BIAS recently sent questions to Mark Chapman, Natasha Judge and Trevor Inns regarding their time on the Bees United Board since being elected. We now have full responses from all three.

The BIAS Committee are grateful to all three for their responses, particularly given the time of year. We would also like to point out that we will be asking questions of the other BU Board members in the near future.

Mark Chapman

Dear Phil,

Thanks for getting in touch. Here is my response. I think it’s important that BU board members are accountable and I hope you extend this to other BU board members and BFC directors.

The contribution you have made to the effectiveness of the BU Board in terms of its operation as majority shareholder in Brentford Football Club
Well I am less than ten percent into my term of office, but in the meetings that have taken place, I have participated in fairly robust discussions on the mid to long term governance of the Football Club. I don’t expect that to change.

What responsibilities you have undertaken
In October, David Hawes stood down as Director of Communications and I was subsequently nominated for the job. I have since developed a communications action plan and this was approved by the BU board at its meeting.

What you have done in terms of these responsibilities
Resolving the Trust’s communication problems is a fairly large task and I took the view early on that it would need at least two or three volunteers to help me. I have offered the newly created post of Press Officer to a BU member and the person concerned has formally accepted, so you should hear an announcement on this pretty soon. I will also advertise for a website co-ordinator early in the New Year to assist with maintenance of what is the Trust’s main communication tool. The Trust website is not fit for purpose, so for the past two months I have been researching an alternative. The new website is to be launched on January 1st 2007 and I hope members will be pleased with the results. All feedback is welcome.

How you feel you have justified your election, with specific regard to the reasons you stood and what you promised in your election statement
I cannot justify my election within three months of election. That is for the BU members to decide in November 2009 on whether they decide to re-elect me. With regards to my election statement, I argued that Bees United “isn’t working” and in some areas I stand by that claim.

Let’s look at the bullet points in my election statement and I give my update to them in this letter.
The current level of board members is too high – I still feel the BU board itself is too large but if I cannot persuade fellow BU members – and the board itself – to agree with me then change will not take place. We do certainly need to revisit the constitution, but that is not top of the Trust’s priorities.
Fund-raising strategy is not good enough – Increasing the membership is the key for me. We have to be realistic and no amount of fundraising is going to pay back the huge sums required for January 2009 and beyond. This will have to come in the form of increased standing orders from supporters and re-financing. If we have a healthy sum arriving into the Trust’s bank account on a monthly basis (10k plus) it will give the Trust more leverage to borrow funds in the future.
The Trust is presently not fit for the role of being the holding company of the football club (BFC) – I still agree with this statement and will not alter my viewpoint unless changes are made. Again, I cannot change this unless other members agree. I do, however, expect the Deputy Chairman to be leading on this.
Communication to fans is abysmal – It is my job, with the help of other board members help to turn this around. Please see my answer to “What you have done in terms of these responsibilities”.
Transparency within Bees United is poor – The appointment of Trevor Inns as Deputy Chairman will give the Trust much needed internal focus. I fully expect him marshalling board members on the areas that the Trust need to improve on.

Ongoing activity
My remit is improving the communication of the Trust and I will do that to the best of my ability. My other duties are that of helping to ensure the Trust is run as effectively as possible, and to represent BU members. These duties covers a wide range of topics. Many, many hours are spent on being a BU board member and my commitment to this will not falter.

Natasha Judge

The contribution you have made to the effectiveness of the BU Board in terms of its operation as majority shareholder in Brentford Football Club
In answer to this question to be honest I have to say, not an awful lot as yet. Of course there are discussions which centre around this responsibility and questions are asked as and when needed. Personally I believe that this is an area that needs improvement and I will do all I can to act in the best interests of BU and its members. Having said that my election statement focused almost singularly on Fundraising and Communication and this is where my focus lies. That said anyone who knows me (and some who don’t!) will be aware that I am more than capable of expressing my opinions and when the need arises I will do just that.

