26 Regiment Royal Artillery Association

Affiliated to the Royal Artillery Association

 

Minutes of the General Meeting to be held at The Britannia Hotel

Fairfax Street Coventry

On Saturday 8th March 2008

 

 

1.      Commemoration.                                                                 Chairman

Steve Wallis MBE read the Royal Artillery commemoration and the meeting replied.

 

2.      Welcome and Opening Address.                                        Chairman

Congratulations to the President on his promotion to Major General and to his appointment as Deputy Corps Commander in the Multinational Corps Iraq.

 

Congratulations also to Mark and Helen Piacentini. For the 2 occasions that have happened since the last meeting, on their marriage, and the birth of a daughter only 2 weeks ago.

 

Cap Badge presented by Peter and Pat Thomas to the Association at the Committee meeting.

 

3.      Apologies.                                                                    Secretary

Ken Kewley, Alan McCartney, Ted Kewley, Paddy Stafford £10, George Ellis Bowers £30, Ron & Tracy Mc Bride, Romano Naceva, Mick Bali, Ray & De Howell, Jim & Carol Crossley, Martin Burton, June Mason.     

 

4.      Approval of the minutes of the last meeting.                            Chairman

          Proposed by: Jack Pye

Seconded by: Peter Thomas                      Passed

 

5.      Matters arising from the minutes.                                               Chairman

          It was brought to the attention of the meeting that at the  

         last meeting is was passed that it would be the committee

         that would select the venue for the reunions

 

6.      Correspondence.                                                                  Secretary

The following have become members: David Alexander, Derek Atkinson, Reginald Boddy, Alan Breese, Lucas Butler, Robert Campbell, Joe Carroll, Paul Cartlidge, Cheryl Catherwood, Maurice Chapman, Colin Clarke, Gary Cromwell, Phillip Dewey, John Dunn, Baz Eccleston, Nick Evans, Kevin Fox, Fred Furber, Neil Gilyhead, John Hewson, Nick Hodson, Steven Horwell, John Huxtable, Malcolm Johnson, Ken Kewley, Alan McCartney, Michael McInally, Nick Mercer, Paul Milton MBE, Robert Shreeves, Kevin Smith, Alan Stirling, Dave Sumner, Colin Thompson, Geoffrey Whiting, David True, Justin Pearce-Young, Dave Wood,    

 

7.      Administrative Announcements.                                       Secretary

 

a)    Hotel. The timings for the Gala Dinner

b)    Entertainment. This is a Disco supplied by the hotel

c)    Raffle. The hotel had given a prize of a weekend for two in any Britannia hotel in the country, and Jack Pye would be selling tickets

d)    Membership. The membership stands at 448 members and 30 honorary members, with some more joining this weekend.

 

8.      Statement of Accounts.                                                      Treasurer

          This was read by Chick Adams on behalf of Peter Thomas

          Proposed by: Rab Forsyth

          Seconded by: Denis Murphy                     Passed

 

         (Due to the Data Protection Act 1998, the details of the 

           associations accounts are only available from the 

           Secretary by letter on request).

 

8.                Matters brought from Committee and Council

         Meeting.

         Secretary Amendment to the Charter

Regional Representative – at least one member from: South West, South East, Central, Wales, North West, North East, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Over Sea’s (Barbados, Fiji, Jamaica etc).

To read:  Members that wish to serve on the General Committee.

 

Executive Committee is to run the routine affairs of the Association and is to meet as required.  The Executive   Committee is to be made up of the Chairman, the Secretary, the Treasurer and the Regional Representatives

To read: Executive Committee is to run the routine affairs of the Association and is to meet as required.  The Executive Committee is to be made up of the Chairman, the Vice Chairman, the Secretary, the Treasurer and the Welfare Officer

 

Proposed by: The Committee

Seconded by: Rab Forsyth                          Passed                                                

 

10.           Report on the Regiment.

     Col Karl Ford MBE RA

The CO gave his report on the last 2 years of life in the Regt and the next year ahead. Also that the Regiment was to hold an Open Weekend on the weekend of the 11th to 13th July 2008, and any ex member of the Regiment were invited there would be collections from airports and my be the ports, there will be more details soon keep your eye on the website.

