The Annual General Meeting of the Kentish Cat Society Is to Be Held in the Club Room Of

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THE KENTISH CAT SOCIETY

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Minutes of the Annual General Meeting held at 15.00 on Sunday 11h March, 2012 in the Club Room of the Otford Village Memorial Hall, High Street, Otford, Sevenoaks, Kent.

Committee Present: Mr. C. Patey (Chairman and GCCF Delegate), Mrs. B. Darby (Hon. Secretary/Webmaster), Mrs J Green (President), Miss H Hendra (Vice- President, Vice-Chairman & joint Hon. Cup & Show Support Secretary), Miss Y. Hendra (joint Hon. Cup & Show Support Secretary), Prof. I. Jarvis,Mrs C Kempe (Hon Welfare Officer), Mr. R. Kempe (Treasurer), Mrs. H. Marriott-Power (Show Manager), Mrs H Nicholson, Mrs. H. Patey (GCCF Delegate), Miss A Robertshaw.

Present: Members shown in the attendance register: Mrs S Lee, Ms S Lee, Mr & Mrs Murton, Mrs H Rowe, Mr & Mrs R Taylor, Mrs J Macoy, Miss J Comer, Mr & Mrs G & H Whiston, Miss J Hyland, Miss J Purland

1. Apologies for absence; Mr & Mrs Alger-Street, Mrs E Barfoot, Ms S Barrett, Mr & Mrs Beattie, Miss R E Brown, Ms J Buist, Mrs J Chambers, Ms M Chapman-Beer, Mrs S Clark, Mr R Darby, Mrs J Davey, Mrs C Down, Mrs. T. Edwards, Mr S Farrell, Dr K Ford, Mrs H Goodburn, Mrs D Hall, Mrs B. Harrington, Mrs S Hedges, Mrs & Miss Hope, Mrs A Ivinson, Mrs J Jeffrey, Dr K Jarvis, Mrs C Lambert, Miss S Nicholson, Mrs L Passfield-Taylor, Mrs. R. Pocock (Vice-President), Mrs. P. Potter, Mrs L Power, Mrs. F. Pragnell (Vice-President), Miss DE Robinson, Mr & Mrs R Semos, Mrs L Shankster, Mrs L Smith, Mrs J Southerland, Ms A Stallings .

2. Minutes of Annual General Meeting held on 14th March, 2010

The minutes of the meeting, as amended were accepted nem con and signed by the Chairman.

3. Matters arising

None raised.

4. Chairman’s Report

Mr Patey said it had been a good year for the club. The 2010 accounts had been signed off by GCCF who had been very understanding over the KCS problems. He hoped the 2011 accounts would be signed off before the May 1st deadline this year. He thanked Mrs Marriott-Power and her team for a very good show in October. Julie Hyland in her red devil costume had been a great attraction. The catering team of Mrs Potter and Mrs Edwards had also done a sterling job.He said the Society was still solvent, membership was just over 200. A loan had been made to GCCF of £2,000 towards new IT equipment as agreed at the previous AGM. The Hot Fork Supper had now bee renamed the Kentish Supper and Quiz night and would be held on 31st March. Bookings were still being taken and it was hoped members would come and bring friends to make the evening a great success and hopefully attract new members. The Garden Party would be on 15th July at his and his wife's home. Details had been sent with the AGM papers and would be on the website.

He was open to ideas for discussion on all concepts for the Society - the Committee was still looking at the idea of a social secretary to co-ordinate the social events and contact members re this.

It was still hoped to have an opt-in email system for AGM and other paperwork and a list was still being worked on. The suggestion that the AGM date be advertised in the show catalogue if at all possible, possibly by use of a bookmark had been noted but had not been able to be carried forward last year.. He thanked the Committee for all their hard work and support this year.

5. Hon. Secretary’s Report

5.1. The Committee has met five times since the last AGM, with good attendance, and covering a variety of topics. We sadly lost the services of Mrs Sheila Izzard who died last year, shortly after resigning from the Committee due to ill-health. Mrs June Taylor also resigned due to ill-health but we were very pleased to see her heretoday. MissAnnette Robertshawand Miss Debbie Robinson had been co-opted to the Committee to take their places although Miss Robinson was unable to be present as she had to work.

5.2. The returns for last year were made to GCCF and accepted. It is hoped that those for 2011 would be completed and returned to GCCF well before 1st May.

5.3. The AGM, show and social functions had all been mentioned on the GCCF website.

5.4. There had been several prefix applications which were signed and returned either to the applicant or forwarded to GCCF.

5.5. Correspondence had included much advertising material, various letters from GCCF, several letters, email enquiries and phone calls seeking breeders of various cat breeds.

