Annual General Meeting 2014
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting held on 15th April 2014
held at Buckingham School
There were 41 members present
Apologies for absence were received on behalf of David Gillman, Dave Chambers,
Frank Thompson, Snowy Jeffs and Tony Rogers
Minutes of the 2013 meeting – were accepted as a true record of the meeting.
Proposed by S. Cory Seconded by M. Grace
Matters arising from the minutes – there were none
Officers Reports
Secretary’s report
Firstly, thank you all for attending tonight and thank you to Graham Brigginshaw for arranging for us to be able to hold our AGM at the school.
It has been an incredibly challenging year for the committee. As you are all aware, we started the year trying to renegotiate our lease with the National Trust. We were advised by Kerry Foster, the Property Manager, that as she was new she wanted to wait a few months to get used to the workings at Stowe before negotiating the lease. We made contact again in August and eventually secured a meeting in October with Kerry Foster and Barry Smith. At this meeting, we were advised that once our existing agreement expired in March 14 the club would no longer be able to fish on the 11 Acre Lake and the Octagon. There were several reasons given as to why this decision had been made, mainly being security issues being raised by the school and the fact that in the near future the National Trust will be opening up the Western Gardens meaning the golf course will also be relocating. Our current car park sits in the middle of this area. As the gardens at Stowe are all about the views, it is not feasible for our car park to remain where it is because it will spoil the vista. Barry Smith has looked into every way possible to relocate this for us but there is no option that will be close enough to the lakes to be viable. The solution that the National Trust have put forward is for the Club to be offered a lease on Oxford Water with parking to be provided there. This water has been reserved by the school in the past as a trout fishery, but the current trout master has agreed to give this water up to us and just keep the reservoir for future.
As you can imagine, this was a huge shock and disappointment to everyone. The committee contemplated whether it was worth continuing on this basis or whether we should fold the Club; however the consensus of opinion was that we owed it to the long history of the Club to continue fishing at Stowe, however we can. We agreed that we would do a ballot of our members to see how many would consider re-joining if we took on the lease on Oxford Water. We received 114 replies, of which 90 members said yes and 24 said no. As the 90 yes votes represents over 50% of the club membership, the committee made the decision to pursue the lease.
There have been several issues along the way but we had arrived at the point where we had agreed to push ahead with a 10-year lease. However, this has now been delayed because Barry Smith has been advised that planning permission must be obtained for our new car park. This will obviously delay proceedings as the car park forms part of the formal lease. We have had it confirmed in the last few days that the National Trust will put an interim agreement in place for 1 year so that the Club will be able to commence fishing on Oxford Water on 1st June, with the intention to put the 10 year lease in place once the relevant permissions have been obtained. There will be a temporary car park marked out for members to use.
The National Trust will be undertaking the work to put in the swims and mow the paths etc. They will also be maintaining the reed beds in the lake. One of the stipulations of the lease is that they will be leaving about 2 foot of reed bank in front of each peg to disguise the staging, so when the lake is viewed by visitors the stages will not be visible. This work is being done at the National Trust’s expense.
We have had a survey carried out on the lake and there are plenty of fish in there. The suggestion by the surveyor was that we fish the lake for a while to ascertain what is there prior to deciding what fish to move. We are currently talking to the Environment Agency to ascertain what permissions we need to have in place to be able to move fish in the future.
Although this is a massive change and very disappointing to everyone, we are hopeful that we will be able to make Oxford Water into a nice mixed fishery to take the Club into the future. We will also be keeping our river stretch for the 2014/15 season.
Moving on to other matters, it was with great sadness we learnt of the passing of Dave Harris, or Stotle to most who knew him. He was a member of the Club for a lot of years, serving on the committee for a number of those. We all send our sympathies and very best wishes to his family. Snowy Jeffs has kindly written an obituary for Dave, which has been put onto the Club website. It’s a very interesting read, for those of you who knew Stotle it will bring back good memories I’m sure, and for those of us who didn’t it gives a glimpse into the history and foundings of the Club we have today. Thank you Snowy for sharing these memories with us.
After the very trying year we have had, Phil Rose, our Chairman, has decided to call it a day. He has been a member of the committee for too many years for me to be able to trace, so I think it’s time we allowed him to leave! We all thank him for his hard work and commitment and look forward to seeing him out fishing or Cray fish trapping in the very near future.
