Chairman’s Chunk

THE CHAIRMAN’S CHUNK...

I don’t think it will come as a surprise to anybody to know that 2020 was an extremely tough year for the NABD.

Though I think that all of the trustees believed that the NABD would survive the pandemic in one form or another, none of us could be certain what condition the Association would be in at the end of it all.

By late April 2020, after having to cancel the NABD’s biggest annual fundraising event (The You’ve Been Nabbed Rally) for the first time in 29-years; we could see that all of the other events that support the NABD would also be cancelled in 2020 so the NABD National Committee decided that there was no other viable option but to suspend 80% of its regular activities (basically, where possible, all of the things that cost money to run) and to furlough one of our two paid staff members.

As even the smaller random donations from individuals quickly dwindled, the National Committee also had to take the heart-rending decision to suspend the NABD Adaptation Grants 6 Open House Issue 98 system, which makes financial grants to people with disabilities who need motorcycles, trikes or sidecar outfits adapting to suit their needs. The adaptation grants have always been at the core of the NABD’s services and the unavoidable suspension of this service was a very hard pill to swallow.

In October 2020, with all indicators suggesting that the effects of the pandemic would continue for much longer than had initially been predicted, the equally difficult decision was taken to offer Redundancy to Jane Singleton, who had been furloughed since June. Jane, fully understanding the position the NABD was in, accepted the redundancy gracefully; taking with her our heartfelt thanks for her years of dedicated service. Throughout the year we continued to offer advice on adaptations and sort-out licensing and insurance problems for people but most other NABD activities remained on-hold until such time as Covid-19 restrictions become a thing of the

past. The monthly National Committee meetings continued (albeit via online Zoom meetings rather than pour traditional meetings at the office) so that we could constantly monitor the situation and liaise on administrative issues like the Charities Commission annual reports, NABD accounts and other aspects of our duties as Trustees.

At our National Committee meeting in January 2021 we decided to use what general donation money we had received since June 2020 and I am very pleased to say that we managed to award grants to all of the people on current the waiting list.

The tangible lift to the spirits of every member of the National Committee that was engendered by clearing the waiting-list of grant applications was an absolute joy to see!

The NABD financial year runs from April 1st to March 31st and although our current financial year began after the Covid-19 restrictions were originally put into place on March 16th 2020 we did have enough money in the Adaptation Grants Fund to process some grant applications before suspending the Adaptation Grants system in June 2020.

Those grants early in the pandemic, together with those we were able to award at our National Committee meeting in January 2020, came to a total of £13,337.55, which has enabled twenty-seven (27) more people with disabilities to have their bikes, trikes or sidecar-outfits adapted to suit their needs.

Though this is a far cry from the previous financial year’s total grants of £52,959.19, which helped seventy-four (74) people with disabilities to have their bikes, trikes or sidecar-outfits adapted to suit their needs; it still feels like quite an achievement to us, under such extraordinarily difficult circumstances.

As there is obviously a long way to go before we see an end to the restrictions relating to this pandemic and all indicators suggest that 2021 may prove just as difficult as 2020, the NABD Adaptation Grant system remains suspended until such time as donations received allow us to once again deal with any grant applications we receive.

The You’ve Been Nabbed Rally 2021

With no end to the threat of Covid-19 in sight we have had no option but to cancel our main annual event for 2021. I have already produced a statement about this for general circulation and that should also be featured in this issue of Open House, so I will not go into all of the details here.

Online Memberships

Simon Freedman, our esteemed and extremely hard-working Webmaster has been busily improving our online services throughout the pandemic and, as I write this, he has just suspended our ‘somewhat problematic’ online membership/ renewals payment system for a few days to enable him to bring online a new, greatly improved system that is much better suited to the task.

At this point it is probably worth me reminding members that, under our new system, you can pay your membership subscriptions monthly, quarterly or annually, to suit your budget and your convenience. You can also choose to ‘auto renew’ your membership to save you having to remember when it is due for renewal.

Membership subscriptions have never been as important as they are now. The simple fact is that the NABD could not have survived 2020 without membership subscriptions. As tough as times are for everybody at present, I urge you to please renew your membership when it is due. Hopefully the option of paying £2.00 per month will make that an easier prospect for many.

Without members there can be no NABD!

This is, quite possibly, the shortest ‘Chairman’s Chunk’ I have ever written but it has been a year of greatly-reduced activity so I will bid you all the very best wishes for 2021 and hope that you all manage to stay safe-and-well until the vaccination programme brings some normality back into our lives.