LANGHAM COMMUNITY COUNCIL
Minutes of a Trustee Meeting held on 16th January 2025
at Langham Community Centre

Present
Alan Cadman, Martin Bottwood, Liz Winter, Charlotte Parker, Raynor Sumner, Bob Schofield, Elizabeth Schofield, Stuart Rudge, Denise Hobday, Cath Hine, Colin Parker, Emma Stevens.

Apologies for Absence
David Druitt, Rob Clark, Carol Grime and Sallie West (received after the meeting).

Alan welcomed everyone to the first Trustee meeting of 2025.

Minutes of the Trustee Meeting held on 17th October 2024
These had been circulated to Trustees prior to the meeting. Acceptance as a true record was proposed by Liz Schofield, seconded by Charlotte Parker and agreed by all present.
Alan signed the minutes.

Matters Arising from them and from the Finance meeting on 2nd December are dealt with under the headings below.

Chairman’s Report
Insurance Alan confirmed that a new direct debit of £345.82 a month had been set up. The only additional clauses were not relevant. For example, a firework request from the Divali hirers on the field was dealt with by the Parish Council, as this comes under their insurance.
Car park resurfacing Emma’s husband, Rick, will commence the repair as soon as the weather is warm enough.
Supporting other charities with similar goals
David Druitt’s report into this matter had been circulated and confirmed that there was nothing in our Constitution or on the Charity Commission website to prevent this. He was thanked in his absence for his investigations.
Emma Stevens – end of six month probationary period Emma confirmed that she was happy with her fixed-hours contract and her role. She stressed that she was not merely undertaking the role for the money, but to make her contribution to the life of the village. Cheryl had experienced one or two hitches with the new booking system, but these were being ironed out.

Treasurer’s Report
Unfortunately, Carol Grime was not well enough to attend the meeting. She had sent her apologies to Liz Winter this afternoon, together with a note of the bank balances:
Current Account £5,412.11; Saver Account £75,452.21.
The rate on the saver is going down yet again to 2.5%.
Looking at the Simple profit and loss account figures, Martin queried the high balance of the current account compared with the balance at the end of December. Emma confirmed that we had received several hire payments which, under the new system, include the total hire charge and deposit. Alan confirmed that a payment of over £1,000 had been received for the quarterly Shop electricity usage.
Emma also confirmed that she and Carol would meet with Maureen Shouksmith next week to cancel the Sage payment and take off the Treasurer links from Maureen’s phone and PC.

Carol wishes to register her concern regarding the viability of the hall. She will also find out from George Pearce exactly what documentation he will need to act as Independent Examiner of our accounts at the end of the year. The full balance sheet has not been kept up to date since the end of March 2024, as we were without a Treasurer once Maureen retired in May and Carol did not take over until September. Expenses are not easy to calculate at present as we have paid no electricity charges since 8th May 2024. (See below.)
CG
EDF Energy As the secretary had still not received any bills from EDF, despite a correspondence going on since early July, she had finally contacted the Energy Ombudsman yesterday and set up an online account with them. She had already been contacted by Sandra Carr confirming that they will take on the case as soon as they receive the documentation, which Liz W has promised to send tomorrow. They will contact EDF at once who will have until the end of January to respond. The supporting documents comprise all communication Liz has had with EDF since the contract was issued, together with a three-page “diary of events”.
It was agreed with Sandra that she should ask EDF for:
1. An apology, 2. Monthly calculated bills, and 3. Compensation.
EDF may or may not contact Liz to suggest terms for early resolution, which will need to be relayed to Trustees for a decision on acceptance or refusal. If we choose not to accept, the Ombudsman Service will pursue the matter for us but they may not complete before the end of March. EW
Rev Otobo As stated in the last Finance minutes, the secretary had sent a Request for Judgment to Civil Money Claims online on 21st November 2024. So far there had been no response, but this is not unusual, particularly with Christmas and New Year intervening.
100 Club Liz W had paid the City Council £20 on her own card for annual renewal of our lottery licence at the end of January. It was agreed to repay her from the petty cash. She confirmed the present total in the petty cash is £495.31.