 

11.           Presidents Address.

      Major General Bruce Brealey

           Read by the Chairman on the presidents behalf as he is

          away on a tour of duty in Iraq.

“I have asked Steve Wallis to pass on my warmest wishes to you all as you gather for the Reunion weekend. I am bitterly disappointed not to be spending the weekend with you as I know what a marvellous time you will all have renewing old friendships and reminiscing about the good old days.

As you may know, I am in Baghdad serving as the Deputy Corps Commander in the Multinational Corps Iraq. It is a fascinating experience and I amp leased to report that we are at last making real progress. The Regiment will also be deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan later this year and I know that you will all want to join me in wishing them a successful and safe tour.

I would like to thank on your behalf Steve Wallis and his Committee for arranging an excellent venue for the Reunion and for making all the detailed arrangements. A huge amount of work goes into organising such an event. I would also like to pass on my personal thanks to Brian Henderson for his extraordinary efforts as the Association Secretary since its formation. I believe it is fair to say that the Association would not exist if it were not for Brian – so, from us all, Brian thank you very much.

I wish you all a most enjoyable and relaxing weekend.

Bruce Brealey Honorary Colonel and President of the Association”

 

12.    Election of Officers                                                    Chairman

          Secretary

The Secretary Brian Henderson is resigning in line with the Charter and not standing for re-election.

There are two proposals:

Charles (Shuggie) McTaggart and Chris Shuter.

The chairman spoke about both candidates as both had booked to go on the early trip, there was then a vote and the winning candidate by unanimous decision and the next Secretary of the Association is to be Charles (Shuggie) McTaggart.

 

Welfare Officer

           In line with the amendment to the charter that has just  

          been passed the new post of Welfare Officer has been

          created, we had a member proposed by the committee,

          from the meeting held in April 2007 and the was Ron

          McBride, but in the past month Ron has written to say that

          he feels that at this time he will not be able to give the role

          100% and that he wished to withdrew his name from that

          post. Therefore the post was open and the Chairman asked   

          Brian Henderson if he would take the role on, and he

          accepted there were no other proposals and the meeting

          accepted him as the Welfare Officer.

 

13.    Date of the next meeting.                                                   Chairman

The date for the next meeting would be either the first or second weekend in March 2010, at a location to be decided by the executive committee.

 

14.    Any other business.                                                              Secretary

          Welfare

The welfare officer spoke to the meeting about the help that is available for past and present members of the Royal Artillery from the Royal Artillery Association (RAA) through the Royal Artillery Charitable Fund (RACF) and told the meeting the amount that was disbursed. In January the RACF disbursed the sum of £81.255 on 209 individual cases. From all sources (such as the ABF, SSAFA and RBL to name some) the sum of £307,255 was disbursed on those cases, making an average of £1472 and that he knows that there are cases within our Association that could be helped,

The main reason that we don’t get asked for help from anyone is that we are stubborn and to proud to do so, that is not a good enough reason, we wish to know of anyone that might need a little help in any way if we don’t know we can not do anything. There is no need to sell a car to put in a stair lift I am sure that we could help in some way.

         

Booking in

Those that have not yet let the committee know that they are here, would they do so ASP at the close of the meeting.

 

Memberships

          All those that wish to become member also do so after the

         meeting.

         

Vice Chairman

During the election of officers we should have proposed for a Vice Chairman.

The proposal from the committee was that the last Chairman should be the Vice Chairman and that was Denis (Spud) Murphy.

This was seconded by Mark Piacentini.                      Passed

 

15     The closing of the meeting.                                                 Chairman

To close the meeting the Chairman asked that the meeting stand whilst he read out the names of those that will no longer be able to join us at these occasions.

 

16.    Last Post:

 

1.                Lyn Standen.

2.                Steven Huxtable

3.                Dougie Naylor MBE.

4.                Billy Jardean.

5.                David Dobson.

6.                Phillip Brewer.

7.                Les Garnett MM.

8.                Mick Burton.

9.                Bill Shepard.

10.           Dennis Price.

11.           Harry Johnson.

12.           Pat Thomas.

 

President: Major General Bruce Brealey