Adrienne Posted February 15, 2014 Report Share Posted February 15, 2014 In December all Club Presidents and Secretaries were sent a remit, results due to be with me by this coming Thursday, 20th February. All financial affiliated members were to be given the opportunity to vote on this either at their next meeting or via email and due to Christmas time the standard two month time frame within our constitution was extended. To date only two clubs have responded. If you have not voted and want further information please contact your own club officers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 19, 2014 Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 Please check the FNZAS constitution: 27. All remits to be considered at the Annual General Meeting shall be forwarded by the Societies to the Federation Secretary by the 14th day of March in each year or such later date as may be agreed upon by the Executive. The Federation Secretary shall thereupon cause a list of all such remits to be sent to all Societies within 14 days. There is no need for any club to respond with their vote until the AGM where their delegate will present the vote of their club. Could you please resend the remit details to the HBAS secretary as he has yet to table this information at a meeting. Maybe you could also email to me so I can push it along... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 19, 2014 Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 Looks like what you are actually trying to do is this: ALTERATION TO THE CONSTITUTION 39. This Constitution shall not be altered, added to, or rescinded except by the following procedure: (a) Any Society may by resolution recommend to the Federation through their delegates proposals for the amending of the Constitution. Such proposals must be submitted to the Federation Secretary in writing. (b) Upon receipt of such resolution the Federation Secretary shall send copies of such resolution to all Societies. © The resolution will be considered by the Federation after a period of two months has elapsed after copies have been sent to Societies and the proposals shall be ratified and written into the Constitution if a majority of the Federation approves them. In this case you must remove the word 'Remit' from all correspondence and the wording of any documents sent to the clubs and refer to it only as a 'Resolution' or it will need to follow the proper remit process. The word remit stuffs up the process of a what is actually a resolution in this case. Have you received a majority response yet? Having not seen the 'resolution' yet I can only guess it's to change the date of the AGM in the constitution to allow it to happen in April or some other date range to give more flexibility than the current rather rigid 'June' requirement. If you still only have 2 replies then you'd best get a majority of clubs to agree to the change pronto or the Constitution will not get changed in time to allow the AGM to proceed at the planned April 12th date... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 19, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 All presidents and secretaries were sent the resolution with the proposed change, a reminder to document the vote, how to respond and the due date way back in December and then were reminded about it prior to the due date via email. A remit does not have to go to the AGM to be considered - however any remit that is to be considered at the AGM was required to be sent to the Executive by the 14th March. The majority of our clubs responded by the due date and the resolution has been passed. The AGM date is 12 April 2014. Adrienne Dodge FNZAS Secretary Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 19, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 I have emailed a copy of the information sent to clubs, to you, as requested. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 19, 2014 Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 Thanks for the documents. The wording of the document and its filename are confusing. The document is titled 'Resolution' but the document states it is a 'Remit'. As per clause 27, remits are to be considered at the AGM only otherwise clause 27 would state a remit can be considered any time of the year. Because the document has been titled 'remit' the vote can only be considered at the AGM. It's clear however the intent was to actually create a 'resolution' which can be considered any time and the mistake has been made putting the word 'remit' on the documentation. I'm not legal savy enough to know whether this causes a legality problem with what has been done or not. I suggest you get the legality of the method used and whether having included the word 'remit' causes a problem so as to protect the decision, then discuss and document it into your next meeting minutes. It may be as simple as stating the intent was to create a resolution rather than a remit and ask all affiliated societies to accept it... Hopefully it pretty easy to sort out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 19, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 Please take this to your club meeting for discussion. If there is an agreement from the majority of your club members that there is a 'problem' then the process is for the Club Secretary to compose a letter to the Federation, signed by the Club President. The Executive will then discuss it at their next meeting, seek advice if necessary and respond to the club accordingly. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 19, 2014 Report Share Posted March 19, 2014 I'm not going to do that - you've been advised there is a potential issue and whether you take action to make sure the FNZAS is not legally exposed or not is up to the FNZAS committee. If you choose to do nothing about it I will not lose any sleep over it. Also, by the time you get the response from the HBAS since we had our meeting last night it will be end of next month - after the AGM. However, it's probably a bit pig-headed of the FNZAS to ignore the possibility they have accidentally breached their own constitution and really should be taking this pretty seriously given the coming AGM could be ruled null and void if it's not sorted out prior - your call and risk. You should at least discuss it given the importance and timing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livingart Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 I would have Thought that this matter would have been raised when your club responded to the emails that went out a few months ago concerning the change of date. