Thank you, I have contacted the Wing Chair and waiting for his call.
For the rest, I will let you know…
Regrettably they would be lost, at least temporarily. Not particularly acceptable but I would estimate thousands lost to cadets from other squadrons in the same boat and at some point you have to say “its not worth it for a couple of grand”.
Of course if the funds are significantly greater, that is the motivation to redouble efforts down the co-operative route. Your experience with your mother is very typical in current times I would say.
Just a point of fact, it is a lawful requirement that any trustee has a copy of the constitution. It is contentious that such documents are held on Bader and not easily accessible, but thew password route that daws1159 has suggested is a practical solution and there are bigger issues to handle.
Purely for point of fact, your CO (or any CO for that matter) is not in a position to tell you what the officers of the charity should be doing. That has been re-iterated in earlier posts. So I repeat this not to be bullish, but to support your position that there should be no grounds for obstruction or quarrel.
If you do choose to stick with ACP-11 after consulting it, then your CO will be an ex-officio member and may offer information about squadron issues relating to funding and welfare.
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Just to inform you all, I am now on the gin! Yes it is a school night and no this is not what I usually do! I am not giving up just yet, but this is a very hard game to play. What I witnessed tonight would make a lot of eyes pop. I am doing this for the benefit of my son, who loves the Air Cadets, and his fellow Cadets. I hope, not too far into the future, I will let you all know it was worth it, when I see them all having a great night out together. One, I hope that I will be very proud of helping to put together. They so deserve it as they work hard at their bag collecting, pretty muddy and car parking duties. I believe that I am good at what I do but I cannot do things when a brick wall is being built right in front of me. All your advice is very much appreciated and I am so glad that I found this forum. Thank you for your support. Diane
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Does the Wing Civ Com treasurer not have a signature on the account? Ours does and that helps a lot. Maybe worth asking.
That would be wrong for me on many levels. I would say having members of the sqn committee as signatories would be ok but someone outside of that would be bad.
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Why would the wing treasurer be on the sqn signature list? Unless he is also a member of the sqn committee than that would be wrong on so many levels the biggest being is that he is an outsider.
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As written earlier, it would be a fast way to get your squadron bank accounts frozen.
Civilian Committee bank accounts are those of a charity that is independent of Wing , Region, HQ, other squadrons and everyone else on the planet. The move for Wing personnel to have a level of involvement in squadron accounts has been put forward before and squashed as it is not lawful.
I accept it may have proved helpful on occasion, but find a polite way to remove him asap!
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I think that daws1159 was talking about your CO being belligerent about not helping you, not directing it at you!!
I would certainly help if my unit was in this situation!
Thank you, you are very kind x
I know in our Wing, the Wing Civilian Committee have had to take over inactive squadron Civilian committees. Speak with your Wing treasurer who might be able to assist.
However … be very careful to seek advice and not be told what to do.
Wing Civilian Committees have no legal right to take over inactive Civcomms and where they do, the original committee members retain legal responsibility…
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Hi,
In my opinion you need the immediate help of your wing chairman, if that is not forthcoming contact your regional chairman direct. If you are unsure who these are pm me with your wing details ( pretty sure you are not my wing as I know the chairs and most of the COs.) and I will find out for you.
The issues and concerns you have with your CO need to be addressed via your wing chairman who will liase with your wing commander. Again if that fails to happen talk to the regional chairman.
How has your squadron functioned without a CC for two years !, who has been handling subs and authroizing the payment of overheads and expenses etc, the CO by the sound of it. I assume at present you are unaware of your legal position as trustees of your squadrons funds, this is laid out in the CC members handbook and ACP10 both of which should be e mailed to all CC members. That situation is fairly straightforward to resolve.
Once you get the bank sigs sorted etc ( as you suggested that is a big pants job) it would be advisable to get your wing treasurer in to audit your accounts, then you know where you stand.