Dave Carpenter has also decided to step down. Dave has been on the committee for the last few years, representing the carp anglers within the club. We all thank him for his hard work and commitment too, and hope we will see him giving Oxford Water a try.
Finally, I would like to thank the whole of the committee for their extra dedication this year. This has been a seriously difficult year for us and an enormous amount of time and effort has been put into getting us to where we are now. It would have been very easy for everyone to say let’s give up, but we all strongly felt we have a duty to the history of the Club to protect and continue fishing at Stowe, however we can. I would also like to thank Barry Smith. Without him I don’t think a solution would have been found for us to be able to continue fishing at Stowe. It might not be the solution we wanted, but at least it secures the Club’s future for the next decade and who knows what will transpire in that time.
Be assured, your committee will continue to work hard on your behalf. We now have a couple of vacancies, so if anyone out there feels they’ve got something to offer and would like to help, we’d love to hear from you.
I look forward to seeing you all out fishing Oxford Water and wish you tight lines.
Match Secretary’s report
Last season was a match breaking one, for one person at least, as most anglers struggled to get a bite. Mr Rob Upton in his first season broke two of the club’s match records. The first which he broke was the four hour, which he achieved with a carp over 5kg one Tench and eight Bream, beating the old record by 3kg. The second was the aggregate with a massive 80kg 980grm overall catch beating the old record by 20kg.
Mr Upton’s records will now go down into the club’s history books, as we now know that it was the last season of match fishing on the eleven-acre lake. In the new season, we will be starting afresh on the Oxford water lake.
The matches against other teams was a mixed bunch which saw us losing all the matches against Brackley home and away, this was down to again Mr Upton fishing our home legs for Brackley, I think he won the matches by his self without much help. The matches against Buckingham saw us winning the home leg and losing the away leg, this was again repeated against Claydon.
For the coming season only I have cut the match calendar down to only six club matches instead of the usual nine that we fish, this is because the committee thought that with it being a new lake with limited pegs this would give the pleasure anglers a chance to fish it at the weekends. The following season I will have more weekends to spread our matches out because of the new no closed season. We will still be having two home and away matches against Brackley. I have not arranged any matches against Buckingham or Claydon for this season but will do again in the following year.
The coming season will see two new changes to our match fishing. The first one will be that we will be going back to weighing in, in pounds and ounces as most clubs still do. The second one is that all home matches against other teams from this season on will now be five hours in duration.
After the thirty plus years that I have match fished at Stowe and the last ten years that I have been match secretary for the club, I am very disappointed that we have lost the eleven acre as a match venue. I will now have to put this into the past and will look forward to the challenges of fishing a new lake. I myself can see Oxford water turning into a great overall fishing venue with time, and hopefully being a match man a great match lake as well!
And lastly, I wish you all have many tight lines for the new season on the new lake, mine hopefully for a change being more than anyone else in the matches.
Treasurer's Report
Income shows an increase this year to £4,969.00 with extra income from Tenchfishers and MK Vets. Expenses are down to £1,733.65 although there have been increases on some items. Stationery, postage and printing cost more this year due to extra newsletters etc as regards the move to Oxford Water. We had a survey done by Andrew Ellis on Oxford Water to assess fish stocks at the cost of £425.00. The club also purchased two new sets of scales. Printing of permits still remains a major cost, the club hope to reduce this next year. Payment to The Angling Trust also increased by £89 but this now includes the club’s insurance as well, but maintenance costs were down and donations were £45.00. The club has a healthy bank balance but as of this season the club has to start paying rent to The National Trust for the use of Oxford Water, and coupled with a membership reduction income next year will show a big reduction.
With an income over expenditure of £3,235.35 and £18.00 cash in hand and a carried forward balance at 09 April 13 of £2,858.06, the club now has a balance of £6,111.41.
Membership Secretary's Report
Current membership remains full and stands at 150 Adult Members, 4 Juniors, 7 Honorary and 9 Complimentary tickets (School & National Trust).
The waitlist currently has 32 names on it.
Last season we were able to offer places to 13 prospective members on the waitlist and 12 took up the offer and no reply from the other 1.
Membership permits and security cards for the coming season which will commence at daybreak on the 1st June 2014, will be sent out in the last two weeks of May.
