ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING WEDNESDAY 27 JUNE 2023
AT THE GEORGIAN HOUSE AT 5.30PM
Present
| COUNCIL
Andrew Eggleston – President Nigel Lawrence – Vice-President Holly Chandler Brendan Noone Ilona Soane-Sands Tony Haywood – Treasurer Lesley Chapman – Secretary
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MEMBERS
Nicky Burland Janet Eggleston Nigel Clarke Abigail de Castella Morton Birch Colin Perry Gill Lowe Patrick Puddle Tracy Farquar-Beck
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MEMBERS
Julie-Anne Uggla Sara Spencer Hilius Pretorius Snr Hilius Pretorius Jnr Tomas Gronych Bennt Bengsson Ronnie Cairnduff
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Apologies
Apologies for absence had been received from the following:
Malcolm Matthews
Annabel Finding
Ian Corder
Chris Fitton
Jenny Rowley
Roger Saunt
Buzz White
Approval of the Minutes of the 2022 Annual General Meeting
The minutes of the 2022 AGM were tabled and unanimously adopted as a fair and true reflection of the meeting. This motion was proposed by Gill Lowe and seconded by Colin Parry.
Matters Arising
The President raised four matters arising as follows:
At the previous meeting, Chamber had proposed setting up forums to discuss issues as they arose however, after discussion it had been agreed that there were sufficient channels in place for members to make their views known on any given subject to the Council and this had therefore nots been progressed further.
The compulsory secondary pension scheme had been mentioned and Chamber had arranged for Gower to provide a presentation with regard to the main requirements for employers to consider with regard to this new legislation. The presentation had been very well attended and is due to come into force during 2024.
Richard Ward had suggested that candidates wishing to stand for Council should be given the opportunity to speak to the meeting beforehand. Taking this comment on board, Council had requested that the three candidates standing for election at the current meeting provide a short synopsis to be read to the meeting prior to the election taking place.
David Nash had raised the issue of commemorative coins at the previous meeting and had asked whether Chamber would be able to look into the issue. Chamber had contacted the States of Alderney, however, had not been able to get a meaningful response. It would appear that there had not been a proper contract drawn up between the States of the Royal Mint at the time.
Presidents Report
The President presented his report which had been forwarded to all members as part of the agenda. He highlighted the following matters from that report:
He advised the meeting that Chamber had been instrumental in setting up a “Setting up a business in Alderney” page on their website. This is available to all potential businesses considering setting up in Alderney and provides information on 10 points which should be taken into account and contact details for professionals in order that further specific information can be sought if required. He thanked Ilona Soane-Sands for all of her hard work in setting this up.
He pointed out that members will now be receiving Chamber notifications under two banners, one being information provided by Chamber and the second being information issued by the States of Alderney and forwarded to members by Chamber.
As far as transportation was concerned, he confirmed that Chamber were and always had been in favour of the extension to the airport runway. The Council felt that this was absolutely necessary in order to secure the economic future of the Island for future generations. Chamber had met with the CEO of Aurigny on a number of occasions and were please to advise that Aurigny had agreed to put in place a further 30-35 rotations to Southampton during the busy period. This is caveated by the fact that should medevacs be required or the aircraft suffer any technical difficulties this will reduce the number of additional rotations available.
He advised that Chamber had set up a Hospitality Group with representatives of all areas of tourism being invited. This group will be headed up by Holly Chandler. The inaugural meeting of the group had been a great success with a large number of attendees and it was intended that this initiative would continue with meetings being held on a regular basis.
Chamber had resurrected the Alderney Post Board which had been in existence for some time but had not been active recently. He advised members that the Board was there for any comments to be made with regard to issues with the postal system. Chamber had arranged for the CEO of Guernsey Post to visit Alderney to meet with the Board and it is anticipated that this meeting will take place in September.
He reminded the meeting that Chamber had sent out a survey with regard to the proposed introduction of a General Services Tax (GST) by the States of Guernsey, the results of which showed that members were against the introduction of such a tax. Chamber had met with the States of Alderney who had been in favour of the tax being introduced and had requested Chambers backing, however, this was refused given the result of the survey of members.
Chamber had recently held a very successful meeting with the Alderney Wildlife Trust and it was hoped that such meetings would continue going forwards.
The President confirmed that Chamber is represented on a number of States Committees. He did express concern on the number of States meeting which have been cancelled recently. He advised that he understood the May meeting had lasted for 15 minutes, the June meeting had been cancelled, the July meeting should proceed, however, in August the States are in recess. He also showed concern that there did not appear to be enough information coming from the States to the electorate and that this was something that was being monitored.
He finished by explaining that the Council members were volunteers who usually met out of office hours given that a number of them had full time jobs and/or family commitments. He therefore thanked them for all of their effort and time spent during the year.
Treasurers Report
The treasurer invited the meeting to collect a copy of the accounts which were available in the room. He explained that the income received was entirely from subscriptions and that the accounts showed an excess of £419 over expenditure for the year ended 31 December 2022.
It was noted that the cost of sponsorship had increased during the year and the Treasurer explained that £500 had been given to Alderney Week and that £750 had been the cost of the new Christmas tree. These were in addition to the two regular sponsorships to the costs of the Fly-in in September and to the Golf Club for a trophy.
Bank charges which previously had been at zero had totalled £150 during 2022 and this was down to processing cheques. He confirmed that Chamber did have access to internet banking and it was used wherever possible as it did not incur charges.
The accounts for 2022 were unanimously adopted by the meeting.
Election of the Treasurer
There being no other nominations, Mr T Haywood agreed to continue to act as treasurer for a further term.
Election of the Council
The President advised the meeting that as part of the rotation system, three Council members were standing down and that these were Ian Corder, Ilona Soane-Sands and Holly Chandler. He advised that Ilona and Holly were not seeking re-election but had agreed to act as co-opted members to continue to head up media relations and the hospitality group respectively. The President thanked them both for all of the hard work that they had put in in their time on the Council and said that he was delighted that they had agreed to continue to assist the Council in their co-opted roles. He further advised that Ian Corder was seeking re-election.
There were therefore three seats available and three nominations had been received as follows:
Ian Corder – Proposed by Alan Woodnut and seconded by Jenny Heald
Nicky Burland – Proposed by Sarah Fisher and seconded by Iulian Chis
Vanessa Main. – Proposed by Holly Chandler and seconded by Scott McDonald
The President read the synopsis that each of the candidates had provided and as the election was uncontested, he confirmed that they were elected to the Council and welcomed all three of them.
The meeting was then adjourned for a short period for the newly elected council to retire to elect the new President and Vice President.
The meeting reconvened and Holly Chandler announced that Andrew Eggleston and Nigel Lawrence had been unanimously re-elected as President and Vice-President respectively. She offered her thanks to both of them and commented that she was aware of the amount of time and energy put in to Chamber by the President for which the Council were extremely grateful.
Any Other Business
The President confirmed that it was Chamber’s intention to expand on the sub-groups and, like the hospitality group, it is the intention to initiate sub-groups to cover the Finance, Retail and Construction industries if possible.
The being no further business the meeting closed at 6.15pm.
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President
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Annual General Meeting 27 June 2023
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