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The meeting was attended by 54 members and
proceedings opened by our Chairman Jim Husband who
then introduced the members of the committee and our
guest Alexander Hoppe Bürgermeister of
Königslutter.The chairman read out the roll of
honour, this was followed by a minute’s silence as
the Langeleben standard was lowered by bearer Tom
Neal.
APOLOGIES:
The Secretary Ernie Callaghan issued apologies of
those members who for various reasons were unable to
attend.
MINUTES OF 19th AGM:
The minutes of
the 19th AGM previously
handed out for the benefit of attending members and
published on our website and newsletter were
accepted by the floor after a proposal by Peter
Westwell and seconded by Neil Mapp.
VICE PRESIDENTS ADDRESS:
In the absence
of our President Major General Peter Baldwin our
Vice President Rodney Goddard welcomed the members
and thanked them for making the physical effort to
attend our 20th anniversary
reunion. He offered a special word of thanks to the
Bürgermeister for taking time out of his busy
schedule to be with us this day.
Rodney explained that
he was standing in for our President Peter Baldwin who
was unwell and was thus unable to make the trip this
year and asked the floor to join him both in thought
and prayer for Peter and Gail at what was a difficult
time for them.
Rodney went on to
give us an outline of what was going on in our two
principle Corps, (Signals and Intelligence) with the
reductions in manning in 2020 of around 14% Royal
Signals and 10% Intelligence Corps bringing the army
total strength down to 82000, this will result in an
increase in the number of reservists.
As a result there
will be approximately 200 Royal Signals personnel in
our main areas of interest divided between Cheltenham,
RAF Digby and Cyprus.
BÜRGERMEISTERS
ADDRESS:
With the help of our interpreter member Michael
Braham is published in full on the website.
TREASURERS REPORT:
Our Treasurer Gerry Kane issued a detailed report on
the branch’s current financial situation which
showed a healthy balance despite our generous
donations totalling £1000 to various charities at
last years AGM, Acceptance of the financial report
was proposed by Denis Parr seconded by Tom Allum and
accepted by the floor. Gerry asked that attending
members paid him the monies for the ordered events
at the end of the meeting.
SECRETARY'S REPORT:
The Secretary Ernie Callaghan started by again
thanking the members for a great turnout on our 20th anniversary reunion, despite the economic
situation we had 54 members attending and with
families and local guests over 100 people would be
enjoying the weekend.
He
also thanked the Bürgermeister Alexander Hoppe for
finding time during the busy Schützenfest celebrations
and for cementing the special relationship between our
association and the town of Königslutter.
He
announced that the reunion branch membership had
continued to grow with 14 new members joining since the
last AGM in 2012. He also mentioned the thanks we owed
to our webmaster Tom Perkin and our newsletter editor
Marlene Brooks for keeping us in touch with events over
the year.
The
Secretary also announced that sadly this would be his
last report as he was now standing down from the
committee after nearly 15 years and that it had been a
privilege and a pleasure to have served the members for
all this time, it had been a great period in his life
but we needed a fresh and younger approach to guarantee
the continuation of our unique association.
ELECTION OF
OFFICERS:
As three members of the committee, Jim Husband, Gerry
Kane and Ernie Callaghan had expressed a wish to stand
down after serving on the platform for some 52 years
between them this left vacancies for the positions of
Chairman, Treasurer and Secretary.
Nominations
were proposed and seconded for members Roger Longden
Chairman, Clive Sanders Secretary, Richard Pickup
Assistant Secretary (UK reunions), John Richardson
Assistant Secretary (German reunions) and John Plaskitt
Treasurer. They were all unanimously elected unopposed
by the floor.
ANY OTHER
BUSINESS:
Member Clive Sanders our poet laureate made a
presentation of a framed poem to the Bürgermeister which
was received with grace.
The
secretary announced that member Tom Allum had arranged
the design and manufacture of a sample number of
baseball caps with the logo’s of the Royal Signals and
Intelligence Corps and the Langeleben veterans. They
were on sale for £7 each, the profits going to branch
funds.
Member
Ilona Hawxwell made an emotional speech thanking our
members that went over to Germany to attend the funeral
of her husband George Hawxwell who died last September,
she was especially proud that member Michael Braham had
arranged for a standard bearer and bugler to give George
a military style farewell as was his wishes.
Honorary
member Arnulf Baumann said a few words thanking the
branch for their donation of £200 last year for his
charity for an african children’s school to obtain
ethnic musical instruments and books, he showed a
photograph of the school principal receiving the gifts.
2014 REUNION:
It was agreed that our reunion in 2014 be held at
Burleigh Court Loughborough during the last week in
August so as to keep equilibrium with the Schützenfest
schedule in Königslutter.
The
meeting closed at 1245 hours.
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