THE LEEDS ASSOCIATION OF ENGINEERS
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting + Lecture) at The Methodist Church Hall, Morley at 7.30pm on Thursday 27th April 2023.
1. Attendance– Eleven members of the Leeds Association of Engineers attended the meeting. Mr Town (President) opened the AGM at 7.30pm. The meeting was to be followed by a talk on “Secondary Metallurgy in Steel Making” by Mark Whitehead a member of Leeds Association of Engineers.
2. Apologies for absence. G. Toulson, J. Burton, J. Bentley, A. Rogers and the three new student members who are to be proposed for membership later this evening.
3. Minutes of the previous A.G.M. Held on 28th April 2022 were given to all members. Mr. Aldersley proposed that these should be accepted as a true record of the past AGM, once an amendment had been made to the total of Honorary members was made. This proposal was seconded by Mr. Kibler and approved by a show of hands.
4. Matters Arising. Fifteen Honorary members added to the original total now updated to 66 with the total membership being updated from 58 to 73.
5. Nominations for Council. Mr. Town said that our constitution states that council members serve a period of two years after which they must resign and re-apply if they wish to remain on council. All current members of council have agreed to continue in their current roles if the membership wishes them to do so. He asked if any member present would like to join council but nobody volunteered. Therefore Mr. Town proposed that all current members should be re-elected and this was seconded by Mr. Kibler. All were voted back on council with a show of hands from the membership.
6. Nominations for Vice President. In the absence of any volunteers for this role last year, Mr. Aldersley said he would be prepared to be interim Vice President if the membership wished him to do this. Once again we have no volunteers to take the role, Mr Aldersley has kindly agreed to continue as interim Vice President for another year. This was proposed by Mr. Roper and seconded by Mr. Yates. This was accepted with a show of hands by members present.
7. Nominations for President. In the absence of any volunteers Mr. Town said he is prepared to continue as president and this was agreed by a vote of the membership.
8. Confirmation of Trustees. Mr. Town said that we need to confirm the names of the trustees at each A.G.M. and minute this for the bank. The names of the trustees are John Bentley, Kevin Hegarty and Ian Blakeley. He asked that the membership vote to accept that these people continue in their current rolls. This was done with a show of hands.
9. Website. Mr. Toulson was not present at the AGM but had reported that all is going well with the website. Costs remain low and this proves to be a good way of communicating with our membership. He did say that new material is always welcome so if any member has something of interest then please do not hesitate in forwarding it to him.
10. Membership Report. Mr Murray started by discussing the diverse range of events we had in the last session. These included a visit to Kirklees Light Railway, a talk by our member Bill Jagger on bridges, a lecture on modern day railway infrastructure titled “Signalling for High Capacity” and a lecture by John Sugden on Anaesthesia, Mr. Yates gave us a talk on the Motor Car and we got a visit to Thorite to hear all about, and see the design and build of a steam powered motor cycle that will attempt to break the world record for a steam powered vehicle. He mentioned the annual church service which normally takes place in May and our Solstice walk in June. He also mentioned that one of our members questioned whether it is acceptable to subsidise certain events including the meal after the solstice walk and the meal after the annual church service that is provided in order to encourage our members to attend the event. He said council are proposing that we should raise subscriptions from £15 to £20 this will allow us to continue to subsidise meals for members and their partners as we have in the past. We agreed that the subsidies at the church service and the solstice walk are available to all members who choose to attend, so the proposal to increase subscription was put to the membership by Mr. Murray and seconded by Mr. Kibler and was agreed by a show of hands from the members present. He reported the membership figures for 2021 – 2022 as follows, Corporate – 3 members, 1 – life member, 46 full members and 15 honorary members making a total membership of 65. He said two of our members Mr. D. Bell and Mr. Norris are currently in care homes so are unlikely to attend any further events. We have three applications for membership at the moment all of which are students at Leeds City College. We must thank Mr. Aldersley for promoting our L.A.E. at the college and he is the proposer for the three student members, Cameron Pinder, Martins Golubevs and Isaac Auty. They are seconded by Mr. Yates and were voted in by a show of hands by the Leeds Assocation members present. He closed by making a request for a volunteer on behalf of Mr. Stacey who has said there is too much work for one person in organising and running the annual golf tournament.
11. Treasurers Report. Mr. Kibler started by thanking Mr. Jagger for verifying the accounts that have been submitted, a copy of which has been made available to all present at this meeting. He said this is the first complete balance sheet for the year following the Covid-19 pandemic. He briefly went through the balance sheet and highlighted the charitable donations we have made since the last AGM. These were, £100 to the Whistlestop Valley (Kirklees Light Railway visit), £250 for the Steam Bike + £50 expenses (for further development of the bike). He thanked Mr. Stacey for using his personal bank card to secure us a 25% discount on the complimentary drinks we provide for guests at our annual dinner. He said we lost £175 on the annual dinner and the total loss for the year was £766.32. Hence the reason for this year’s annual dinner increasing by £5 per head and our request to increase subscriptions. He disclosed the amount we have in the current account and the savings account but those figures are not reported in the minutes because they would then appear on the internet. He said that because we have had to change our account to a business account we are now subject to bank charges if we exceed 10 transactions per month but unfortunately this is unavoidable. Mr. Murray proposed that the accounts should be accepted and this was seconded by Mr. Roper and accepted by a show of hands of the members present.
12. Annual Dinner. The 2023 annual dinner was at Headingley Golf Club on the 15th April the general consensus was that the food was not as good as previous years. However people had still enjoyed the evening.
13. Annual Golf Tournament. The annual golf tournament took place on the12th July 2022 at Cobble Hall Golf Club, Leeds. The Braime Trophy was won by David Ward, this was the 87th time that the trophy has been contested. Mr. Stacey is currently trying to raise sponsorship for this year’s event and thinks he will have a full complement of 39 players already. However, if any of our members would like to attend the evening meal they will be made very welcome. He anticipates that the cost of the evening meal only will be approximately £18 which will be confirmed nearer the date of the tournament.
Any Other Business. Mr. Murray mentioned that he had been in touch with trustee Mr. Hegarty who had said he was willing to step down as trustee if someone else was willing to take up the position. Mr. Yates had said he would be willing to become a trustee if a position was to become available. This matter would be discussed at a later date. Mr. Town reminded people of the forthcoming annual Church Service and the Solstice walk before closing the A.G.M. at 7.50pm and announced our speaker for the evening, Mr. Mark Whitehead who will talk about Secondary Metallurgy in Steel Making.
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