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20 Under the Constitution, with 47 voting delegates and com-
mittee members present, Greater Manchester’s application
needed to have 32 votes in support if it was to be success-
ful. When the vote was taken it was obviously going to be
a close thing but to Greater Manchester’s relief they at-
tracted 34 votes in favour, with 5 against and 8 abstentions,
so that Greater Manchester are now a recognised County
of the Association.
The next item on the agenda was the appointment of
auditors. Murray Smith LLP Chartered Accountants of
Northwich were again appointed.
This was followed by the election of Officers. With only one person standing for each of seven
positions the meeting was asked if they would be happy to vote en bloc but Roger Green of North
Yorks asked for a separate vote on the Umpires Director post which the Chairman agreed to do.
The following posts were then elected en bloc. President – George Clarke (Norfolk), Chairman –
Barry Hedges (Essex), Treasurer – Barbara Mills (Cheshire), Committee Secretary – Carol
Hawkins, Competition Organiser – Brandon Whittaker (Cheshire), Committee Member – Roy Duke
(Hertfordshire).
The position of Umpires Director was then voted on with the only nomination Martin Davies
of Oxfordshire. He was elected with 8 abstentions. Keith Hawkins was then elected as Adminis-
tration Officer with one abstention. This left the post of Coaching Director. The nomination from
the floor was for David Millington-Jones of Herefordshire, he was elected with four abstentions.
Two more Committee Member positions were still to be filled and three members expressed inter-
est, Chris Willies of West Mids, Becky Cox of Herefordshire and Karl Hudson of Somerset.
Chris Willies spoke at length but said he would offer himself for a committee post only on his
own terms. He spoke of what he would like to help the ESMBA take forward including the web
site. His name did not go forward to the vote which was a great pity as he appeared to be someone
that could really bring something to the table. Becky Cox & Karl Hudson were then elected to fill
the two remaining committee positions.
Following the closure of the AGM the Open Forum then took place. After the Chairman
opened the meeting Countdown Discounts cards was first on the agenda. It was announced that
the ESMBA will discontinue the scheme in September. It has proved to be a costly venture that
did not prove popular with members. The Chairman then spoke on Development. The ESMBA will
be at the 50+ Show at Olympia, the cost will be half what it was the last time the ESMBA were
there. He said that small sub-committees would be set up for the Worlds and the British Isles etc.
It was also announced that the ESMBA will be going live with a new Skype number shortly.
Plans of closer links between the England Squad, the England Under 21s and the England Ladies
team were announced. The ESMBA see these teams as feeder teams into the main England
Squad. Hedges also spoke of two new pilot competitions, a Fours and a Pairs, where members
of any county can join together to play with the winners qualifying to represent England in the
World Championships.
He spoke of using both Church Gresley IBC and Daventry IBC as regular venues with the
ESMBA storing sixteen mats at each venue. He said that the ESMBA are at an early stage of talk-
ing about sharing a venue with office space etc available for the ESMBA but spoke of the legal
implications involved. They would possibly have to form a limited company to do this. He spoke
of short mat bowls being a pyramid structure with England/Elite players at the top, County players
in the middle and the grassroot/club players at the bottom and asked what can we do for the grass-
root bowlers as that’s what most of the membership is.
There was also talk of setting up a dropbox for counties to access information from on PDF
files. There was also a suggestion of younger umpires being introduced, perhaps to umpire Eng-
land Under 21 games. Cornwall complained they have a lot of umpires that are not being used
enough, The Chairman explained that expenses were high for bringing umpires in from Cornwall.