Minutes of the East Grinstead & District Guild Quarterly Meeting

Held at Chiddingstone on Saturday 11 June 2016

The meeting commenced at 6.15pm.

The Chairman, Dave Threlfall, thanked the Revd. Martin Beaumont for taking the service this afternoon, Bob Wilson for playing the organ and Patrick, Kate, Roger and Ros for organising tea.

Present:  Dave Threlfall, Patrick Wills, Kate Desbottes, Ian Cochrane, Jane Wroe, Robin Grant, Helen Goldstraw, David Finch, Yvonne Cooper, Andrew Brock, Sheila Marsh, Rosalind Cowsill, Roger Cowsill, Gavin Bennett and Caroline Stockman

1.             Apologies for Absence were received from:

Margaret Funnell, Iain Davey, David Tomsett, Mike Bullett, Candy O’Donovan, David Cochrane, Elaine Farrow and Lynda Johnson.

2.              Minutes of the quarterly meeting held at Warnham on 9^th January 2016

                  The Secretary, Patrick Wills, read these out to the meeting.  It was noted that the Guild library remains at Dave Threlfall’s home for the time being, pending its relocation.

                  Dave Threlfall proposed adoption of the Minutes.  This was seconded by Sheila Marsh and approved by all present.

3.              Matters Arising

                  None.

4.              Election of New Members

None.

5.              Outing on 9^th July 2016

Dave Threlfall confirmed that he was arranging this and that arrangements were pretty much settled.  He is waiting for some confirmation e-mails.  Details of the outing will be posted on the Guild website.  Dave confirmed that members need not drive too far and all the Towers are fairly close together.  Some members will have visited these Towers before.  The timing is as follows:

Cobham (8) at 10.00am; Stoke D’Abernon (6) at 11.45 (this is an historic church which has the oldest monumental brass in the country, dating from the mid-fourteenth century); Ashtead (8) at 12.15; lunch is at Ashtead and the choices are a pub or a fish and chip restaurant; Epsom Common (8); followed by Epsom (10).

6.              Report of the Central Council of Church Bellringers Meeting on 30 May 2016

Kate Desbottes reported on her attendance at the meeting hosted by the Winchester and Portsmouth guild at Southsea.  There were a couple of motions relating to methods which she thought she did not need to explain to the members as some of the issues were quite complicated.  There were two quite interesting motions, one of which involved setting up a working party to look at the way that the Central Council operated and to come up with ideas as to what changes, if any, could or should be made and how bellringers generally could be represented.  Some amendments had been suggested to the motion but ultimately the intention was accepted and the motion was carried.  The working party is to be set up with a maximum of 15 members, five from the existing Central Council (not committee members or officers), five former Central Council members, and five ringers who had not at any time served on the Central Council.  Those persons who considered that they would make a useful contribution to the working party were welcome to apply to join.

It was reported that Sheila Cheesman (Surrey Association) abseiled down the Spinnaker Tower at Portsmouth to raise funds for the work to be done on the bells at Southwark.  Gavin reported that the last ring on the Southwark bells will be on Saturday, 17^th July 2016, after which the bells will be removed.

7.              Guild Library

                  Andrew Brock reported on the progress he had made with his enquiries.  The Tower captain at East Grinstead, Betty Green, had been willing to house the library but the Tower members had not been in agreement.  The East Grinstead museum was not interested.  It was suggested that further discussions be deferred until the next quarterly meeting.  Dave Threlfall said that it was important that a new home was found for the library because he could no longer house it at his home.  The main criterion is that the library needs to be easily accessible to all Guild members.

8.              Guild Website

Dave Thelfall congratulated Patrick on having done a magnificent job with the new website.  Patrick reported that he had found a free website authoring package with a company called One and One (1&1).  He had purchased the domain name www.egdg.co.uk at a cost of £0.99 and had developed the new site there before transferring it to the old domain, www.egdg.org.uk.  The new website has a list of all  the peals rung for the Guild, and photographs of the pages in the Guild’s Peal Books.  There is also a list of the 98 towers covered by the area of the Guild and this is linked to those towers’ individual websites, Dove’s Guide and Google Maps.  The website also shows agendas and minutes of meetings, upcoming events, Guild rules, the Rope Fund rules and the Guild’s data protection policy.

