logo DEVON BRIDGE ASSOCIATION
The home of Bridge in Devon
EBU logo
Menu

October 2015 Meeting Minutes

Published October 2015

Minutes of the Committee Meeting of the DBA held on Monday 12 October 2015 at the Isca Centre.

Present: Michael Hamon (Chairman), George Simnett (vice-Chairman), Terence Treeby (Hon Secretary), Vivien Peters (Hon Treasurer), Jean Whitlam, Terry Cannon (East), Geoff Clements was welcomed as a new South representative.

1. Apologies.

1.1 Paul Ainsworth, (South), David Clarke (North), Ros Morgan (West). Clare Hamon has resigned as West representative. Jeanine Keith resigned from the committee and her various posts. Jeanine was thanked for her work. Ann Slee was co-opted to the committee as Tournament Administrator and also appointed to the Selection Sub-committee as a full member with special responsibilities for liaising with the central committee. The committee modified the terms of reference for the Tournament Sub-Committee by inserting “(c) agreeing prize structures with the Hon Treasurer” and relabelling old (c) and (d) as (d) and (e)

2. Minutes of meeting 7 July 2015.

2.1. The minutes were then accepted and signed as correct.

3. Matters arising.

3.1. (July 3.1.) No further information on possible affiliation of Spreyton, Noss Mayo or Twixt Moors (Winkleigh and Chulmleigh).

3.2. (July 4.2.) EBU Counties Working Group / County Forum The post remains vacant.
Education Sub-Committee [Carol Ritzen]. The Chairman continued to negotiate with potential members of the sub- committee. Offers of help would be welcomed.
Youth Officer: Responsibility for youth matters included within the Education sub-committee.

3.3. (July S7.2.) EBU document highlighting “Best Practice for County Associations”: the committee had not identified anything they needed to adopt or modify.

4. Treasurer's Report and Financial Matters

4.1. The Treasurer tabled her report. The current account balance is £9674 (£9122 last year) plus £14007 with Scottish Widows (unchanged since 2013). Expenditure to end of financial year of £2679 was summarised.

4.2. The Treasurer tabled discussion points regarding spending from surplus and reserves. The reserves are sufficient to cover future replacement of duplimate, bridgemates and county computer (due to be written down to zero in the next account). There is an additional cushion of £4000-£6000. It was agreed to pursue the following (i) a free-to-enter playing session, possibly flighted to allow a balance in playing standards (Hon Treasurer to organise with advice from Hon Secretary); (ii) subsidised director training session (See also 6.1.); (iii)an advanced seminar in 2016 by Michael Byrne or someone of similar standard.

5. Secretary’s Report and Correspondence (including S Shareholders’ report on EBU matters)

5.1. From 1 Oct Jeff Smith’s program (renamed EBUScore) is to be owned, run and licensed by the EBU. Any affiliated club currently using it can continue to do so and will receive all updates for free. The updates will be available via the member’s area. Counties will also be able to use it on the same terms. For those clubs who currently use another product they will be able to continue to do so with no changes.

5.2. New Master Point Rule (75% rule) deferred until Jan 2016 to allow for late concerns to be considered. This rule requires that for a session to be eligible for Master Points each pair should be scheduled to play at least 75% of the boards which are in use.

5.3. New EBU Licensing & Master Points Handbook 2015 available for download.
(a) Rules regarding the county’s Major Pairs Championship (Julia Chadwick) have been rewritten and affect us as follows: (i) qualifiers are treated as normal club events, and receive no extra masterpoints and (ii) there is a new calculation for the green point awards for the final. This replaces our previous special arrangement with its complicated calculation.
(b) County leagues are now allowed to award blue points in the top division. We would need to nominate a section league as a county league in order to take advantage of this.

5.4. The committee approved a request from Andrew Leslie on behalf of Newton Abbot BC to run a blue pointed charity swiss teams on Sun 15 May 2016 and also approved a potential repeat in subsequent years with the date to be set AFTER the Graphic Cup date is confirmed.

6. Section Reports

9.1. North (circulated) Approximately £6600 in the accounts (£600 in the current account and £6000 in the congress account). Secretary has had no reply from Simon Barb (EBED) re director training. The Chairman will approach EBED/EBU to attempt to resolve the matter. See also 4.2. League has 2 divisions of 5 teams. All are welcome to sessions of North Section Swiss Pairs; Filleigh Charity Matched Swiss Teams Sunday 1st. November.

6.2. East (circulated) The Eastern League has a full 24 teams. John Woolcott on 9/10 January will be directed by Robin Barker. The budget predicts a surplus of £874.

6.3. South (circulated) League has 15 teams in two divisions and is being run by Mike Hamon. DBA Sim Pairs for Devon Air Ambulance: first event of the year completed, raising £565 (a new record for Monday night). One non-affiliated club dropped out in protest at the excessively high licence charge for non-affiliated clubs, even though DBA treats it as an overhead rather than charging non-affiliated clubs a higher table fee. Winter Pairs: First round completed – 8.5 tables (3 more than October last year); run by Andrew Leslie and team.

6.4. West Noting to report

7. Sub-committee reports

7.1. Technology sub-committee [George Simnett, Paul Ainsworth, Ruth Edmondson]
No report.

7.2. EBU Counties Working Group.[vacant]

7.3. Tournament Sub-Committee [Terence Treeby, Vivien Peters].
No report.

7.4. Education Sub-Committee [Carol Ritzen]
Andrew Robson (20-23 Mar 2017). Treasurer to prepare budget so that dates can be confirmed. The Education sub- committee asked to review teacher listing (still pending). Chairman to contact Michael Byrne re possible future seminars. Ongoing strategy for education (including schools and youth) and training held over.

7.5 Selection Sub-Committee [Warner Solomon, Ruth Edmondson, Alison Pollok]
Four pairs (Joe and Gillian Fawcett, Mike Orriel/Peter Bowles, Alex Maddocks/Warner Solomon, Jim Grant/Stefan Lindfors) have been selected for the Tollemache with a fifth pair to be decided after the Avon match on 31st Oct. The selection sub-committee was asked to post future selections on the website. A team won 17-3, B team won 19-1, C team lost 8-12 against East Wales. The committee was minded to impose playing-within-county qualifications for Tollemache selection from 2016 onwards, to be discussed at the March meeting.

7.6. Congress Sub-Committee [Marion Kelsey, Terence Treeby, Mike Kelsey, Vivien Peters. Shadow for 2016 Mike Hamon] Clare Hamon stood down on 1 Sep as shadow and as Lead Organiser for 2017; a replacement is now urgent.
Brochures circulated by post and email to clubs in several counties and to past entries. Postal surcharges will be refunded to clubs affected. An advert will be placed in the December EBU magazine as usual.

7.7. EBU Shareholders: [Terence Treeby, Dick Andrews, Michael Hamon]
The Shareholders will decide who attends the EBU AGM on 25 Nov. The committee approved the nomination of Gillian Fawcett to continue on the EBU Tournament Committee.

7.8. Conduct Sub-Committee: [Steve Quinn, Maureen Baser, George Simnett, Keith Ponsford, David Clarke]
No report.

7.9. Disciplinary Sub-Committee: [Michael Hamon, Howard Kent-Webster, Robin Barker, Paul Ainsworth, Ann Slee].
No report.

8. Any Other Business.

None

9. Next meetings

9.1. The next meeting will be at the Isca Centre at 6.30 pm on Mon 7 Mar. Committee members are sub-committees are asked to send documents for circulation to the Hon Sec by 15 Feb at the latest.