Powerin

Yeah...Zibi is just doing due diligence before jumping on a bandwagon. Always be careful jumping on any wagon with Motz....... Seriously though, I'm a bit wary of just sending in emails/letters of support to the Council involved. There is the danger of it looking like a fake Internet campaign if Council suddenly get emails from half way across the country (or the world in Gentreau's case) in support of the airfield. If you do, then talk their language. Remember, if you don't live in the shire you can't vote them out at the next election. Write about holidays, tourist dollars or potential business investment, all of the positive things that an airport can do for a Council. In this case though, it seems the Council are not the ones that need convincing.

Perhaps some legal minds might like to correct me if I'm wrong here.... As far as I can see it doesn't really matter what the legal advice to SR says (if it exists) and there is no point in trying to get a copy of it. It is a legal opinion, not a legal judgement. SR has acted on that opinion and has remained President. We have seen at least one legal opinion on this forum that says SR's resignation should stand. Which opinion is correct? Only a judge can say. Even if you were to get a copy of the legal advice and it DID say that SR could remain President, we don't have to abide by that advice. However, as the President made clear at the meeting, it would have to be challenged in court. Obviously SR got that little nugget of advice from our RAAus lawyer as well. If we don't want to take court action (and I don't think it's worth it) then we either dismiss SR at the next meeting at Natfly or vote him out at the next election.

It really doesn't matter. The guidelines for associations are clear...solve your internal disputes yourselves or take them to court. The only legal opinion that matters in the end is the judge's. Having said that, there was nothing to stop the President standing aside in the name of fairness or integrity. Our constitution is also quite clear that the President shall chair all meetings....unless he/she is not there. The president was quite within his rights to stick to his guns and remain as chairman. This is an example of a constitutional rule that probably seemed like a good idea at the time of writing, but is found wanting when things don't go to plan. The answer is to learn from the experience and change the constitution.

That was gold

My question was about a hypothetical organisation keeping funds in reserve to defend hypothetical litigation. RAAus's financial status is a matter of public record and it's relationship to the question I asked is purely coincidental.

I have a question. There were questions at the meeting regarding how big the RAAus "nest egg" of money is and whether it could be put to better use. The reply from the treasurer and others was that this was being kept for a rainy day, maybe to fight for improved privileges etc. It was very strongly argued that we also needed to keep funds to pay for any potential legal action. My question is: is this wise? As much as you like to think legal action is about justice, it also tends to be about how much money can be won from the defendant. Wouldn't an organisation with $millions in the bank be a far more attractive target for litigation than one with $1000s?

The thing is we shouldn't have to. Any secretary or treasurer worth their salt should provide that anyway shouldn't they? Also, to be prepared for any meeting a secretary should have at least a couple year's worth of minutes from previous meetings, and the treasurer several years of financials ready to answer questions should they arise. The six monthly financial summary shown to us yesterday should have been provided to us all in paper form as well as on the screen. A good treasurer would have been on his feet pointing to things on the screen and explaining what those figures meant. The figure that eluded Eugene yesterday, I think, was the total income from aircraft registrations last financial year. If he had just looked at the document he posted onto the RAAus website for all to see just a couple days ago he would have been able to tell us that it was $421,691 and the previous year was $368,089. From memory the figure flashed up on the screen for the first 6 months of this year was around $165,000 (??...anybody remember?). So rego income for the first half of the year is only 39% of last year's, rather than the ~50% you might expect. Why? Probably because of the grounded aircraft I would think. But the treasurer wasn't even in possession of last years figures, let alone having an explanation of the big difference!

