Handover

Outgoing President’s Report

 The outgoing President, Richard Gage, summarised the main achievements of the Club during the year highlighting the support given to young people through RYLA and the Calvert Trust and to the mock interview experiences offered to pupils at the Bedford Academy.

The main fund raising event was a charity lunch with John Benjamin as the speaker.

The charities benefiting are St John's Hospice, the Teenage Cancer Trust, the Tall Ships Youth Trust and Bedfordshire Opportunities for Learning Disabilities.

A number of social events were held during the year including the President’s weekend in Portsmouth which was well attended.

The President thanked members of the Club for their help and support during the year before making presentations to the Rotarian of the Year, Charles Codrington, the Clubman of the Year, Tony Wildman.  The President won the Tony Cole Attendance Cup.

Charles Codrington's Admin, Membership & Media  Report

Membership

We started the year with 41 members and conclude the year with 40 members.

1 member relocated back to the homeland and 2 members resigned.

We welcomed 2 new members Ken Sanders and Rupert Weston who are already valued members of the club and settling in well.

Sadly, we lost our honorary member and past president Gary Payne after a long battle with illness.

Media

Martin Furlong has continued to perform a marvellous, single handed job of running the club website. It is consistently up to date with forthcoming activities and reports and photos of past events – special recognition is given to Martin.

General

In other areas, the committee has performed a wide range of duties that keep the club activities running;

·         organising the external events, snooker, bowls and golf;

·         liaising with the hotel to ensure meetings run seamlessly every week;

·         the role of almoner and continued contact with widows;

·         running the raffle to ensure vital funds continued to be raised each week;

·         speaker finding to ensure that not only ensured that our guests turn up on the right day and have all the necessary equipment they need but also bringing some fresh faces to our evenings;

·         the reintroduction of the Interclub Quiz, which proved a great success and will hopefully be a regular annual event going forward.

Paul Heerey’s Fundraising Report.

We had a successful Charity Lunch on the 18th November, which raised c£5,000. This was shared between the Teenage Cancer Trust and Bedford Castle.

A number of other fund raising options were considered and investigated including a 'Celebrity Speaker Event' and a race night. As far as the proposed Race Night was concerned this was deferred given the fact that Bedford Lions had already put in place plans for a similar event at the same time. No suitable celebrity speaker was available within our timescales.

 I would like to thank my Committee for their support during the year albeit with the numbers decreasing as the year progressed with Peter Blenkinsop moving north and Ash Kavan having a sabbatical six months.  

Ken Borneo’s Youth Service Report

Ken thanked all members of his committee for their support during the last year.

The main events which Youth Service Committee undertook during the year were:

 1.     The Calvert Trust, where our candidate provided something of a challenge given the nature of his disability.  As I was on holiday at the time, I arranged for our candidate to be taken to Leicester East Forest Service Station where he caught the coach to the Lake District, and I would like to thank Paul Hoare for bringing our candidate back to Bedford.

 2.     Young Musicians, was another successful event, and I would like to thank all members of the Committee for their contribution including Dominic Mills.  I would also like to thank Charles Codrington for officiating in my absence.

 3.     Rotary Youth Leadership Award (RYLA).  We had two candidates for RYLA, both of whom attended our Club and gave accounts of their experiences which they said greatly benefited them.  Paul Hoare was thanked for his contribution.

 4.     Mentoring/Mock Interviews.  Alan Porter led these events which resulted in some 80 students being interviewed. Alan was thanked for his successful contribution.

Leigh Brewin's Community, Vocational and International Report

The chairman thanked all the committee for their support and contribution during the last twelve months. This great team effort had resulted in a wide variety of successful and rewarding projects throughout the year with the added bonus of not only raising funds for international events such as the End Polio Now campaign, through the Purple Crocus and Purple 4 Polio Jam events, but had also raised additional funds for club charitable funds.

Stroke Awareness Day was a great success with a club record of 497 blood pressure tests being undertaken with 29 persons being referred, bringing the total BP tests undertaken by the club to over 4500 during the past 18 years. Over £2500 has been raised during the year to provide medical apparatus for Bedford hospital and an information notice board for the Harrold and Odell country park orchard. Carpet bowls continues to attract new members with average monthly attendances rising which provides over 30 hours of bowling per month. 128 pupils at Kingsbrook primary school were presented with Dictionaries for Life continuing our annual support to local schools.

An international dinner was held at a local Turkish restaurant and the ‘Castle singers’ held a Christmas carol concert at Southways residential home. The annual litter pick took place around the Oasis pool and along the surrounding riverside walkways. Regular support is provided to Grafham Water Sailability club who provide sailing experiences for all ages to people with both physical and learning disabilities from the surrounding areas.