We see this as a challenging season and will decide at the end of this year if we are going to need to keep a cap on the number of members. This will be assessed during the year based on how many members re-join and how busy the lake and car park gets, any reduction will be achieved by natural wastage.
The committee are currently discussing having photo I.D. cards next year as this will also help with security.
We have now started emailing Newsletters, Updates and Permit renewal forms, and despite a few hitches at first we think that this is now the way forward, this also now saves the Club a lot of money on postage and stationery. It is therefore very important that if at all possible you provide us with a valid and up to date email address on your renewal form. We will of course carry on sending out information to those members who do not have an email address. All the information sent out can be found published on our website.
Election of Officers
Phil Rose has decided to step down from the committee so did not stand again for election as Chairman. He proposed Graham Brigginshaw, previous Vice Chairman, to be elected into the Chairman’s position. Samantha Gillman seconded this proposal.
Phil Rose then suggested to the attendees that the remaining committee be re-elected on block. Dave Carpenter is not standing again. Matt Mallett kindly joined the committee earlier this year, the rest of the committee remains the same as last year.
This was proposed by Tim Hilsden and seconded by Steve Cory.
General Propositions – No general propositions have been received by the Secretary for consideration at the AGM.
Going Forward
Barry Smith came forward as representative of the National Trust. Barry congratulated the committee on how they have handled the changes. He explained that the decision was made mainly due to the restoration of the historic gardens to the 18th century landscape. As part of the project, the golf course will also be moving outside the gardens, although this taking a bit longer to achieve. The gardens are now receiving 150,000 visitors. The National Trust will offer limited access to fishing on 11 Acre and Octagon lakes in the future.
Ken Rayner questioned the cost of the lease, which Phil advised is £2,400 per year including VAT.
Questions
Question was raised about the sewage works as they are also in the gardens. Barry said he would love to get them moved and he is hopeful that these will be moved in the future.
Boats – Barry was asked about the boat activity on the lake and how that fitted within the 18th century landscape. Barry explained that the school handed the gardens to the National Trust for the payment of £1. Within that agreement, the school retained rights to use the gardens and lakes as they want.
Fishing 11 Acre/Octagon – Barry mentioned limited access fishing, who will that be for? Barry explained that when this goes ahead the parking will have to be at New Inn and then shuttled down to the lakes. This has been discussed with the club and there may be an option for the club to hold a block of tickets for this. This is still to be discussed further.
Stuart Jeffs bought up the point that it was devious of the NT to allow us to stock fish and do bank management whilst knowing that they would be taking the fishing away from the club. Barry advised that the club had been given the use of the lakes for 10 years rent free, so these things were in lieu of rent. Samantha Gillman advised that the committee had spent several weeks a couple of years ago deciding whether they should do any stocking or wait for the lease etc, but the committee felt that if we didn’t do something by the time the lease was renegotiated we wouldn’t have a membership left because of how badly the lakes were fishing.
Ken Rayner queried the size of the car park as he has heard rumours it will only take 6 cars. Barry explained that initially he had thought we could avoid planning permission by having a small car park. Other than match mornings, it is very rare to see more than 4 or 5 cars in the car park. However, this has become an issue and planning consent has to be achieved. In view of this the NT are now looking at parking for 20 cars and applying on that basis. The NT are now giving the club a 1 year lease to allow time to get the parking through planning, with a view to a 10-year lease thereafter. They will also be looking to provide toilets as well. A temporary car park is to be sited in the wooded area to the right of the entrance, although definite location is still to be confirmed. Permanent car park is proposed on the left-hand side.
When will work start on the pegs? Barry confirmed that his deadline for the work completion is for fishing to commence on 1st June, so the NT are committed to that date.
Is this value for money? Question was asked as to this being a small amount of water for the same subs. What about Copper Bottom. Barry explained that CB has not held water properly for some years. Work is planned in the future to restore the lake but this will be very costly. Also, there are plans to restore a lake which was in the original garden plans, which is no longer there, and also work is required to the dam at Papermill.
Question was raised about barbless hooks. Why are we going for barbless hooks? Barry advised that this was a club decision and not a National Trust one. Phil explained that the committee felt that in view of the type of fishing Oxford Water was going to offer, barbless hooks were the way forward. We do not want to end up with damaged fish due to barbed hooks.