My take on the meeting was that I saw a board that had been overwhelmed by events in the last year(s) and to some extent have acted like rabbits in the headlights not knowing which way to turn. There were some speakers that said the rapid growth of the RAAus is to blame. I accept this to some extent, but more to point it has been the failure of the Board, over many years, to "grow" with the organisation and put plans and procedures in place to manage that growth. This is not necessarily the entire fault of the current Board members, but they have been left with the aftermath when it all eventually blew up in their faces. They have suddenly found that they have nothing in place to manage the mess that they now find themselves in. They are flailing about in the water and realising they forgot to check for holes in their sinking ship. I think a lot of the questionable things we have seen recently from the board are not necessarily from evil intent, but rather from desperate attempts to defend themselves while they try to hurriedly get things fixed. We seem to have a board doing things because that's the way they have always been done (as per the monkeys in a cage story in another thread). As long as things were going smoothly there was no need to change. The Board blindly trusted their Tech Manager and CEO were doing the job (as you do in a small "club") and never bothered to really check because the organisation was growing, pilots were getting their certificates, there was a wonderful amount of planes getting registered and the bank balance was growing. The membership blindly trusted that the Board was doing its job and never really bothered to check because we got our certificates and our planes got registered and the organisation wasn't going broke. So we just voted in anybody that wanted to do the job. Until now. We threw the Board a lifeline at this meeting and I think they were grateful for it. We have watered the tree, but we need to keep a close eye on it to see if it still needs pruning (excuse the mixed metaphors). I have to say that the excuses from Middo about his wildly innaccurate membership figures and from Eugene about his missing financials at the AGM were so lame that they might even be true. Again, the secretary and treasurer have never had to face this level of scrutiny before and don't have the procedures in place to have even the simplest information at hand. The number of RAAus members is such a basic measure of our organisation's health that it should be reported to the executive on a monthly or weekly basis. The fact that Eugene couldn't supply us with a basic financial figure (aircraft registrations) when several of us in the audience did have those figures at our fingertips was embarrassing to say the least. I'd like to thank the reform team and others involved for their work, especially "The Rat" whose motion about reviewing and reforming the Board gave them something to hang their hats on and work towards.

Ah...got the last figure wrong. Thanks. And thanks Col for that summary.

Thanks Sue...did I do something wrong because with the corrected figures I get 67% rise in employee expenses?

Thanks John. But why not bring RAAus under the umbrella of the Act (and especially section 27 I mention above) so that it is impossible for any legal repercussions to happen? Then we don't have to "read between the lines" but instead get a clear and concise report (as much as that is possible in an accident report). EDIT: furthermore, why dismiss "pilot error" as not worthy of being reported? There are many hard lessons that can be learnt if we know about the mistakes of others.

Fair enough...thanks Andy. Here is one part of the Transport Safety Investigation Act which provides protection relating to accident reports that the ATSB release: 27 Reports not admissible in evidence Final report (1) A report under section 25 is not admissible in evidence in any civil or criminal proceedings. (2) Subsection (1) does not apply to a coronial inquiry. Draft report (3) A draft report under section 26 is not admissible in evidence in any civil or criminal proceedings.

You never know Maj...perhaps one of us at the meeting might be in the mood to make you very happy....

I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiments here but if you are really serious about this you need to do some reading. Start with the ATSB website and then move on to the Transport Safety Investigation Act (as I did today ). Also have a read of section 4.08 of the RAAus Ops Manual which outlines our obligations for reporting and what RAAus says it will do in relation to accident reports. I'm sorry to put a damper on things, but remember we are talking about the Australian TRANSPORT Safety Board. It concerns itself with aviation, rail and marine because these are methods of mass transport and have the potential to kill a lot of people at once. It doesn't investigate car accidents. They don't investigate everything in aviation either, they don't have the funds....only those accidents which have the most potential for helping keep the maximum amount of people safe. For example they don't generally investigate aerobatic accidents, because they usually involve one person engaging in risky behaviour. UNLESS it happens at an airshow...where a lot of people could have been impacted. Let's be honest, Recreational Aviation rules have been specifically designed to minimise risk to the general public. Our planes are light, reasonably slow, we can't fly in CTA or IMC (so we can't hit big jets), or do aerobatics or fly at night. In short, we can't hurt too many people if we crash. By its very nature RAAus is not on the ATSB investigation radar....until we hit a ferris wheel at a carnival or something. If it is true that the ATSB offered to do investigations for RAAus, and the offer was rejected, then a very valuable opportunity was lost to us. I don't think any sort of legal action is going to help because I don't think any law has been broken. And I would be careful about trying to extend the principal of "Duty of Care" any further. I think we all have far too much duty of care as it is. By the way....there shouldn't be any legal ramifications in doing investigations. The Act specifically prevents investigation reports from being used as evidence in any legal action. Also, as Scotty said, Coroners reports are usually a matter of public record. Here's some findings from the NSW Coroners Court. Google for them in your state. I'm not saying do nothing...just that we need a different tack than legal action. By all means move a motion at the upcoming meeting, or the Natfly meeting, that RAAus explore methods of investigating accidents and making the information available to the membership. They used to do it (there are reports from about 10 years ago), why can't they do it now? I don't know how much it would cost to get an investigation done. If it averaged $10K per investigation ($1 per member) then I think that would be money well spent.

