Minutes AGM May 2019

2019-08-30

AGM

Minutes of the Annual General Meeting of Chess Edinburgh held at Slateford Bowling Club, Edinburgh, on Thursday 23rd May 2019 at 19:30.

Present.
Voting members: David Stewart (Bank of Scotland), Dave Watson (Corstorphine), David Archibald (Edinburgh), Jim Wallace (Pentland Hills), Crawford Macnab (Edinburgh Civil Service), Stewart Good (Gorgie/Dalry), Martin Robinson (Edinburgh West), David McGilvary (Badgers Brook), Chihon Ley (Edinburgh University), Alistair Small (Musselburgh) and Jim O’Neil (Wandering Dragons).

Others: Eddie Gillespie (Treasurer), Ronnie Dunnet and Calum McGillivray

Clubs not represented: Sandy Bells and Dunbar.

1. Apologies for Absence
Jenny Wilson

2. Minutes of 2018 AGM

The Minutes of the previous Annual General Meeting, held on 17th June 2018, were accepted – proposed by David McGilvary and seconded by Martin Robinson.

3. Matters Arising

(3) Dave Watson and Jim O’Neil had both found that Chess Scotland has a written policy on Child Protection for clubs and associations to use. The Council will take this forward.

4. President’s Report

Convening of this AGM: The Chess Edinburgh AGM and Fixtures Meeting was booked at Slateford Bowling Club being that it is situated of the middle of the Chess Edinburgh Member Clubs.

Summer Cup & Summer Plate 2018: Wandering Dragons won the Summer Cup Final; Bank of Scotland 1 defeated Musselburgh in the Summer Plate Final.

Chess in the Park: At the Fountain Café in Princes Street Gardens. Chess Edinburgh meet every Thursday and Sunday between 2 – 5 pm during British Summer Time until the end of October. As well as the ten donated sets from last year from Chess in Schools and Communities ten analogue clocks have been donated from Clubs. We continue to receive good media coverage including recently an article in The Herald.

Website: The CE website was kept under continual review. The website contains up to date Rules for all CE events. From the end of November 2018 a full Edinburgh Chess League and Edinburgh Allegro Chess League result service was operated to the end of the season with results updated regularly. Team Captains can submit their league results via the Website, from last November, by e mail or by post. Entry Forms to congresses were downloadable. The Calendar of events we try to keep up to date. This season which we will continue is that for each of the 31 league teams their Team Pool are available on the website. Useful when playing a match to see if a player is registered.

Peter Elder’s Quaich This trophy donated by the family of Peter Elders and the members of Corstorphine Chess Club will be presented annually to the player from an adult from a Chess Edinburgh Member Club with the greatest grading improvement. This years winner being Matt Rounds of Civil Service.

Edinburgh Chess League: Invitations were sent out in September 2018. The League Fixtures Meeting was held in October 2018 at Slateford Bowling Club.

We lost a clubs, being Balerno and a decrease of one team. The ELC 31 teams (6 PD and Division 1, 10 teams in Division 2 and 9 teams in Division 3). Once again, Team Captains were offered the option of submitting result cards by the Website, e-mail or post. The Fixture List was posted on the CE website in mid-October 2018. The penalty for defaulted matches was £10 per offence. The penalty for late cards, and for late declaration of team pools by 31 October 2018, was £5 per offence.

From the end of November Calum McGillivray as League Secretary and Bill Marshall collaborated to produce league tables on the CE website. Bill Marshall provided league tables throughout the season based on the results submitted by Calum.

In this seasons Play Off Matches Calum will give the results under 5 (a) of the Agenda.