Marketing Manager’s Report
Emma confirmed that feedback from hirers had been mainly positive regarding the new booking system. Hummingbird Home Hub were in all day every Wednesday in term-time, Tiny Champs are weekly on Monday morning, Cornerstone Church were moving to the main hall on Sunday mornings 9.30-1.30, with the Christadelphians in the Committee room on Sunday afternoons from 2-4pm.
The Winter festival had been very successful. It was an extremely windy day and many other local events had been cancelled. That and the presence of footballers on the field brought in more people. The pizza van which attended now has a regular booking for the car park on Wednesday evening. The LCC share of profit from the stall bookings of £110 has been paid into our account.
Emma has been confronted for the first time with the Bowls/Bridge booking conundrum, where the former club ask for Monday evening hires to play matches in the hall, while the latter are loath to move into the Clubroom/Committee room. The dates are 27 Jan, 17 Feb and 17 Mar. Hopefully, an agreement has been reached.

Mobile phones Emma now has a Tesco pay-as-you-go simcard in her LCC phone at no charge. Her first monthly payment of £10 will be due on 10th February. Cheryl would change hers shortly in the same way. The Trustees agreed that these payments would be refunded from the Petty Cash each month, as this seemed the simplest option. There would be a refund due to Sue Armstrong for Emma ‘s phone once the TalkTalk payments had been cancelled.

Liz W proposed a vote of thanks to Emma for the enthusiastic way she had tackled the many duties of Marketing Manager and the number of hires she had introduced. This was echoed unanimously by all present.

Chairs for the Main Hall and Clubroom
Trustees were referred to the email of 9th January received from Martin Bottwood regarding agreement from the Parish Council to match-fund purchase of new chairs under certain conditions. These were
i. to check the quality of any chairs selected; (£1584 for 60 seemed very cheap)
ii. to ensure the old blue folding chairs are recycled, sold, repurposed but not binned.
The Trustees were grateful to the PC for the match-funding proposal and were happy to agree to this and to abide by the condition of not simply discarding the folding chairs, which could still have a useful life elsewhere. Martin agreed that he would put to the PC the purchase of the chairs by them so the VAT can be reclaimed.

Emma would obtain as soon as possible samples of the possible new chairs as the prices varied from £40 to £100 and it was agreed that we could not afford the more expensive. She also asked Trustees to enquire about any chairs used in venues they visited as to price, weight, ease of stacking and durability. ES
There was a discussion around how many to purchase: 150/160 to renew all Hall chairs or 100 to make up to £150 what we already have? There is also the perennial problem of storage if they are less manoeuvrable and take up more space than our current ones, which have to be put away and got out regularly by Cheryl and less practised hirers.

Maintenance
Emma confirmed that she had contacted Boydens flooring company to quote for laying a new floor in the changing rooms and gents toilets. She would also contact Gillard Brothers whom we have used previously, and one other.
Any work will need to be undertaken when there are no bookings in the hall, as is the case with a volunteer decorating party, and school holidays might be the best time. ES
Bond plumbers had fixed several taps earlier this month, mended the Pre-School flush and looked at the water heater in the corridor gents to stop it leaking. It was decided not to replace any water heaters at the present time unless problems arise.



Developer Contributions – Section 106 and Unilateral Undertakings
Martin confirmed that no construction has begun at any of the proposed sites and the first allocation of S.106 money was set aside for LED lighting at the LCC.
In December Williamsons asked for a review of the conditions imposed before they can begin. The PC is making objections, particularly in view of the surface water drainage proposal into the School Road ditch, claiming that conditions have NOT been met. Vistry also argue that their completion of the Langham Meadows site should take priority.

Hall Roof
Rob Clark had circulated an update. He has still been unable to arrange a meeting with Hoggarth Cooke. A copy of the roof survey had not been found and it was agreed that the secretary would trawl through old files on her computer, while Cath and Colin agreed to search through the old LCC files in the Clubroom cupboard.

Progress on Safeguarding Policy/Evacuation chair
Colin reported to the meeting. There are only five lines in our booking form which refer to our Safeguarding Policy, which is definitely insufficient. Colin has researched online and, combined with his personal experience, will draw up a draft policy, which will need to be reviewed annually.
We do not need to have a stairlift. Without one we would be “not allowing a disabled person to use the room” but we can offer alternative spaces.
We do not need to have an evacuation chair but, under Fire Regulations, we have to able to evacuate “everyone” from the building. If our chair is unsuitable for use on the fire escape stairs, perhaps there is an alternative kind.
Colin was thanked for his research and his continued willingness to pursue both matters on our behalf. CoP

Any Other Business
MUGA – Stuart asked what progress was being made. Martin replied that the Parish Council was going ahead with the specification but it was not yet out to tender.

Date of Next Meeting
The next Trustee meeting will be held on Thursday 20th March 2025 at 7.30 pm.

The next Finance meeting will be held in the Clubroom on Monday 24th February at 7.30 pm.

Alan thanked everyone for their attendance and closed the meeting at 10 pm.