Statement by Chair of Council 2/7/19
Statement by Chair of Council
As Chairman of Council, I would like to respond accordingly to information provided by a group calling themselves the WPCS Action Group on behalf of my fellow Board of Trustees.
I would firstly like to clarify that the Welsh Pony and Cob Society does not have any connections or involvement with the WPCS Action Group.
To say that trustees avoided a vote of no confidence and members were denied this opportunity is very misleading. There was no vote of no confidence because the petition did not reach the criteria to qualify the needs as verified by our solicitor. I would also like to take this opportunity to alleviate any rumours and to make it clear that no trustee has had any involvement in assessing the original petition. Legal advice sought by the individuals conducting the petition was chosen to be ignored. Had the petition met the criteria and 5% or more were to vote for this purpose, a General Meeting would have been called.
However, as a Board of Trustees, we agreed to hold a General Meeting to allow members to write in with any topics for discussion to allow us to work with members for the future of the Society. All discussion topics have been collated and will be discussed at this meeting. The General Meeting is due to take place on the 31st August 2019 and details of this were published on our social media on 6th June 2019 and then on our website on the 12th June 2019, 13 days prior to this second petition being raised.
We are concerned as a Board that this petition is suggesting that a second General Meeting is to be called if the petition is to be successful. There is then a significant financial burden on the Society for calling this second meeting with mailing costs alone for the full membership being in the region of £3,500.00. On top of the thousands of pounds that it has already cost our Society in legal advice because of a very small minority which appear to have different agendas for trying to ruin the Society.
Trustees have been accused of delaying the General Meeting; this was booked to try and avoid any major clashes with Area Association shows and the 31st August 2019 is the first date which appeared to be suitable.
I would also like to confirm that as a Board, Mr A. S. Everitt & Mr M. Howells were contacted and offered mediation to discuss and settle any differences on neutral ground for the good of the Society. This was declined as they preferred to target trustees for their resignations.
It is discussed by the Action group that if they was to be successful and the Society has less than 10 but no fewer than 6 trustees remaining, that nominations will be taken from the floor and voted on who is to become directors. I would like to remind members that you all have the opportunity annually to be voted in by the full membership.
All we ask is that members worldwide please have faith in us for the rest of the year and allow us to deliver our aims. Then, when your opportunity comes at the end of our terms, you are able to decide if we are worthy or not. We have already been working on better communication and promotion of the Breed with one particular Society video being shared over 570 times receiving over 250 comments and over 1.400 reactions in total reaching over 227,116 people. We will report at the General Meeting on the progress made by the Society in more detail.
I speak on behalf of the Board and we did not agree to be trustees to be the target of victimisation and abuse.
I would like to finish with the below Swedish proverb
“Don’t throw the old bucket away until you know the new one holds water.”
Chair of Council, Colin Thomas
02 July 2019