if universities were more supportive and less restrictive and I do understand how uni clubs are struggling generally. (I've been in the happy position of being able to facilitate considerable funding for a number of uni clubs recently, so please don't think I'm unsympathetic to the difficulties they face; quite the reverse.)

Could I just ask; when you say "Ireland" do you mean Northern Ireland or the rest of Ireland south from the border?

 

[nobrotson]

Nobrotson - just to put on record; you wrote: "no one seems to want to be part of the BCA anymore". 'Fraid that's just not true; I'm a satisfied member and I know plenty of others who are.

That doesn't mean I don't take your point though.

Forgive me for being uninformed but why can't students just go caving anyway, without all the unnecessary mather of paid minders? We always did. I agree it would be far better if universities were more supportive and less restrictive and I do understand how uni clubs are struggling generally. (I've been in the happy position of being able to facilitate considerable funding for a number of uni clubs recently, so please don't think I'm unsympathetic to the difficulties they face; quite the reverse.)

Could I just ask; when you say "Ireland" do you mean Northern Ireland or the rest of Ireland south from the border?

1. what are you satisfied about? I know a lot of very indifferent members who think it may as well not exist.

2. If the Irish students go caving without authorisation from the university, the university will shut the club down and repossess all equipment bought with university funds. The club would also then have no ability to access funds from either the university or other bodies (in this case Sports Ireland). The same thing effectively happened to SUSS about 20 years ago, they were effective in combating this by ensuring the university was not able to access the equipment, by ensuring other funding was available, by having a strong relationship with other cavers for support in going caving (along with good alumni support) and by telling the university they would keep using the university name in the club name so the university would still be associated with the club by name (not what the uni wants, they want to control what happens in their clubs which they would not have been able to do in this case). Unfortunately the Irish student clubs are not in a position to do this.

Your student days were some decades ago - since that time, universities have changed massively, and are now businesses rather than places to learn in most cases. This is even more the case in Ireland than in the UK, and Ireland has quite a different, more Americanised, approach to liability than the UK does as well.

3. I mean the Republic and Northern Ireland. Administratively in this case student caving clubs from NI and ROI are basically treated the same and the universities from both places are acting together.

 

[andrewmcleod]

When I stood down as CNCC rep to BCA there were working groups looking at both 'vision' and 'constitutional change'. Did anything happen with either?

The Vision group didn't really get anywhere, I think.

The Constitution and Operations group (technically) still continues to (just about) run on and off. They put forward or were involved with most of the recent constitutional changes in the last (possibly excepting the major change of replacing all the Standing Committees with Working Groups). I am still the chair (for now) but finding time to do anything at the moment is tricky. There are vague considerations of re-organization, but nothing concrete yet. Any volunteers?

The problem is that even if a Vision group came out with a fantastic long-term plan for the BCA, or the the COG group totally rewrote the constitution, what would that achieve when you don't have the keen volunteers to implement? And, if you had the keen volunteers, what difference does a constitution really make (while the BCA constitution is a little odd, I don't think it really stops the BCA doing anything it really wants to do).

If you had 10 keen people who really wanted to run BCA, the coup would probably not only be bloodless but would probably be invited in politely for tea and biscuits. One of the Executive positions (Treasurer) is about to become vacant I think, and another one of the positions would probably be very happy to stand down for a keen young person to replace them. The P&I working group has no Convenor, and at least two of the working group convenors would happily step aside for someone with

Currently peace reigns primarily, I suspect, due to apathy rather than universal harmony. I have come to appreciate quiet apathy, to be honest, with the skeleton crew just keeping it all ticking over... giving space, time and money for those bits of the BCA more directly connected to cavers (like Y&D) somewhere to operate. Equally if you got in people with fire and drive, but no political sense, you might find yourself back in the bun fights of not that long ago where a lot of arguing happened but was never resolved by the executive... in times of such disputes, I would welcome a strong executive who actually just made a decision rather than revisiting the same disputes every meeting and not actually getting anywhere.

 

[andrewmcleod]

3. I mean the Republic and Northern Ireland. Administratively in this case student caving clubs from NI and ROI are basically treated the same and the universities from both places are acting together.

I was under the impression the BCA as a matter of (potentially unwritten) policy left all of the island of Ireland to the SUI; for example, I don't think there are any BCA clubs in Northern Ireland? (I could be misremembering)

 

[andrewmcleod]

1. what are you satisfied about? I know a lot of very indifferent members who think it may as well not exist.

Fortunately indifferent members rarely do anything to change the status quo (of having a single national body).

The BCA does most of its useful work just be existing. Insurance without a national body would be almost impossible, and limit access to a lot of sites. The Regional Councils do all the access and conservation work, but the BCA pays the bills, and I don't fancy going back to club-only caving where the clubs pay the regional councils (like they used to).

There are things that the BCA could be doing, certainly. They could do a better job with publicity: volunteers please? (this often gets lumped onto IT but ideally the IT group shouldn't be creating any content, just managing the systems).
The BCA can't really do a lot with conservation and access, as this is devolved. Except of course for that very expensive legal case, which sadly went south...
They already do quite a bit with Y&D; because this is a place where good can be done, good people are attracted to do that good.
Being the insurance manager of the BCA is possibly the most important job at BCA but not terribly glamorous