21. Who gets to see the records?

The Our Community Policy Bank (https:// communitydirectors.com.au/tools-resources/ policy-bank) gives you a headstart. It’ll give you some idea of what things you need a policy on (only on things that are specific to not-for-profits, though; for general management you’ll need to look elsewhere) and it provides a base that can be whittled down or built upon to meet your own organisation’s particular needs. Don’t take any of the policies as gospel; they’re just a starting point.

Rather recursively, the Policy Bank includes a Policies Policy, designed to ensure that policies get made and implemented. One clause in it says:

The Board shall nominate a Policy Officer to be responsible for ensuring that proper procedures for the development, consultation, acceptance, recording, and implementation of every policy are designed and adhered to.

As the person who knows all the paperwork you’re the obvious person to fill this role. If you can find someone else who’s qualified – the previous secretary, perhaps? – and willing to take it on, then certainly delegate, but there has to be a policy officer, and you’re the default setting. If you’re waiting for someone to step forward and volunteer spontaneously then remember that hope is not a policy, or a policy bank.

Once you have a policy bank, it needs maintenance. It will need to be reviewed for relevance every couple of years, in case the relevant laws have changed or the national mood has shifted. Within that time, each policy should contain its own monitoring system – a means of reporting how often it’s been called upon and what sanctions have been imposed under its rules. These things need to be reported to the board, as the final authority behind the rules, and the secretary will have to be responsible for finding a spot on the agenda for them.

Your organisation’s constitution, if it is based on the model rules, is likely to say something to the effect that all members can see all “records and documents relating to transactions, dealings, business or property of the Association” (that’s from the Victorian model rules).

Furthermore, the Associations Act in several states has provisions stating that any member can consult the minutes of any general meeting (and in states without those provisions, they would probably be implied anyway). No such provision covers the minutes of board meetings, but most states say that you have to have in your constitution a clause setting out what kind of access members have to the organisation’s records in general and the board minutes in particular. This means that your organisation can decide for itself whether it wishes to be transparent or guarded, and will then have to live with the consequences.

You can decide for yourself, that is, but many groups don’t, choosing the less taxing approach of simply adopting the model rules for their constitution. If you’ve done that, you may find that your constitution now says something like this:

“The records, books and other documents of the association must be open to inspection, free of charge, by a member of the association at any reasonable hour”

Taken at face value, this implies that members can see the minutes of any committee, not to mention the petty cash book.

In practice, nobody really knows how far this language extends, and it may be inconsistent with your fiduciary duties to let everybody see everything without restriction. If something’s really sensitive, hold it back and see whether the inquisitive member is willing to take you to court for a certain expense and an uncertain outcome. If you’ve got a little elbow room, though, take the trouble at your next AGM to adjust your constitution so that it specifies exactly what members of the organisation can and can’t see.

So far, we’ve looked at what members of the organisation can see. Members of the board, on the other hand, are entitled to see all the board papers, including the minutes. The board and all its members are collectively responsible for the operation of the organisation, and can in theory be sued if anything goes wrong, so it’s only fair that they should be able to see exactly what the board is up to. If a board member misses a meeting, send them the minutes.

Board members (other than the secretary) aren’t entitled to see anything else, though, except in their capacity as members of the association. If a board member wants for any reason to chase up (say) the petty cash book, the staff don’t have to show it to them unless the whole board moves a motion to that effect. The board has total power, but each individual board member on their own doesn’t have much.

Board members, then, can demand to see the minutes, and other people can’t. That doesn’t mean that you can’t show the minutes to the second larger group if you want to. As a board, you’re perfectly entitled to make particular exceptions to your general rules, and if you want to be transparent and accountable you can (and should) release anything on request unless there’s a good reason to keep it confidential.