Any Other Business
Stuart Jeffs asked if there are any carp in Oxford Water. The committee confirmed that there are, along with big perch and crucians.
Trophies were presented to Rob Upton, Tony Rogers, Alan Hawkins and Roy Fenables.
Tim Hilsden thanked the committee for all their hard work in what has been a difficult year.
Graham Brigginshaw thanked Phil for his hard work and dedication to the club.
Meeting closed 2020 hrs.
held at Buckingham School
There were 41 members present
Apologies for absence were received on behalf of David Gillman, Dave Chambers,
Frank Thompson, Snowy Jeffs and Tony Rogers
Minutes of the 2013 meeting – were accepted as a true record of the meeting.
Proposed by S. Cory Seconded by M. Grace
Matters arising from the minutes – there were none
Officers Reports
Secretary’s report
Firstly, thank you all for attending tonight and thank you to Graham Brigginshaw for arranging for us to be able to hold our AGM at the school.
It has been an incredibly challenging year for the committee. As you are all aware, we started the year trying to renegotiate our lease with the National Trust. We were advised by Kerry Foster, the Property Manager, that as she was new she wanted to wait a few months to get used to the workings at Stowe before negotiating the lease. We made contact again in August and eventually secured a meeting in October with Kerry Foster and Barry Smith. At this meeting, we were advised that once our existing agreement expired in March 14 the club would no longer be able to fish on the 11 Acre Lake and the Octagon. There were several reasons given as to why this decision had been made, mainly being security issues being raised by the school and the fact that in the near future the National Trust will be opening up the Western Gardens meaning the golf course will also be relocating. Our current car park sits in the middle of this area. As the gardens at Stowe are all about the views, it is not feasible for our car park to remain where it is because it will spoil the vista. Barry Smith has looked into every way possible to relocate this for us but there is no option that will be close enough to the lakes to be viable. The solution that the National Trust have put forward is for the Club to be offered a lease on Oxford Water with parking to be provided there. This water has been reserved by the school in the past as a trout fishery, but the current trout master has agreed to give this water up to us and just keep the reservoir for future.
As you can imagine, this was a huge shock and disappointment to everyone. The committee contemplated whether it was worth continuing on this basis or whether we should fold the Club; however the consensus of opinion was that we owed it to the long history of the Club to continue fishing at Stowe, however we can. We agreed that we would do a ballot of our members to see how many would consider re-joining if we took on the lease on Oxford Water. We received 114 replies, of which 90 members said yes and 24 said no. As the 90 yes votes represents over 50% of the club membership, the committee made the decision to pursue the lease.
There have been several issues along the way but we had arrived at the point where we had agreed to push ahead with a 10-year lease. However, this has now been delayed because Barry Smith has been advised that planning permission must be obtained for our new car park. This will obviously delay proceedings as the car park forms part of the formal lease. We have had it confirmed in the last few days that the National Trust will put an interim agreement in place for 1 year so that the Club will be able to commence fishing on Oxford Water on 1st June, with the intention to put the 10 year lease in place once the relevant permissions have been obtained. There will be a temporary car park marked out for members to use.
The National Trust will be undertaking the work to put in the swims and mow the paths etc. They will also be maintaining the reed beds in the lake. One of the stipulations of the lease is that they will be leaving about 2 foot of reed bank in front of each peg to disguise the staging, so when the lake is viewed by visitors the stages will not be visible. This work is being done at the National Trust’s expense.
We have had a survey carried out on the lake and there are plenty of fish in there. The suggestion by the surveyor was that we fish the lake for a while to ascertain what is there prior to deciding what fish to move. We are currently talking to the Environment Agency to ascertain what permissions we need to have in place to be able to move fish in the future.
Although this is a massive change and very disappointing to everyone, we are hopeful that we will be able to make Oxford Water into a nice mixed fishery to take the Club into the future. We will also be keeping our river stretch for the 2014/15 season.
Moving on to other matters, it was with great sadness we learnt of the passing of Dave Harris, or Stotle to most who knew him. He was a member of the Club for a lot of years, serving on the committee for a number of those. We all send our sympathies and very best wishes to his family. Snowy Jeffs has kindly written an obituary for Dave, which has been put onto the Club website. It’s a very interesting read, for those of you who knew Stotle it will bring back good memories I’m sure, and for those of us who didn’t it gives a glimpse into the history and foundings of the Club we have today. Thank you Snowy for sharing these memories with us.