What responsibilities you have undertaken and what you have done in terms of these responsibilities
Following on from my successful election campaign (thanks to all who voted for me!),I volunteered for the position of Fundraising Director. I was duly elected and stood unopposed in the recent re-elections following the BU AGM. My responsibilities as Fundraising Director, as I see them are as follows:

To ensure that the fundraising activities of the Trust are appropriately run, advertised, marketed and co-ordinated
Co- ordination of a band of volunteers
Communication with other fans regarding events, ideas, suggestions etc and in addition communication of action plans, strategies etc
Building relationships with members and non-members to understand the needs of our ‘customers’ and provide them with what they want.
Negotiation of Corporate Sponsorship for BU events wherever and whenever possible
Liaison with fundraising group and steering group sub committee, made up of a number of the different groups within BFC eg BIAS, BSA, Lifeline etc, through regular meetings
Inclusion of local commuity groups in the strategy and planning of events
Participation and support of events organised by supporters for the aid of both BU and BFC
Co-ordination, consideration and decision on ideas put forward. Viability, suitability and possible gain analysis.
Report to fellow Board members

In addition following our strategy day I also volunteered to look at a Community Strategy. This I believe is a major task and in order to keep it manageable I have decided with the BU Board backing to expand the steering committee set up to co-ordinate events etc.

This committee will include representatives from all groups associated with BFC and a ‘community’ representative. Initially the group was to consist of Peter Gilham, representing Lifeline, BFC and BSA, Tony Cross BIAS, Paul Skelhorn, CST, David Harrison PCC (Programme Collectors Club), Luke Kirton Community Representative and myself.

This I hope will now expand to include GPLZ, GPG/BAMB, TITS and Beesotted, Out and About with the Bees.

The initial meeting summary will be published shortly and focuses primarily on the need for each group to understand the other and to discover how we can all help each other grow and succeed for the overall benefit of Brentford Football Club.

In addition I co-ordinate and consider ideas received from all BFC supporters that care to approach me. There are a number of schemes that are continually running which I help out with where I can. In addition there are a number of other proposed ideas which have been documented within the strategy.

Below is a copy of the activity report that I delivered to the Board in November 2006. Octobers actions included, reformation of the fundraising meetings, production of the fundraising strategy, attendance at the Supporters Direct conference etc.

Response to BU Members regarding their individually proposed ideas
First meeting of Steering Group
Liaison with Ron Cooper re ‘Build a better Future’ – this will be up and running in the New Year.
Liaison with Mark Atkinson re possible energy affiliations
Ongoing liaison with volunteers
Provision of the ‘community strategy ‘document with which I was tasked at the BU Strategy Day has been started and is awaiting approval.

Achievements against election statement
As previously stated my election statement focused purely on Fundraising and Communication as such I have been given the responsibility of Fundraising and have outlined a strategy. The overall aim is to raise sufficient funds in the coming 2 years to allow BU to repay its debts totalling ITRO £550k. I can only hope to achieve this with the support and backing of as many BFC supporters, BU members or not, as possible. Thankfully the ideas have been pouring in and hopefully you will see some of them come to fruition very shortly.

How you feel you have justified your election, with specific regard to the reasons you stood and what you promised in your election statement
I have begun to hopefully re-energise the fundraising attached to BU. I took the decision not to launch anything in December, as I felt that with the excellent Fighting Chance fund scheme and the inception of the BIG raffle Bees fans were being asked to contribute to enough schemes in the run up, to what is an expensive time of year! I had intended to run the Christmas Hampers as I did last year but was advised that many in the local area had been hit hard by the Farepack saga and hampers were not a popular topic of conversation!. However the Build a Better Future scheme will launch in the New Year and I hope to have sufficient interest and volunteers to arrange a Valentines Celebration Bash of some description.

I have resurrected the Fundraising Meetings and had well over 25 attendees at the last meeting in October. The next is scheduled for early January and a date will be released shortly. I initially expected to hold these meetings monthly but on reflection I believe that this is too often and will hold them bi-monthly in the future. From the fundraising group the steering group detailed above emerged. Minutes of this meeting have been produced but as yet I have been unable to publish them. I hope this will be rectified for the 2nd meeting. I have also as promised continued to support fundraising events, both BFC and BU ones and indeed still bucket collect on the Brook Road at every home game. Furthermore, fundraising totals are now regularly published and will, I hope become more ‘up to the minute’ with the recruitment of the new Finance Director.

