North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

One has to wonder what's going on behind the curtain which led to that? Could be something minor - or not. Any guesses?

Noel

 

To my simple mind, an AGM is to receive reports from the directors on the previous years performance, including the accounts, appoint any new directors and make proposals for the future. There's only the latter that might require further thought which would lead to a postponement. That does not bode well, IMHO.

 

If there's bad news in the first you listed, that might also require "further thought" on how to present it. (Your conclusion still applies, there, too; although one would have thought that they'd have seen that coming.) But it could be a hangup in the second - someone who had volunteered to come on board has just backed out, and a replacement has to be found. (What that would mean would depend on why they changed course; innocent potential causes also exist for that.) Ah, well, we'll probably know fairly shortly.

Noel

 

And the obvious question about the accounts is whether the auditors are saying something that would be difficult to manage at an AGM and the directors are kicking the can down the road

 

That was my thought. Or - have the accounts yet been signed off?

These things work to a time line that is very sequential - you choose your date, work back a certain number of days for the required notice period; work back from that for postal delivery times; work back from that to print lead times for documentation and so on. So realistically you may require something like 6 - 8 weeks between the Chairman signing the accounts and the earliest possible date for an AGM. If for any reason that is delayed, it essentially has a knock on impact all the way down the line.

Tom

 

Cue...start the conspiracy theories.

 

Spot on Tom. It had been hoped to bring the AGM date forward to August instead of its traditional Autumn date. Unfortunately that’s proved to be over optimistic. No need for conspiracy theories. The truth is mundane.
Steve’s summary of the AGM process is not wholly accurate. The event itself is to record the results of the members’ postal/electronic votes held before the meeting to receive the report and accounts as approved by the Board and to vote for trustees. Following conclusion of the formal AGM there are presentations on the future with a question and answer session but they are not part of the statutory AGM.

 

To prevent endless speculation and discussions such as this one on Nat-Pres, the NYMR should have learnt by now that instead of simply announcing that the AGM has been cancelled, they should have added a short note explaining why. <BJ>

 

It was never cancelled! The hoped for earlier date had not been agreed. All that's happening is that the meeting will be held at around the same date as in recent years.

 

I think my simplistic description pretty much agrees with yours. I didn't mention the Q & A session because, as you have said, they are not part of the formal business and recent history tells me that any embarrassing questions will be simply dismissed as irrelevant.

 

Putting aside the misuse of the word cancelled instead of postponed, a tiny bit of common sense would tell people that, as @free2grice said, a simple explanation would have done wonders.

 

Pleased we agree. I thought your description implied that there might be votes at the AGM which is why I emphasized the postal/ electronic membership voting beforehand with the results declared at the meeting.

 

Unfortunately, you have forgotten to mention about the main gist of my post, that if a short note had been added explaining why there was a change of date, this would have prevented unnecessary speculation and discussion. <BJ>

 

Speculation and discussion, surely the purpose of a forum?

 

Rather than shoot the messenger, why not take their advice on board?

If they had included a simple explanation as per the latter part of this post and the more detailed one in your previous post then the speculation would never have happened.

 

Traditionally the AGM was in the spring, most commonly on the Saturday before the operating season started, when the venue was the railway institute, after the start of the season once the memorial hall in Pickering was refurbished and that became the venue.
It used to be much more than the dry reasons others have mentioned as a purpose.
It was a social event that brought ordinary members, volunteers, managers, trustees and officers together, so all could see the human face of those in charge.
A facet of the railways operations which was really undervalued and has been lost.

Sawdust.

 

Do I recall that the year end has been moved from December to March?

I've been on the other side of a year end timetable, and know that setting the dates in advance can be challenging. However, I agree with others both about the messaging, but also the underlying doubts about what this says. There's an line saw that bad numbers take longer to add up than good ones, and the relatively late notice of this change in plan, whatever the legal formalities, does send a message whether or not justified or intended.

As for the wider purposes of the event as a whole, I can only concur - there's an important element of stock taking and consolidation that goes on in such meetings, whether narrowly focused on the official "business", or more expansive with Q&As etc.

 

As I recall, the NYMR changed its financial year (I think there was one 15 month "year") which would have a knock-on impact on when you could hold the AGM and probably explains a shift in AGM date from earlier to later in the year. I suspect it is also inevitable that as railways have got larger, the length of time to agree the accounts gets longer with more complex audit required.

FWIW, on the Bluebell our financial year ends on Dec 31st and we hold an AGM in mid June, which gives basically 4 1/2 months to get everything done; it is apparently sometimes quite tight. The biggest issue is the accounts, since they need preparing, auditing and agreeing before the paperwork for the meeting goes out. Our normal format of the post-covid era is to make the whole day a sort of "behind the scenes" day, of which the formal AGM is just one part. We put on additional early and late trains so people can come by rail, enjoy the railway and look around behind the scenes, have the AGM in the late afternoon and then still have a train back to East Grinstead for those with onwards connections. It seems to work quite well, though hopefully we don't get a June heatwave as the marquee it is held in can be a bit stuffy at the best of times! What struck me at this year's AGM was how many Trustees / Directors I saw in the morning doing some job or other around the railway. The person who was about to be elected our new Society Chairman in the afternoon was in overalls fettling some piece of Maunsell carriage in the morning, and that was far from an isolated occurrence.

Tom

 

An interesting suggestion as the next Trust AGM could be set for early Spring and still comply with the statutory 18 month time limit.
There's not much that can be done about what you describe as the "dry reasons" for holding an AGM. That's what company and charity law mandate and it's always going to be tedious for some. However I agree that as many people as possible should be encouraged to participate which is why the post meeting presentations and Q&A session are included. One obvious difference from the past is that the meetings can be experinced on line affording much greater opportunity to those who would find physical attendance difficult. However, that probably does reduce the faces visible on the day.

 

Holding the AGM on a weekday won't help with attendance either in person or virtual.

Sawdust.