After the very trying year we have had, Phil Rose, our Chairman, has decided to call it a day. He has been a member of the committee for too many years for me to be able to trace, so I think it’s time we allowed him to leave! We all thank him for his hard work and commitment and look forward to seeing him out fishing or Cray fish trapping in the very near future.
Dave Carpenter has also decided to step down. Dave has been on the committee for the last few years, representing the carp anglers within the club. We all thank him for his hard work and commitment too, and hope we will see him giving Oxford Water a try.
Finally, I would like to thank the whole of the committee for their extra dedication this year. This has been a seriously difficult year for us and an enormous amount of time and effort has been put into getting us to where we are now. It would have been very easy for everyone to say let’s give up, but we all strongly felt we have a duty to the history of the Club to protect and continue fishing at Stowe, however we can. I would also like to thank Barry Smith. Without him I don’t think a solution would have been found for us to be able to continue fishing at Stowe. It might not be the solution we wanted, but at least it secures the Club’s future for the next decade and who knows what will transpire in that time.
Be assured, your committee will continue to work hard on your behalf. We now have a couple of vacancies, so if anyone out there feels they’ve got something to offer and would like to help, we’d love to hear from you.
I look forward to seeing you all out fishing Oxford Water and wish you tight lines.
Match Secretary’s report
Last season was a match breaking one, for one person at least, as most anglers struggled to get a bite. Mr Rob Upton in his first season broke two of the club’s match records. The first which he broke was the four hour, which he achieved with a carp over 5kg one Tench and eight Bream, beating the old record by 3kg. The second was the aggregate with a massive 80kg 980grm overall catch beating the old record by 20kg.
Mr Upton’s records will now go down into the club’s history books, as we now know that it was the last season of match fishing on the eleven-acre lake. In the new season, we will be starting afresh on the Oxford water lake.
The matches against other teams was a mixed bunch which saw us losing all the matches against Brackley home and away, this was down to again Mr Upton fishing our home legs for Brackley, I think he won the matches by his self without much help. The matches against Buckingham saw us winning the home leg and losing the away leg, this was again repeated against Claydon.
For the coming season only I have cut the match calendar down to only six club matches instead of the usual nine that we fish, this is because the committee thought that with it being a new lake with limited pegs this would give the pleasure anglers a chance to fish it at the weekends. The following season I will have more weekends to spread our matches out because of the new no closed season. We will still be having two home and away matches against Brackley. I have not arranged any matches against Buckingham or Claydon for this season but will do again in the following year.
The coming season will see two new changes to our match fishing. The first one will be that we will be going back to weighing in, in pounds and ounces as most clubs still do. The second one is that all home matches against other teams from this season on will now be five hours in duration.
After the thirty plus years that I have match fished at Stowe and the last ten years that I have been match secretary for the club, I am very disappointed that we have lost the eleven acre as a match venue. I will now have to put this into the past and will look forward to the challenges of fishing a new lake. I myself can see Oxford water turning into a great overall fishing venue with time, and hopefully being a match man a great match lake as well!
And lastly, I wish you all have many tight lines for the new season on the new lake, mine hopefully for a change being more than anyone else in the matches.
Treasurer's Report
Income shows an increase this year to £4,969.00 with extra income from Tenchfishers and MK Vets. Expenses are down to £1,733.65 although there have been increases on some items. Stationery, postage and printing cost more this year due to extra newsletters etc as regards the move to Oxford Water. We had a survey done by Andrew Ellis on Oxford Water to assess fish stocks at the cost of £425.00. The club also purchased two new sets of scales. Printing of permits still remains a major cost, the club hope to reduce this next year. Payment to The Angling Trust also increased by £89 but this now includes the club’s insurance as well, but maintenance costs were down and donations were £45.00. The club has a healthy bank balance but as of this season the club has to start paying rent to The National Trust for the use of Oxford Water, and coupled with a membership reduction income next year will show a big reduction.
With an income over expenditure of £3,235.35 and £18.00 cash in hand and a carried forward balance at 09 April 13 of £2,858.06, the club now has a balance of £6,111.41.
Membership Secretary's Report
Current membership remains full and stands at 150 Adult Members, 4 Juniors, 7 Honorary and 9 Complimentary tickets (School & National Trust).
