AGM Rings the Changes
Those who live by the sword…. as the saying goes….
Well, we will see about that, but it is certainly the case that the engineers of the new Constitution, approved overwhelmingly at the BKA Annual General Meeting (AGM) today, will have to live with the changes they have wrought – as four members of the constitutional revision committee were elected to posts on the EC. One as Chairman (Errol Blake), and others as Secretary (Debbie Bevan), Vice-Chairman (Hillary Hadley) and Director of International Relations (Jock Hopson).
The AGM was a day full of surprises and change.
The BKA’s constitution has been discussed and debated for as long as I can remember, but the long debate appears to be reaching a conclusion with a definitive re-balancing of power within the organisation. Each Bu (faculty) now has greater powers to run itself and control it’s own finances. What was formerly the Executive Committee (now called the National Committee or NC) has a more limited role, monitoring the Bu, but not organising or running activities except those most efficiently handled across the whole organisation (such as membership renewals) and handling complaints. Most importantly, each Bu’s finances are now ‘ring fenced’ meaning that losses made on, for example, events, must be covered by savings in other areas of a Bu’s expenditure (eg squad funding) rather than cross subsidies being drawn from a central pot as was the case under the old system. Different Bu can, of course, help each other out, but in principle they are each to be financially responsible for their own affairs.
One or two minor amendments were made to the transitional arrangements for managing the introduction of the new rules, but the basic Constitution, available here ,was approved almost unanimously.  The most notable votes against came from some sitting EC members who expressed their fears about the new structure along with a number of other individuals. The principle concern appeared to be that the level of autonomy introduced by the new arrangements would make cross-organisational coordination difficult.
A lengthy discussion took place with many questions and observations from the floor but the atmosphere was good natured and, while occasionally spirited, the discussion did not descend into bitterness and recrimination as it has, on occasion, in the past.
While the elections saw a number of officers stand down or not be reelected, it was noticeable that all those not elected were generous in their offers of help and support to the new team and dignified in their acceptance of the will of the meeting. Several of the officers who have relinquished roles on the NC have given many years of service to the BKA and the new Chairman, Errol Blake, made an emotional tribute to the work of these officers and in particular, to the outgoing President, John Howell.
So the new NC consists of Errol, Debbie, Hillary and Jock as outlined above, plus Patrick Breheny who continues as Treasurer and Malcolm Smalley who stays on as Membership Secretary. A vacancy remains for the post that was previously the Kendo High Grade role, but is now the Kendo Grading Officer. This role was up for reelection as the term of the previous holder (Steve Bishop) had expired. All the other Bu officers continued to hold their roles providing some continuity across the otherwise major changes that took place.
And in Other News…
The other major story of the day was the nearly unanimous support the members gave to the decision to defend the BKA against an action being brought in the Small Claims Court by the former Kendo Bucho, Paul Budden. Mr Budden has asked for storage costs relating to equipment held by him on behalf of the BKA when he was Bucho and not handed over when he ceased to hold that role. The EC advised members that they felt this claim was unfair and defensible, and members agreed that the Action should be opposed.
A notable feature of the meeting was the relatively few Kendoka present in comparison to members who focus primarily on Iaido or Jodo. This may have been because Kendo practitioners saw little to object to in the new Constitution, but also felt they had less to gain from the new structure. Absence thus expressed a lack of concern either way at the results. This is a shame, as the meeting made important and long term decisions which will affect the running of the organisation for many year’s to come. Still, we are a democracy and no one is forced to attend or vote at anything.
All in all the day rang the changes on a generation of BKA management as a largely new team took over. The spirit of the meeting was generous, open, and to use an old fashioned term, ‘gentlemanly’. If this positive spirit and determination to work for the greater good can be continued then the new Constitution may almost appear unnecessary – it was designed in the light of more difficult relationships in the past and in the hope of preventing such problems in the future. But that is for another day. For now we have to focus on making the new system work and, of course, on our practice.
Note
Full minutes for the meeting will be published here in due course. Apologies if this report misses any key points, but it has been published quickly to update members on the key decisions and is necessarily partial and abbreviated.  Over the next few days we will amend contact details on the website and other information you may need.
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Posted: May 30th, 2009 under General.
Tags: AGM, Constitution