Here's a bit of research I did in response to a question about CASA records. Also see my follow up post below this one regarding the numbers of Jab and Rotax engines on the CASA and RAAus registers. Hope it adds something to you own research. http://www.recreationalflying.com/threads/jab-down-again.50745/page-2#post-251642

How is your plane going Solomon?

Am I correct in assuming the next General Meeting at Natfly (which will be only seven weeks after this one) will be a fully fledged meeting at which the membership can move motions and decisions can be made? I'm going to the Feb 9th meeting with the intention of helping to ask some hard questions of the Board. They have a lot to answer for. Perhaps they will provide the correct answers...or not. My thoughts are that the Natfly general meeting will be the place where we can act on these answers in whatever way the membership deem necessary. If there are some hard decisions to be made, and strong motions to be moved, then 7 weeks gives plenty of time for the "full membership" (whatever that means) to be notified, and the scales of (natural) justice can be seen to be tipping in a fair and democratic way.

Another fair and balanced comment from you. Thanks John.

PROXY FORM BELOW I have separated the proxy form (Appendix A) from the constitution into a separate file. It is attached below. To get your very own proxy form download the attached file and print it out. Read Part 30 of the Constitution shown below. Decide who you would like to represent you. Fill the proxy form out and send it. Easy! raaus_proxy.pdf raaus_proxy.pdf raaus_proxy.pdf

It's a shame, but perhaps not surprising, that Mr Thobaven seems to regard all this as a battle of wits that requires war room tactics when all the membership want is answers and a way forward.

I certainly intend to have a copy of the constitution and by-laws in hand at the meeting....I am far from a "legal type" but I have lost count the number of times I have read that damn constitution. From what I read here the impression I get is that there will be several people attending who are very well versed in the constitution and highly experienced in meeting procedures. Number 9 in Andy's list above is a big one for me. Providing financials to the membership in a timely manner is not optional, or a matter of convenience. It is required by law. I believe this should taken further and the appropriate authorities informed. It really irked me when the "president" said in the RAA magazine they would "try harder" in the future as if it was a favour they were doing for the membership.

I hope to go and will travel by car. If anyone needs a pickup to and from the airport in Canberra, or to accommodation, just PM me. Might save you a taxi fare at least. If anyone plans to fly into Gundaroo (Dick Smith's strip) a pickup might be possible on my way through. Feb 9th is my wife's birthday....but she said don't worry, just go....bless her.

I think we ALL agree with your points above. My question to you is HOW do you propose we resolve these issues if not with a meeting to call the Board to account? Your points should have been enacted by our Board as a matter of course as part of there duties to members. Despite this: There appears to have been a lack of decisive action. The failure to comply with CASA audits over the course of a year despite having been given four opportunities to do so is a case in point. There have been two CEO/GMs in recent years. Neither appeared to have the qualifications you desire. Can we trust the next appointment to be any better? I hope so. You identify that the Board has failed to communicate. I think they have got the message that this is a problem. It doesn't seem to have improved anything. Because of the lack of communication we haven't seen any plans to resolve the problems and issues. It is the duty of any Board to have a strategic plan in place. Does one exist now? Has one ever existed? How would we know? There was a Board elected committee involved in reviewing the constitution. As far as I understand, when the Board members who helped instigate the review resigned from the Board the committee was disbanded and the review was shelved. The tech and ops manual were supposed to be updated. I think after a number of years we might be seeing a rough draft of one of the manuals soon? You say some of us have an axe to grind. Let me be the first to put my hand up. I think any member who thinks that the Board is not acting in the members' best interests should have an axe to grind. It seems other methods of getting information from the board have failed. If calling a GM and "haranguing" the board is what it takes then so be it. The need for answers is the very reason the GM was called...sometimes it is the only way. If I come away from the GM with open, honest and believable answers to all of your excellent points I will be happy. Given the previous record of some of the board I am not optimistic, but live in hope.

MEMBERS WHO WANT A PROXY FORM: You should receive one in the mail in due course. If you want to print out your own download the RAAus Constitution from here. Read Rule 30 on page 19 of the constitution (and while you're at it read the whole thing) Print out page 22 (choose to print only page 22 after you click Print).

A very wise and insightful comment Jack