Edinburgh Allegro Chess League: The entry was 14 teams, the same as last season. The format remained at six monthly meetings. The EACL was a Swiss over twelve rounds. Fixtures were published on the Chess Edinburgh website in October 2018. Results were calculated and published on the CE website monthly. Grading of the results were carried out monthly by Crawford Macnab and published on the Chess Scotland website. The playing venue was at Slateford Bowling Club. Teams paid a £10 deposit in the hope that of getting teams to turn up with a full complement of four players at each match. The deposit will be returned at the start of the new season to those teams who did not default any boards during the season just ended. Jim Wallace directed the EACL for the last time in which Maurice Kelly has volunteered to take on this position next season. Details on the EACL is under 5(c) of the Agenda.

Lothian’s Championship: The individual competition in which players played over the league season over five rounds using Member Clubs venues starting from November. This year’s Champion is Martin Robinson (Edinburgh West).

Lothians Allegro – 13 January 2019 at Bainfield Bowling Club, Gorgie, Edinburgh: Martin Robinson directed this event with 114 players, an increase by 25% and a surplus £383 was achieved. Entries were received by Dave Watson and the grading data was on the CS website shortly after the event. Next year’s Allegro will be held on 12 January 2020 at the same venue.

Summer Cup & Summer Plate 2019: Calum McGillivray will provide full details of current progress under 5(b) of the Agenda.

Edinburgh Congress 5 – 7 April 2019, St Thomas of Aquins High School: The total number of players that attended was 233 players, up on last year. Edinburgh remains the largest weekend Congress in Scotland. A surplus £446 was achieved. The congress was directed by David Stewart.

Dave Watson received the entries and John McNicol prepared the grading data. Jim Fisher of Chess and Bridge London provided a Bookstall and the chess equipment. The Edinburgh Congress is one of the very few Congresses that can offer a Chess Bookstall in Scotland. Chess & Bridge have agreed to provide the Bookstall at next year’s Edinburgh Congress.

For the Congress I would like to thank everyone that helped the Parent Teachers Association for providing the Catering, Dave Watson for taking the entries, Eddie for being the Treasurer, Jim Wallace for being the Deputy Director, Calum, Chihon and Martin.

Next year’s Congress has been booked for 3 - 5 April 2020, at a venue yet to be decided.

Thank you: To all the Council Members for their hard work and Robin Murray (Auditor).

5. Competition Reports
(a) Edinburgh Chess League 2018/2019

The League Secretary (Calum McGillivray) reported that:

The results of each division were:
Winners Relegated
Premier League Edinburgh 1 Edinburgh University 1
Division 1 Civil Service 1 Corstorphine 1
Division 2 Sandy Bells 1 Wandering Dragons 3
Division 3 Musselburgh

Play-offs: For the Premier Edinburgh 2 defeated Bank of Scotland 1 and remain in the Premier.
For Division 1 Edinburgh University 2 declined their place in the play off
For Division 2 Edinburgh 5 defeated Edinburgh West 2 and are promoted.

There were a few defaults and late return of cards resulting in some clubs being fined.
Edinburgh University 1 had a particularly bad record in the Premier which accounted for their relegation.

(b) Summer Cup 2019
Calum McGillivray reported that the entry was down from 18 to 12.

It is currently at the Quarter Final stage and that the draw for the Plate has been made.


(c) Edinburgh Allegro League 2018/2019
Jim Wallace reported that:
The entry had remained at 14 teams.
Wandering Dragons B were the winners.
Slateford Bowling Club has proved an excellent venue and could cope with 20 teams. It .has been booked again
for next season’s event at an increased cost of £40 a night (previously £35).
He thanked Crawford Macnab for his work on the results and David Stewart for his support.

Jim Wallace is standing down as Organiser and was accorded a warm vote of thanks by those present.
Maurice Kelly (Musselburgh) will be the new organizer next season.

(d) Primary Schools & Secondary Schools

David Archibald reported that the events run by Lothians Junior Chess had gone well with a large increase in Primary age pupils taking part.
There is a constant problem replacing parents who give up organizing events when their children stop playing and it is still heavily reliant on Andrew Green for coaching.

Chihon Ley praised the Academy run by Andrew Green.