If the existing sigs refuse to sign I would ask them to advise you in writing their reasons for not signing and handing over the reigns of power, then pass these to your wing chair to act upon. He/she will almost certainly send it up the chain to HQAC. I assume you have no idea what has happened over the last two years, whatever it is needs investigation by those with the authority and experience in these matters, it might be a storm in a tea cup but it might be a whole lot more than that.
A
All sensible advice … but as written before all these people may try to help, but they have no legal authority and may make the situation worse. I know it is tough to swallow, but HQAC can do nothing legal. The CivCom is independent and they ca’t interfere with trustees, hence my earlier posts suggesting softer moves.
That said, they may have cause to interview the CO to find out what has been going on although they should already be aware through internal reporting.
I wouldn’t touch the Wing Treasurer, I would go to an independent person for audit. Firstly you are likely to get more experienced feedback and secondly I would have thought it probable that Wing have been involved in the situation in some way if it has lasted two years and that may turn on *rse-covering mode.
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There is a difference between “interfering” and giving instruction to volunteer committee members who have no real idea what it is they need to be doing.
Where a whole committee is replaced, as mine was a few years ago, then if the OC/Adjutant doesn’t explain what’s required and point the committee in the right direction, something is wrong.
I know that have this particular bugbear about people interfering with the the omnipotent and sacred “trustees” but let us not forget the the whole purpose of Civilian Committees and the charity funds they control is that it must be in support of the Squadron.
When Civcoms take general charity legal advice from people who don’t understand the point we end up with the situation we had a few years ago where they entire CivCom went rouge.
There must be a balance between legal advice and general “this is the big picture” guidance.
The Civcom exist and have a legal obligation to support the Squadron. Who is a better advisor of whether that is taking place than the OC who actually gets to see both sides and can tell immediately whether funds are being pooled for no reason; or spent - as they should be - for the benefit of the unit?
A CivCom throwing money around ill advisedly at the “orders” of the OC is failing in their legal obligation; but so too is a CivCom who doesn’t take the OCs advice as to how best the Sqn requires their support.
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Entirely fair comment
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But the trouble is that there is little or no resource within the ACO to deal with charitable matters. Of course there may be some who operate as trustees for other groups and who have wider experience. Rarely have I ever experienced a chain of command who really understands the implications of the position and is prepared to question the chain of command on the position. We had a Wing Exo a few years back who defaulted to the chain of command over similar situations and he learnt the hard way that his chain of command was totally ignorant on such matters and that the Nuremberg defence is ineffective in such matters.
Within ACO there is often a conflict between what the organisation wants and what Charity Law requires. Of course it is a two-way street, but the ACO will not step in to help a Civcom whereas it will protect uniformed volunteers. You have clearly had a bad experience, but the hard fact is that the ACO must operate within Charity Law - there is no provision for the other way around. Perhaps your Civcom got poor advice, but the ACO just isn’t a special case and it is set up to have eternal difficulties in this area until there is a court case.
Yep … totally agree. But there must also be far better education for uniform staff of what the true role of CivCom trusteeship actually is and the serious responsibility incumbent upon trustees. Equally, there should also be far better education of CivCom members as to their undertaking and the mechanism of co-operation between the two parts.
That would see us all get somewhere.
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Yes. I’d agree with that.
I understand that training for new officers at Cranwell, the role of the CC is covered in about five minutes. So its hardly surprising that most COs have little idea of the legal role the CC plays under charity law.
I have posted here before that I feel that all chairmen and new chairs should undergo half a days training in their role and the responsibilities that they and their team undertake. The rest of the day can be taken up with the child protection course thus killing two birds with one stone. I do appreciate that the latter is not compulsory unless the chair is combined CI/CC but I feel its a wise idea. It would also be an idea for the wing secretary or chair to give a short presentation at a COs conference to keep them up to speed on CC matters.
A
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I so want to say what great words of wisdom … they actually are and any HQ monitoring person should read and heed.
I just have this niggle that the Wing Secretary and Wing Chair are more than likely not going to be appraised beyond the organisation and, typically being ex rank, are likely to tow the line rather than offer independent and objective training.
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