This year’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) is on Thursday 27 July. At the AGM, which will be hosted online, we will be voting:
To elect the new OASF board
To amend our Rules to correctly reflect our financial year (requires a majority of at least 75%)
To disapply audit requirements for next year’s accounts
We will also be presenting this year’s OASF accounts.
Election
Because OASF has changed to become a community benefit society, we need to elect a full set of 10 board members. All existing board members need to be re-elected if they want to continue.
Any OASF member who signed up by Tuesday 27 June can stand for election, they just need their nomination form signed by two other OASF members (who also signed up by Tuesday 27 June).
We have attached a job specification below to give you a sense of what is expected of OASF board members. If you have any questions, feel free to contact any of our current board members or contact us at hello@oasf.co.uk.
The terms of each elected board member will vary to ensure that the number of new board members elected at future AGMs is consistent and manageable. If 10 new board members are elected, the terms will be as follows:
The 4 candidates with the most votes will serve 3 years
The 3 candidates with the 5th-7th most votes will serve 2 years
The 3 candidates with the 8th-10th most votes will serve 1 year
If less than 10 directors are elected, we will rebalance the term lengths as appropriate and confirm after the AGM.
If you would like to stand for election, please complete the attached nomination form by Monday 17 July and send it to our election management group at oasfelection2023@gmail.com.
Departing Board Members
Whilst all current OASF Board Members will be required to stand for election at the upcoming AGM to continue in their role, two have already confirmed they will not be standing again due to demands on their time from other commitments.
We would like to thank Garry Brown and Darren Mills for the time and effort they have put into OASF in their time on the board. Their energy and expertise will be missed.
Election Management Group
To ensure this year’s election is open and fair, we have assembled an election management group separate from the OASF board. The members of the group are:
Darren Mills, OASF membership secretary
Robert Whitaker, Blackpool Supporters Trust
Allison Dyson, OASF member
Rules Amendment – Financial Year-End
Due to an error when submitting our Rules to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the copy which has been uploaded on the FCA’s website incorrectly lists our financial year-end as 30 June rather than 31 January which is listed elsewhere on our documentation and on the FCA mutuals register.
Whilst this does not have any bearing on when our financial year-end is (the FCA confirmed it remains 31 January), we recognise that this error could lead to some confusion so are proposing to change line 85 in our Rules from:
“The Society Board will in respect of each year of account ending on June 30th:”
to:
“The Society Board will in respect of each year of account ending on January 31st:”
Although this is a minor change to the Rules, it is considered an extraordinary resolution. That means we need a 75% majority in the vote to make this change.
Disapplying Financial Audit
As a community benefit society, OASF is required to get its accounts professionally audited every year unless its members vote to disapply that requirement at the preceding AGM. If OASF members vote to disapply the financial audit requirement, OASF is instead required to get its accounts independently examined (such as by a qualified accountant).
Financial auditing is very expensive as it must be done by a specialist auditor, so it is normal practice for community benefit societies to vote to disapply this requirement unless there are serious financial concerns. That is why we are asking our members to vote to disapply the audit requirements for the next set of OASF accounts.
The vote requires a majority of at least 75% to pass.
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