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 Could you please resend the remit details to the HBAS secretary as he has yet to table this information at a meeting. Maybe you could also email to me so I can push it along... Not sure if the HBAS actually responded - Adrienne would know if they did or not. I missed the Feb meeting and the resolution/remit has not been raised at any HBAS committee meeting I'm aware of (yes I'm on the committee). My first response yesterday was the first I knew about the resolution/remit. Irrespective of whether the HBAS responded or not, it's been noticed now with little time left before the scheduled AGM so what does the FNZAS plan to do about it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 20, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 What do you expect the FNZAS to do about clubs that do not respond to emails sent from the executive? The minutes from your February meeting will show if it was discussed, if not please take it up with your own club office holders. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 There is not time to discuss it with the HBAS committee before the FNZAS AGM. For some reason you are being incredibly short-sighted about what could be a very serious issue affecting the validity of the upcoming AGM. It would be very stupid of the FNZAS to directly ignore an issue raised which is intended to help ensure the recent proposed change is actually valid and cannot be contested by anyone in the future. Given the time frame it's not practical to go via the HBAS and you should be treating the issue with consdierably more seriousness than you are. Treat the matter as official and urgent correspondence directly to the committee - this is possible and a club need not be involved. You could be wasting a lot of peoples time and money travelling to Dunedin if the AGM is legally deemed to be null and void at a later date. It's the FNZAS duty to treat this as a serious matter and failure to do so questions the committee integrity. Now the issue is raised you have to ensure you are not breaching your own constitution. Ignore it if you wish but if it comes back to bite you in the arse later you were warned... It's now up to you as I'm having no further input into the matter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 Our club had a special meeting to discuss this back in February, having first received information about the changes, and why, some time before that so plenty of notice was given at the time. I believe legal advice was sought and given to go ahead. I suspect it would not matter what date the AGM was held, few would be willing to give their time (and be able to afford the expense) to attend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 20, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 A lawyer has been consulted re the resolution/remit, her parting words were 'Go and enjoy your AGM in Dunedin in April'. There is no problem with the wording as the directive from myself as Secretary to the Club Officials made it clear that it was a resolution and the wording you are referring to is of no significance. Adrienne Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 A lawyer has been consulted re the resolution/remit, her parting words were 'Go and enjoy your AGM in Dunedin in April'. There is no problem with the wording as the directive from myself as Secretary to the Club Officials made it clear that it was a resolution and the wording you are referring to is of no significance. Adrienne Instead of being bloody difficult you could have stated this when I first raised the issue - nice, good on you. Instead you string me along for some reason - not a very good look for the FNZAS Secretary... Thanks for finally answering my initial concern - and thanks Caryl for responding - level headed as usual. If it hadn't been for your reply... I'm glad to be proven wrong as it means the AGM can proceed as planned. I've checked with a couple of HBAS members and the resolution correspondence was never raised at our committee or general meetings. This is an internal matter for us to deal with. Had I known about the resolution at the time it was sent out I would have supported it and recommended to the HBAS it be accepted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livingart Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 It seems the lack of communication lies within your club not with the secretary Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 20, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 I am sorry that you are not happy that I took into consideration your comments about not having time to take it through your committee, and made a lawyers appointment for early evening, at which time the answer was given. I can assure you that I take my position as Secretary very seriously, and I do my absolute best to try and get communications out to club members via the correct avenues. In reply to the earlier query re replies from the club - no responses have been received from your club since approximately March last year, despite numerous emails being sent to your officers, some requiring voting on other matters prior to this one, apart from a membership list and capitations payment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted March 20, 2014 Report Share Posted March 20, 2014 Thanks for this info - I had no idea there has been a 1 year gap in any communication from HBAS. There have been several occasions where we did receive communication from the FNZAS, discussed it at club meetings or committee meetings and instructed our secretary to send a response as per our minutes. Upon checking with our secretary he confirmed having sent the information. We will now have to invsetigate what has gone wrong and why you never received our replies. Please be assured the lack of communication from the HBAS is for some reason other than the club deliberately not responding - I know the HBAS is keen to participate in the FNZAS activities. I'll follow this up and let you know the outcome out of the public forum... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joG Posted April 5, 2014 Report Share Posted April 5, 2014 All the best for your Conference, We hope it goes well. We will be unable to attend as we will be in Samoa with Big Sea Turtles. We look forward to hearing what happened and how the weekend went. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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