Agenda and minutes

The Chair will draw attention to the emergency evacuation procedure as set out under Note 6.

The Chair drew attention to the Emergency Evacuation Procedure.

There were no apologies for absence.

To receive any declarations from Members/Officers of personal or prejudicial interests in respect of matters for consideration at this meeting.  Members who have an interest to declare are asked to:

a)  State the Item Number in which they have the interest;

b)  The nature of the interest;

c)  Whether the interest is personal, or personal and prejudicial.

Any Member who is unsure about the above should seek advice from the Monitoring Officer prior to the meeting in order to expedite matters at the meeting itself.

There were none.

There was none

Statements had been submitted by the following members of the Friends of the Recreation Ground (copies of which are available on the Minute book);

• Worthy Gilson
• Keith McGarrigle
• Tony Hooper

Councillor Andy Furse regretted that there had been no papers available for the meeting; he wanted to know about the costs associated with the consultation and how the questions would be set.  Without a report, he felt there was no transparency for the beneficiaries of the Trust.

On a motion from Councillor Hawkins, seconded by Councillor Pritchard it was

RESOLVED that the Minutes of the previous meeting were confirmed as an accurate record and signed by the Chair.

A verbal report will be submitted and the Trustees will be asked to consider launching the consultation.

The Chair introduced this item by explaining that the Charity Commission have stated that they believe that the Trust is at a point where it is ready to apply for a new scheme which must be done by 31^st March 2011.  The Commission have also made clear that the Trust is required to consult with the beneficiaries on the main aspects of the plans.

The consultation exercise will have to involve a detailed description of any Trust land involved and, if there are detriments from land lost to the beneficiaries, it will need to be clear what land might be available to balance these detriments.

The consultation will last for 8 weeks and will involve a range of activities such as publication of paperwork, website entries, public meetings, surveys etc.

The Trust has a duty to resolve the abuses that exist and it is appropriate to use the Trust’s resources to bring about this resolution.  It is reasonable for the Trust to expect that any body that may benefit from a resolution of the current abuses to contribute to the cost of any consultation on the matter, which could include the Council and the Rugby club. The consultation document will be designed by the Trust to seek the views of beneficiaries on the Trusts proposals to resolve the existing abuses.

Councillor Watt explained that the new ownership of the Rugby club had brought clarity to the club’s demands and the Trust now needed to review these to see if they could accommodate these within the framework set by the Strategic Review.  The Board did not consider the 31^st March deadline to be optional so would be starting the consultation exercise very soon.

The Chair apologised that, due to the number of parties involved and the situation changing up until the point of the meeting, it had not been possible to produce written proposals for the meeting.  He then opened the meeting up for further questions – key points arising from these are set out below;

• Third parties will have no input in influencing the content of the consultation document and questions;
• Advice for drafting the consultation document would come from the Trust’s independent Advisor, legal Counsel, the Strategic Director and officers with experience of running effective consultation exercises;
• The Trust will not run a separate consultation exercise regarding land at Firs Field as this is a matter for the Council not the Trust;
• In considering land values, the Trust would take into consideration the size, displaced activities, utility and commercial value and would be advised by independent valuers.

Due to the commercial sensitivity of the discussions that were needed (as set out in the Public Interest test document circulated to the meeting), the Chair explained that the meeting would now be moving into exempt session.

The Trustees will consider whether the verbal report and the following debate will contain information which is exempt from publication and, if so, will be asked to agree the exclusion of the public from the next item on the agenda.

It was moved by Councillor Chris Watt, seconded by Councillor David Hawkins and

RESOLVED that in accordance with the provisions of Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following item of business because of the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act, as amended.