(e) Lothians Championship

Calum McGillivray reported that{
The entry for the 2018/2019 competition had fallen to 12.
All players had paid their entry fee.
Martin Robinson was the winner.

6. Proposals for the League and Allegro League

(a) The Council proposed that the League rules be amended to read:
If no member of a team has turned up after 30 minutes and that there has been no message from them regarding a delay the match should be considered a default.
This is a reduction from the current 1 hour.
After considerable discussion during which it was pointed out that a club could appeal to the League Secretary if it felt harshly treated the motion was passed by 7 votes to 3.

1. The Council proposed that the Allegro League rules be amended to read:
the deposit is £20 (up from £10) and clubs will forfeit their deposit if they default on a total of four boards during the season.
A counter proposal was made by Pentland Hills that there should be a penalty of £10 for each defaulted board. This was defeated by 10 votes to 1.
The Council’s motion was passed by 8 votes to 2.


7. Treasurer’s Report

The Treasurer, Eddie Gillespie, circulated a financial report.*

The Association made a surplus of £807 compared with a loss of £29 the previous year.
This was mainly due to the profit made by the Lothian Allegro Congress and the fact that no money had been donated to
Lothian Juniors.

In response to uncertainty over how grading fees are paid to Chess Scotland, the Treasurer reported that the League affiliation fees that we pay to Chess Scotland cover grading fees for the League. However we pay additional grading fees for the Allegro League, Summer Cup and Lothians Championship. The Congresses also have to pay their own grading fees.

8. League Subscriptions for 2018/19

In view of the Association’s healthy financial position the Treasurer recommended a reduction in League subscriptions:
League £44 (£42 if club is Chess Scotland member) to £32 (£30)
Allegro League £22 (£20) to £16 (£15)
After some discussion the meeting voted to end the Chess Scotland discount and approved the new subscriptions of £30 and £15 by 9 votes to 2.
(Note this decision supercedes that made on the Allegro League fees in item 6 of the agenda)


9. Presentation of Trophies

The Lothians Championship trophy was presented to Martin Robinson
The Premier League trophy was presented to the Edinburgh Club.
The Division 1 trophy was presented to the Civil Service Club.
The Division 3 trophy was presented to Musselburgh.
The Allegro League trophy was presented to Wandering Dragons.

Sandy Bells were not present to receive the Division 2 trophy.

10. Election of Office-Bearers

The following office bearers were elected en bloc to serve for the forthcoming year proposed by David McGilvary and seconded by Ronnie Dunnet.

President David Stewart
Vice-President Jim Wallace
General Secretary Dave Watson
Treasurer Jim O’Neil
League Secretary Calum McGillivray
Minutes Secretary Dave Watson
Congress Director David Stewart
Tournaments Secretary Martin Robinson
Primary Schools Representative Jenny Wilson
Secondary Schools Representative David Archibald
Webmaster Bill Marshall
Council Member Crawford Macnab
Council Member Eddie Gillespie
Council Member Chihon Ley
Council Member Maurice Kelly
Auditor Robin Murray***
Child Abuse Contact Vacant
*** The Honorary President, Auditor and Child Abuse Contact are not members of the Chess Edinburgh Council

Eddie Gillespie was accorded a vote of thanks for his 20 years as Treasurer.

David Stewart will contact clubs who are not represented on the Council to encourage them to nominate someone.

11. AOCB

(a) Jim O’Neill had contacted the Tourist Board to see if they would publicise Chess in the Park, but they had declined.

(b) Chihon Ley intends using social media to try and attract more Juniors into chess.

(c) Martin Robinson pointed out that the entry for the 2018 Allegro Congress had bbeen 90 and not 113 as stated in the minutes.

Dave Watson 30/5/2019

*Anyone wishing a copy of the full Treasurer’s Report should contact the Secretary, Dave Watson
email stillgamedave70@gmail.com
Tel. 0131 334 1062.



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