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Are we ‘IN’ or ‘OUT’ yet? (Winchester Branch Report) I guess by the time you read this - Brexit (in whatever form) may well have happened and the country is either up to its eyeballs in shedloads of new deals it has finally arranged with the rest of the world and all is well, or alternatively Jeremy Corbyn is now the UK’s new Prime Minister together with his sidekick Diane Abbott as the Foreign Secretary and unsurprisingly civil disorder has broken out across the country and I am living in a mud hut in Outer Mongolia. Nah! That couldn’t happen could it? Anyway I only mention this in passing because as I sit here in early January 2019 struggling to come up with some ideas for our branch article for the S&B magazine I can hear on the radio playing in the background yet another political pundit waffling on about “BREXIT blah de blah, LEAVE blah de blah, REMAIN blah de blah, BACKSTOP blah de blah”, and funnily enough it reminds me of how similar and appropriate these words are to my current ‘writers block’. In other Words BREXIT - what should be the theme of the article? LEAVE - put it off for another day and go and have a coffee (always a good option). REMAIN - stick with it and at least get something down on paper. BACKSTOP- publishing deadline end of March! And then it comes to me. Put all that rubbish aside and simply concentrate on all the good and varied things we as a branch have organised and carried out throughout 2018. So what has the branch been up to throughout the year? Well in addition to our alternate monthly formal and social meetings, plus supporting the monthly Turning of the Pages in Winchester Cathedral, the first of our activities for the year kicked off in early February as it usually does with our branch AGM under the beady eye of our Chairman Roy Stanger. Now I am not sure how other branches are run but we in Winchester have what we call a ‘Management Board’ responsible for all administration and general running of the branch. It consists as most do of a President, Chairman, Treasurer and Secretary. To ensure a stable continuity of the branch over the years, each member of the board only holds their appointment for a period of 2 years with overlapping elections for two of the appointments every 12 months for anyone who would like to give it a go. This year being no different saw a few changes with John Harper our Secretary for the last 6 years finally give up on mastering his Spellchecker and hand over the secretarial reins to John Fritz-Domeney who relinquished his role of President to Brig Nicholas Prideaux. The latter exchange as Nick pointed out in his Presidents address was a little bit of branch history as he and John had been exchanging this particular appointment for more years than they care to remember! You know that old adage? If you want something done well - then use a busy man. This is a perfect Swift & Bold Journal 2018
Swift & Bold Journal 2018
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