Secretary's Report (June 2007)

There is a well-known saying where databases are concerned – “Garbage in, Garbage out”. I could add to that “Nothing in, Nothing out”.

You would be surprised just how often the first we know of an initiate or joining member is when a Brother is appointed to office in a Lodge. I then wonder if Grand Lodge has been informed and, quite often with a joining member, they haven’t. This, of course, skews the membership statistics and can cause all sorts of problems, not least being a reduction in our appointment and promotion figures.

We require from BP1 to be completed for every change to membership. That is, initiation, joining, rejoining, resigned, excluded, died or, quite simply, moved house. Again, often the first we know of a house move is when we send out those much-awaited appointment letters and they don’t arrive! I know that some members do not inform their Secretary as soon as they move but, surely, if a member isn’t receiving a summons and doesn’t turn up for meetings, some form of follow up action should be taken.

In the (hopefully) not too distant future, we shall start doing pre-entry onto Adelphi, the U.G.L.E. database. At that time, we shall require all Registration Forms P to be sent via the Provincial Office. As the latest version of Form P contains all the information we need, it will then not be necessary to send BP1 for initiates, joining and rejoining members. Until that time arrives, please help to ensure that our records are as up to date as possible.

Of course, all other changes will need to be notified on BP1 which is available as hard copy or as a Word document for emailing.

The last three-month period from 1st March to 31st May 2007 saw a total of twenty seven initiates in the Province, together with eighteen joining and rejoining members. Sadly, this was offset by nine deaths and twenty five resignations & exclusions, resulting in a net gain of eleven – a marked improvement over recent times... Total unduplicated membership in the Province now stands at 3821.

What is the betting that if I run the statistics for that period again at some time in the future there will be a marked change in those numbers!