Ringing Forums

I do think it’s an issue, and I think it says something about the perceived impact of the role.
Middlesex decided to cover travel but not accommodation at least partly because covering the full cost for four reps would be our single biggest cost for the year.
If we were going to fund a full weekend for four people each year we would need to feel that the reps are able to represent the members on topics we care about and influence decisions at the council which change ringing. Whether we like it or not right now it is not seen that way because there are few real decisions taken at the council meeting.

The Ely DA has always covered expenses in full, though trips often share a car to save on traveling expenses.

It is true that covering the reasonable expenses of the Council Reps is the single largest budget item in the Scottish Association. And for international organisations, the ability of a rep to be able to afford to travel can't help but be a consideration.

Truly understanding the full role of a Council Rep is still a loose end from when we reorganised and modernised how the Council operated. Previously, Reps, as well as representing their associations, were expected and encouraged to join committees and participate in the many activities that the Council does to serve ringing. In fact, if you weren't a Rep, you *couldn't* participate in that way.

The reforms removed that barrier, which was incredibly liberating, especially for some teams where they interesting in a particular thing and not actually interested in the rest of the Council activities. The original plan was to dramatically reduce the number of Reps, leaving them with the governance role wihtout the expectation to further volunteer.

The Association chooses their representatives, and then decides what they want from them, in exchange for some payment of reasonable expenses.

Personally, I would be delighted if ASsociations chose Representatives who were also willing to engage more meaningfully with the work that we do, join a working group or otherwise volunteer. The more help and experience we have here, the more we can accomplish.

Also quite a few associations have chosen their President or other officer as a Rep, and this is an extremely valuable relationship and perspective.

If we were going to be daring, could we propose some radical ideas:

1. For the role and scope of the meeting itself, does this need to be an in-person event? Would we be more inclusive if we held it online?

2. Should the in-person event be more of a volunteer/activity showcase?

3. Would we work better with a Council membership made up of association leaders?

I don't have answers by the way, just throwing some thoughts out there.

I definitely agree that the role of the rep is now less clear and some of the people contributing in the workgroups are not reps and therefore many of the reps have little involvement in the work that is happening. This is probably part of why the communication topic came up so strongly in the AGM.

If the role of the Rep is to challenge the council to work on the things members in the association need then it often would make sense for this to be someone who is an active committee member / leader within the association. Equally if those people knew what the council was aiming to achieve they would be able to communicate it clearly to their members as they already have a role to guide their association.
I think this already works in some associations.
But tying the role to an Association leadership role makes the association role (whether it is President, Chair, Master…) bigger, and potentially harder to fill.

An online meeting is more inclusive but quite difficult to chair, especially if the aim is to outline proposals and discuss and reach agreements.
It could be done with workshops around a topic before a proposal is brought to the meeting so different reps could join different workshops depending on areas of interest and then a proposal would be brought to the big meeting for a vote.

Potentially then the in person event has a theme and aims to involve people in shaping the workgroup efforts for the coming year or two (and possibly finding more workgroup volunteers) so that it actively working on the aims of the council and not ‘just’ presenting what’s already being done or planned.

The recent online efforts for the Membership system and the budget proposal for higher fees per member seemed to work well at bringing the interested and responsible people together to discuss and ‘workshop’ potential plans. Maybe this kind of targeted workshop is a useful way of shaping workgroup activities and focus along the way, so that it’s not a once a year chance for reps to hear about what is happening.