Ongoing activity
Ongoing activity will consist of a number of items including regular meetings of BU Board meetings, Supporters Director Meetings, Steering Committee and Fundraising meetings. In addition I will begin to organise a programme of events for 2007 and these will be well promoted and advertised. Some of the bigger ideas are detailed below.

Build a better future – A buy a brick scheme that will be launched early in the New Year
£1m virtual stadium – This idea is in its conceptual stage, with a volunteer kindly investigating the viability of the project. The idea is to build to the plans of the proposed stadium at Lionel Road, a virtual stadium supporters can purchase anything from bricks, to the dugouts can pay to be manager, or even run a food kiosk! Corporate sponsors will be approached for stadium/stand sponsorship etc. This will be a long term project running over a minimum of 2 years.

I have received many many ideas all of which I have acknowledged, some have been left with the originators to begin researching, others have been rejected and still others are awaiting some refinement. Nothing has yet has been rejected out of hand..

Furthermore I have tried to keep fans updated on what is happening with a fundraising update which I hope to produce at least bi-monthly. Fundraising meetings have also been reformed and these will be held also at least bi-monthly. The first was held in October and the next I hope to arrange on Wednesday Jan 9th. Out of the first meeting was born the idea of a steering committee which has evolved into a community strategy group. A community strategy will follow but it is a huge task and needs to be done properly. I suspect that it will take a good 3 months to produce this document in full. Meanwhile we have had a meeting involving 4 of the groups associated with BFC and we have planned to arrange a social evening where we arrange to meet with all groups and understand more about what they do and how they help BFC. The link to the fundraising update will be provided as soon as possible.

Trevor Inns

The contribution you have made to the effectiveness of the BU Board in terms of its operation as majority shareholder in Brentford Football Club
I have made no specific improvement to this.

What responsibilities you have undertaken
At the most recent board meeting I was allocated the role of Deputy Chairman and that of Financial Director. However, as I said to the BU Board at the time, I am only fulfilling the role of Financial Director until a longer-term nominee could be found.

What you have done in terms of these responsibilities
The Board meeting at which I was given these responsibilities was three weeks ago – not that long ago! However, with regard to the Financial Director role – I have effected, with Stephen Callen, a handover of documentation. I’m also actively looking for a longer-term successor for the role of Financial Director.

This evening, after writing this, I am completing the Annual Return required by the FSA. I’m currently formally defining the role of Deputy Chairman and it would be right and proper that the BU Board agree the role before letting you know.

How you feel you have justified your election, with specific regard to the reasons you stood and what you promised in your election statement
Well I said in my statement ‘I can’t promise to change things’ – so I’m in the clear on this one! On a serious note, I said that I would endeavour to make BU ‘more of a team effort and not a one-man operation’, the new Deputy Chairman role will deliver this. As far as a more ‘open and transparent trust’ I hope that information is flowing better from BU board meetings on an informal basis. With the appointment of a Press Officer in the next couple of weeks I expect this to improve further and on a more formal basis.

Unfortunately we still have issues with a decent flow of information between the club board and the BU board.

The creation of the Deputy Chairman role was an important step to increase communication between BU Board members – but we shall see as it requires commitment from all board members to make it work effectively. The BU Board meets once a month for three hours – part of the problem is that those three hours aren’t enough to have a full debate on the full-range of projects (e.g. Lionel Road, financing, fundraising, budget, corner kick strategy etc.). In my opinion email discussions (and the like) are not best way to discuss what may be large and complicated matters between up to thirteen people. As such the BU Board have decided to have dedicated meeting so that the all BU directors can understand the issues, risks, assumptions and everything else that is not fully understood by all at the moment.

I have outstanding concerns about the club’s budget and there is precious little good news in the updates we receive from Joe Bourke at BU Board meetings.

Ongoing activity
The reconvened AGM is on 30th December which will be followed by a Q&A session. I hope BIAS Committee Members, BU Members and graffiti sprayers will be there to take advantage of this opportunity to ask questions of Board Members.

The financial sub-committee of the board (comprising myself, Joe Bourke, David Hawes, Chris Gammon and Stephen Callen) plan to meet over the holiday season. There is also an ad-hoc committee for membership & fundraising issues is also planning to meet over the same period. In my opinion increasing membership and standing order income is key to the long-term future of Bees United and, consequently, the club.