Newsletter – 7 November 2018

Notice & Agenda of Annual General Meeting on November 22 2018

As previously over the last few years we are sending you the papers for the AGM in the form of a members’ newsletter. Though we request that you bring the documents with you, there will be a few hard copies available on the evening. The screening of The Other Side of Hope should start at about 20:00.

Abingdon College and District Film Society –
Annual General Meeting

To be held at 19:30 on 22 November 2018 in Abingdon Health and Wellbeing Centre.

  1.  Minutes of the last Annual General Meeting (16-11-17), (see below).
  2. Matters arising.
  3. Officers’ Report and Accounts (see below)
  4. Matters arising from, and adoption of, officers’ reports and accounts.
  5. Election of Officers, “other executive officers” and between 5 and 7 other members of the General Committee, and
  6. Appointment of Independent Examiner of Accounts.
  7. AOB

Minutes of the 2017 Annual General Meeting

held at 7.30 pm. at Abingdon Health and Wellbeing Centre, Audlett Drive, on Thursday 16 November 2017.

Present: 40 members.
Apologies for absence: Martin Johnson (Chair) and Noeleen Farrell.

  1. Minutes of the previous AGM (held 10/11/16) which had been circulated were accepted as a true record. (Proposed Dave Thomas, Seconded Martin Johnson and agreed nem con.)
  2. Matters arising: Gift Aid:- In view of the fact that we claimed and were paid “Gift Aid” by HMRC in error the Secretary proposed that ABCD FS write to HMRC asking how the money received can be repaid. This was seconded by Andy Norton and agreed nem con.
  3. Officers’ Reports: The reports had been circulated prior to the meeting and copies of the accounts (to 31 July 2017) were issued at the meeting. The Treasurer addressed the meeting and gave a brief résumé of the finances with the overall balance being about £1000 up on the previous year due to the interest earned on our deposit account. The accounts had been inspected and sanctioned, conditionally, by the Society’s Independent Examiner of Accounts, to whom thanks were extended. The condition, as in the previous year, related to the claiming of Gift Aid on member’s subscriptions which the examiner considered to be outside the scope of Gift Aid. (see Matters Arising above) The accounts showed our financial position to be satisfactory. It was proposed by Graham Legg and seconded by Mike Bloom that the Officer’s Reports excluding the accounts be accepted. Agreed nem con Accounts as qualified by the Independent Examiner be accepted. Agreed nem con.
  4. Matters Arising. Caroline Harben objected to the way the accounts had only been presented on screen and therefore she was not able to view and study them in detail in advance of the meeting. It was agreed that the Treasurers Report would be revisited at a Special General Meeting in a week’s time on Thursday 23 November at 7.45pm.
  5. Election of Officers and Committee Members: All the outgoing Committee Members had confirmed they are willing to stand for re-election except Tim Haywood. Richard Smart had agreed to put his name forward and was proposed by Geoff Bailey and seconded by Barry Reeves. There were no other nominations. It was proposed by Tim Haywood and seconded by Ellie Rawle that the committee as proposed be re-elected en-bloc. This was agreed nem con. The Committee for 2017-18 was therefore:
    Executive Officers

    Chair: Martin Johnson
    Treasurer: Jeffrey Karoly
    Secretary: Dave Thomas

    Membership Secretary: Barry Reeves
    Program Coordinator: Noeleen Farrell

    Other Committee Members:

    Mike Bloom
    Richard Smart
    Andy Norton

  6. Independent Examiner of Accounts. Steve Lawrence was willing to undertake this again and he was reappointed nem con.
  7. AOB. Ann Smart asked if the Health and Wellbeing Centre will still be available to ABCD in view of the announcement of closure of some centres by the County Council. The Secretary replied that the Abingdon Centre was one of the centres currently identified as being retained so it is expected we will be able to continue to use it.

The meeting closed at 8.05 pm

Minutes of the Special General Meeting 23 November 2017 at the Health and Wellbeing Centre

It was agreed that Mike Bloom would chair the meeting. He announced that there was only one item to consider. The Society’s Annual Accounts which had been introduced at the AGM but not agreed as there had been an objection that there had been insufficient time to consider them.
It was proposed by Mike Bloom and seconded by Dave Thomas that the way in which the accounts were presented at the AGM was sufficient for them to be viewed and studied and therefore the accounts should be accepted. This was agreed nem con. Mike Bloom then thanked the Treasurer for his work on the accounts and also Steve Lawrence for his work as Independent Examiner.

The meeting closed at 7.55pm

Officers’ Report to the 2018 AGM

Summary of the main activities.

We held 12 Committee Meetings to manage the Society’s business in accordance with Charity Commission guidance, and to select the next season’s films. These included the AGM on 16 November 2017 and the Member’s Meeting on 10 May 2018. We showed a main programme of 22 films including 3 which were introduced by specialist speakers, Alex Jacoby, Dr Anne Miller and Prof Ian Christie, with discussions post-screening. We again showed our traditional Silent classic in St Nicolas’ Church, this year Shooting Stars directed by Anthony Asquith, with piano accompaniment by Andrew Youdell. We were fortunate enough to have film directors Anthea Kennedy and Ian Wiblin come and introduce their film, The View from our House. We showed 5 short films this season, but no additional films. Audience numbers ranged from 28 to 64 with an average of 38, the maximum audience was less than last year and the average was also down on the previous season.

Summary of the main achievements of the Society during the year.

The main season commenced on 5 October with Arrival and ended on 22 March with Frantz. We again supplied our audiences with reaction slips to record their ratings and comments on the films. The highest scoring feature at 95% was A United Kingdom, a film recommended by one of our members. The lowest score was for Inside Out which scored 60%. Of the short films Living was the most popular. Average audience satisfaction for the feature films was 82% (5% higher than last season). The full programme and details of reaction slips (scoring) for each film, are posted on our website http://abfilms.org.uk . As usual, we commenced work on preparing our annual programme of films for the next season (2018/19) in January of 2018. We invited members to a meeting to review the selection process in May and finalised the programme in June subject to bookings being confirmed, and the brochure text and images prepared for printing. This year we produced a new style brochure in booklet form with thumbnail images for all the films. Copies of the brochure were sent out in early September 2017 to existing members, past members and potential new members who had expressed an interest with a letter inviting them to become members for the 2018/19 season. We continued our membership of Cinema For All. We did not seek any special grants this year. Membership at the end of the season was 46 (down 8 on the previous season). It remains the committee’s objective to attract more members, so that we can continue to show films at reasonable subscription rates.

The Treasurer’s Report is presented as a spreadsheet to be issued at the meeting.

Now that the Newsletter is issued via a link in an email please think about forwarding the email you received to friends and colleagues as this will introduce them to our website.