Patrick then demonstrated an off-line version of the website.  He added that he had circulated link to the new website to the committee before it went online and said that he   had taken on board the suggestions that had been made.

9.              Any Other Business

9.1           The meeting recorded Ros Cowsill’s birthday today and she was given all good wishes.

9.2           There was a photograph of Ian in the Kent and Sussex Courier relating to his trip to Buckingham Palace.  It was agreed that the photo of him should go on to the Guild website.

9.3           Dave Threlfall spoke of Julie McDonnell, a Sussex ringer with Leukaemia.  She is a capable, able and very intelligent lady who, by rights, should no longer be alive and has a limited life expectancy.  The Anthony Nolan Trust offered her stem cell tests and that has resulted in an extension of her life.  She is still ringing and she aims to raise £100,000 for the benefit of the Trust.  She has been asking ringers to ring quarters for the benefit of the Trust and is working with Alan Pink to progress this.  On 25^th June 2016 she is doing a walk along the Pilgrims Way ringing at various Towers on route.  She is ultimately hoping to end-up ringing at Canterbury.  The band at the Cathedral will provide 6 ringers and Alan Pink will be sourcing another 6 ringers.  Caroline will be ringing with that band and she will be the only inexperienced ringer present.  There is also to be ringing on 24^th June 2016 at Burmarsh, organised by Chris Cooper.  It was suggested that Guild members should do their best to arrange quarters at their own Towers for the benefit of this fund raising exercise.  Dave Threlfall suggested that he would arrange an East Grinstead District Guild quarter over the coming few weeks.

9.4           Patrick Wills reported one item of correspondence: an application to the Rope Fund from Bletchingley.  The ropes there were replaced in 2003 and were now quite worn.  Avon Ropes have quoted £1,810 without VAT.  Andrew Brock, a Rope Fund Trustee, noted that it was down to the members at the meeting today to approve whether or not a grant should be made.  There were only two Trustees present.  It was agreed that this was not a request that the members would want to refuse.  Andrew Brock and Dave Threlfall took note of the views of the meeting and will therefore agree to make a grant to Bletchingley.  It was agreed to make a grant of up to £200.  Dave Threlfall will talk to both Candy O’Donovan and Mike Bullett (the other Trustees) and see about giving slightly more than the £180 per rope that had previously been provided to other Towers.  There are ample funds in the Trust account.

9.5           Kate Desbottes suggested that prospective new members should be asked to complete the Membership Application Form (available on the new website).  She said it would also be extremely helpful for the Secretary to have full contact details for existing members, and suggested that they provide a completed application form as well.  The adoption of the application form was proposed by Roger Cowsill and seconded by Helen Goldstraw.

9.6           Kate Desbottes said that it had been agreed at the meeting at Warnham in January that it would be a good idea to have another clothing order.  She said that she had not had an opportunity to provide details of clothing samples and prices but would endeavour to do so for the September meeting.

9.7           Kate Desbottes reported that there was to be a 90^th anniversary peal attempt in the morning of Saturday 10 June 2017, the day of the anniversary dinner.  Due to lack of time on her part she had delegated the task of arranging the peal band to David Finch and asked him to comment.  David told the meeting that there was not a large base on which to draw a band.  He would like everybody who is interested to participate in a pre-peal attempt.  It was important that the peal should succeed and he wanted to have a weeding-out process.  It would give members who are interested an idea of what to expect and they needed to show some degree of commitment.  Coleman’s Hatch was a possible Tower and David already had a conductor in mind.

                  David said that he did not think that a 10 bell peal was on the cards because there were not enough members to achieve this.  He would like to give priority to those members who support the Guild most regularly.  It was more likely that those members would be selected for the band than others who only come once or twice a year.

                  It was noted that the peal attempt will be around the time of Ros Cowsill’s 60^th birthday.

                  It was noted that the meeting had the use at Chiddingstone until 8pm at which point the bells would need to be lowered.

The meeting closed at 7.34pm