6. Hon. Treasurer’s Report

6.1. Mr. Kempe said that as his computer had been giving trouble, Mr. Patey was very kindly continuing to prepare the accounts until he was able to take over. Mr. Patey said that circumstances therefore had prevented him from producing the 2011 draft accounts for the meeting but hoped these would be available soon and would be examined soon for despatch to GCCF before the May 1st deadline. If any member wished for a copy they were entitled to request this.

6.2. Donations had been sent to three charities.

6.3. Appointment of Accounts Examiner. Agreed to re-appoint Mr. Bensley who had asked that his fee for checking the 2010 accounts be donated to the Welfare Fund. He had instead been given a small gift.

6.4. Show Accounts These were being examined by Mr G Gow and showed a provisional substantial profit. Agreed to re-appoint Mr Gow for the 2012 show accounts. Mrs Marriott-Power and her team were thanked for the success of the show.

6.5. As mentioned in the Chairman's report, £2,000 had been loaned to GCCF towards improvements to the IT system.

7. Hon. Cups and Show Secretaries’ Report.

Miss H Hendra said 50 cups had been awarded out of the 100 owned by the Kentish. Of these, only 12 were going out today. She reminded members that only cups which had been requested before the meeting could be brought as they no longer had their own vehicle and had to ensure everything was ready for the taxi. She said that there had been two phone calls that morning just as they were leaving to request cups be brought.

8. Show Managers’ Report

Mrs. Marriott-Power said that she felt last year's show had been a great success with 65 entries more than the previous year. It looked as if there would be a profit of around £1,600. The 2012 show would keep the Halloween theme as it had attracted such good comments. The venue at Maidstone was very economical and this had added to the profit. There was a round of applause for the Show Managers and an honorarium of £350 each was agreed.

9. G.C.C.F. Delegates’ Report

9.1. It had been a very busy year for GCCF as a limited company. Mrs Marriott-Power was the new Chairman.

9.2. The Supreme had been turned from a major loss to a small profit. In 2012 the show would be a week later on 24th November due to a clash of events at the NEC. There would be an Imperial class offered and only cats with an Imperial title would be allowed to enter UK Grand classes. Cats from other registers would again be invited and it was hoped to attract cats from abroad.

9.3. On the financial side the capital of the new Company had been reduced as the main asset (the Bridgwater offices) had drooped in value due to property prices falling. Revenue had been turned from a loss of £52,000 to a profit of £14,500 in June and by February to £25,500. Financial turnround was mainly attributable to the determination of GCCF to operate according to sound business practice.

9.4. The IT project was underway with online registrations fro one breed being trialled. It would initially be online for registrations and provision for payments although the actual registrations would be done on the main GCCF computer. Accuracy should be improved and time and money saved.

9.5. The Business Plan was to include diversification and new income streams without GCCF attracting tax.

9.6. Council meeting reports and the Business Plan were all available on the GCCF website.

10. Hon. Welfare Officer’s Report

Mrs Kempe had reported there had been little activity, but the Society had given financial support to three charities.

11. Website report Mrs. Darby said the website continued to attract visitors world wide, from countries as far apart as all of the UK, Australia, North and South America, many parts of Africa, the Indian sub-continent and many different countries in Europe. Visitor numbers varied day by day but averaged about fifteen to twenty meaning that the site attracted around about four hundred & fifty visitors each month. The main pages visited were the show and social events pages consequently the figures shot up from September through to November.

She had been having some trouble with the site over the last year as it was created in FrontPage and Microsoft (in its wisdom) decided not to continue with support for this so it was downloaded into Dreamweaver which was nowhere near as user friendly as FrontPage and had led to some loss of interaction as the two formats didnot communicate. She had however recently acquired another program which it was understood should accept the FrontPage site and transfer well. This was being worked on she hoped to be able to report more success shortly.

Mrs Darby made the usual plea for any suggestions as to more and/or different content so please do contact her if there were any changes wished for or helpful or useful suggestions.

12. Election of President, Vice-Presidents, Secretary, Committee Members and GCCF Delegates Unanimously agreed that Mrs. Green be elected President with Vice-Presidents Mrs. Pragnell, Mrs. Pocock, Mrs. Lauder and Miss H Hendra. The Secretary said that nominations had been received for Mr. Kempe as Treasurer, Committee members Miss H Hendra, Miss Y Hendra, Mrs. C. Kempe and Miss A Robertshaw. Nominations had been received for GCCF delegates for Mr C. Patey and Mrs. H. Patey. All were unanimously ratified. There were two vacancies for the Committee.

13. Brainstorming Session

Mr Patey asked that members give consideration to ways of attracting new members and attendance at social functions.

Mrs Nicholson suggested that reciprocal links on the website would be looked into, with possible discounts for members. Possibly sign up new members and have free raffle tickets.

13. Any other businessNone raised.

14. Presentation of trophies

These were presented by Mrs J. Green, the President, the meeting closed at 4.30pm and members proceeded to tea.