THE LEEDS ASSOCIATION OF ENGINEERS
Minutes of the Council Meeting held at 7.30pm on Thursday 7th November 2024 at The Corner House Club, Leeds.
1. Attendance. President J. Aldersley in the chair with G. Roper, S. Stacey, M. Murray, G. Toulson, J. Bentley, I. Scholes, I. Auty, C. Pinder and M. Golubevs.
2. Apologies for absence. B. Yates, J. Burton, R. Town, A. Kibler, H. Soutar, I. Blakeley and A. Rogers.
3. Minutes of the Previous Meeting, dated 3rd October 2024 were approved & signed.
4. Matters Arising. Mr. Aldersley commented that in ‘Any Other Business’ in the October minutes the student member’s name should have been Cameron Pinder instead of Martins Golubevs.
5. Treasurers Report. Messrs. Aldersley and Murray had been sent the transactions report below from Mr. Kibler in his absence.
| Date | Item | Detail | Debit | Credit |
| 11/Oct/24 | Other | Council Meeting Room | 160.00 | 0.00 |
| 22/Oct/24 | Subs | M Murray | 0.00 | 20.00 |
| 30/Oct/24 | Subs | E Atkinson | 0.00 | 20.00 |
| 1/Nov/24 | Subs | C Stocks | 0.00 | 20.00 |
| 5/Nov/24 | Subs | S Stacey | 0.00 | 20.00 |
| 5/Nov/24 | Subs | A Kibler | 0.00 | 20.00 |
6. Correspondence. Mr. Toulson said he had received an email from John Pankhurst of the Keighley Association of Engineers advising that their proposed dinner in November had been cancelled due to poor uptake. Other council members had received similar notifications. Several LAE members had been considering attending this dinner. Mr. Aldersley advised that any payments made to attend the dinner would be reimbursed, according to Mr. Pankhurst. Mr. Aldersley had contacted Richard Eaglen thanking him for the visit to The Leeds Welding Company. He proposed contacting Braime Pressings and Schneider Electric to investigate possible visits for the next session.
7. Membership. Mr. Murray said that there had been no change in membership from last month. He advised that subscriptions would be requested soon. He commented that in the past we had sent a stamped addressed envelope to return subscriptions, and that although nowadays postage is very expensive it had brought in more subscriptions. Mr. Murray said that in chasing up subscriptions he had noted three emails that had been returned, undelivered. Two of these had been resolved, leaving only one member’s account outstanding, namely Mr. Johnson (now retired from Craftsman Tools). It appeared that there had been a technical hitch with the email but this too had been resolved. Mr. Aldersley said that WDS Components had recently joined as a corporate member and he had asked The Leeds Welding Company to consider joining as a corporate member, but so far he had received no response.
8. Student of the Year Award. Mr. Aldersley confirmed that Cameron Pinder had been selected for the award this session. He asked Cameron if he had any thoughts for a practical prize, perhaps for use in his work, which would be awarded by the association. Mr. Aldersley advised that Mr. Soutar had previously proposed establishing a design competition for determining the future winners of the award. This is in the early stages and Mr. Aldersley asked our three new student council members if they had any ideas to contribute to the proposed competition.
9. Current Programme. Mr. Aldersley explained to the three new council members how the association runs the annual session of events and said that if they have any suggestions for future events these would be welcomed. He advised that the next visit would be to Britvic Soft Drinks at the end of November. As Mr. Murray had advised that as there had been fewer uptakes than the thirteen maximum visitors there would be no need to have a raffle to select those allowed to attend. Mr. Aldersley said if anyone would like to attend then please contact Mr. Murray. He informed that events in the New Year would start with a January visit to M.A Ford, who have been very supportive to the association, especially with regards to sponsoring and taking part in the golf tournament. In February, Cameron, Isaac and Martins will be giving us a talk on their work experiences. In March there will be a visit to WDS Components and at the AGM in April Andy Ross will talk about his model of Hunslet Engine Company. Mr. Kibler had sent a message advising that member Neil Cobbold was working towards arranging a visit to Leverton (Caterpillar) in the summer, this most likely being a Saturday event.
10. Next Session. Mr. Aldersley mentioned ‘Airedale’ for a possible visit next session. Mr. Pinder said he knows a design engineer at Airedale to make contact. He also suggested ‘Bob’ a staff member at college for a source of event suggestions. Mr. Aldersley said he had tried to cajole Bob to giving a talk but hoped that he would attend lectures to keep in touch with the association. Mr. Aldersley suggested another brewery visit might be worth investigating as it had been a while since we last had a similar event.
11. Website. Mr. Toulson confirmed that all events in the current session had been added to the website and that we had a full programme right through until next summer. He welcomed any articles from our new council members that would be of interest to the membership. Mr. Aldersley suggested they could forward articles or maybe details of their day to day work, perhaps with photographs, providing this is allowed by their employers.
12. Golf. Mr. Stacey advised that he had booked the tournament at Leeds Golf Club for Tuesday 1st July 2025. He had looked at other venues and found that the fees had considerably increased, with an example being at Moortown the cost was now £150 per round. At Leeds GC he had agreed £68 per head for the day, an increase of £3, with the ‘afternoon only’ cost rising £2 to £52. He informed us that there were two sponsors, namely M.A.Ford and Braime Pressings. There would be nothing further to organise until the New Year when he would forward a golf notice to Mr. Toulson for the website. Mr. Stacey had decided to cut free wine from the menu in order to keep costs down. He had agreed with Mr. Kibler to receive remittances to his own account and then send one cheque to the Treasurer in order to avoid additional bank charges. Mr. Stacey commented that due to ever increasing costs we may need to consider if the tournament is viable in future, as in the past it had been self funding and at zero cost to that association. Mr. Roper said that our bank had recently become a part of ‘Nationwide’ and it might be worth considering a different account which does not penalise large numbers of transactions, such as cheques from golfers. Mr. Murray asked Mr. Stacey if members of the association could be given priority and informed about booking for tournament places one week before it is generally advertised. Mr. Stacey was not particularly in agreement with the suggestion mainly due to the difficulty he had experienced in booking places to balance team numbers. Mr. Murray further expressed his point that he thought association members should be given a chance to book places before non-members.
13. Annual Dinner. Mr. Kibler had sent a message that there had been no change to the organisation of the dinner. He was awaiting confirmation of the cost which at the moment stood at £32 but he has asked if the cost could be kept at £30. Mr. Kibler said that as regards free dinner places we should forget them as we simply don’t have the funds.
14. Annual Church Service. Mr. Aldersley asked if we should cancel the subsidy on the lunch after the service. Mr. Murray suggested we leave the subsidy as is as he believed this contributed to attendance at the church service. He informed us that before introducing a lunch after the service attendance by LAE members in the church had been embarrassingly down to two.
Any other Business. Mr. Bentley was asked if he would produce a new journal, this being our 160th anniversary year. He said he will consider this and the possibility may depend on a printer being sourced. Mr. Scholes said that the printer of the last journal might not be available due to family health issues, but this would be investigated.
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