The waitlist currently has 32 names on it.
Last season we were able to offer places to 13 prospective members on the waitlist and 12 took up the offer and no reply from the other 1.
Membership permits and security cards for the coming season which will commence at daybreak on the 1st June 2014, will be sent out in the last two weeks of May.
We see this as a challenging season and will decide at the end of this year if we are going to need to keep a cap on the number of members. This will be assessed during the year based on how many members re-join and how busy the lake and car park gets, any reduction will be achieved by natural wastage.
The committee are currently discussing having photo I.D. cards next year as this will also help with security.
We have now started emailing Newsletters, Updates and Permit renewal forms, and despite a few hitches at first we think that this is now the way forward, this also now saves the Club a lot of money on postage and stationery. It is therefore very important that if at all possible you provide us with a valid and up to date email address on your renewal form. We will of course carry on sending out information to those members who do not have an email address. All the information sent out can be found published on our website.
Election of Officers
Phil Rose has decided to step down from the committee so did not stand again for election as Chairman. He proposed Graham Brigginshaw, previous Vice Chairman, to be elected into the Chairman’s position. Samantha Gillman seconded this proposal.
Phil Rose then suggested to the attendees that the remaining committee be re-elected on block. Dave Carpenter is not standing again. Matt Mallett kindly joined the committee earlier this year, the rest of the committee remains the same as last year.
This was proposed by Tim Hilsden and seconded by Steve Cory.
General Propositions – No general propositions have been received by the Secretary for consideration at the AGM.
Going Forward
Barry Smith came forward as representative of the National Trust. Barry congratulated the committee on how they have handled the changes. He explained that the decision was made mainly due to the restoration of the historic gardens to the 18th century landscape. As part of the project, the golf course will also be moving outside the gardens, although this taking a bit longer to achieve. The gardens are now receiving 150,000 visitors. The National Trust will offer limited access to fishing on 11 Acre and Octagon lakes in the future.
Ken Rayner questioned the cost of the lease, which Phil advised is £2,400 per year including VAT.
Questions
Question was raised about the sewage works as they are also in the gardens. Barry said he would love to get them moved and he is hopeful that these will be moved in the future.
Boats – Barry was asked about the boat activity on the lake and how that fitted within the 18th century landscape. Barry explained that the school handed the gardens to the National Trust for the payment of £1. Within that agreement, the school retained rights to use the gardens and lakes as they want.
Fishing 11 Acre/Octagon – Barry mentioned limited access fishing, who will that be for? Barry explained that when this goes ahead the parking will have to be at New Inn and then shuttled down to the lakes. This has been discussed with the club and there may be an option for the club to hold a block of tickets for this. This is still to be discussed further.
Stuart Jeffs bought up the point that it was devious of the NT to allow us to stock fish and do bank management whilst knowing that they would be taking the fishing away from the club. Barry advised that the club had been given the use of the lakes for 10 years rent free, so these things were in lieu of rent. Samantha Gillman advised that the committee had spent several weeks a couple of years ago deciding whether they should do any stocking or wait for the lease etc, but the committee felt that if we didn’t do something by the time the lease was renegotiated we wouldn’t have a membership left because of how badly the lakes were fishing.
Ken Rayner queried the size of the car park as he has heard rumours it will only take 6 cars. Barry explained that initially he had thought we could avoid planning permission by having a small car park. Other than match mornings, it is very rare to see more than 4 or 5 cars in the car park. However, this has become an issue and planning consent has to be achieved. In view of this the NT are now looking at parking for 20 cars and applying on that basis. The NT are now giving the club a 1 year lease to allow time to get the parking through planning, with a view to a 10-year lease thereafter. They will also be looking to provide toilets as well. A temporary car park is to be sited in the wooded area to the right of the entrance, although definite location is still to be confirmed. Permanent car park is proposed on the left-hand side.
When will work start on the pegs? Barry confirmed that his deadline for the work completion is for fishing to commence on 1st June, so the NT are committed to that date.
Is this value for money? Question was asked as to this being a small amount of water for the same subs. What about Copper Bottom. Barry explained that CB has not held water properly for some years. Work is planned in the future to restore the lake but this will be very costly. Also, there are plans to restore a lake which was in the original garden plans, which is no longer there, and also work is required to the dam at Papermill.
Question was raised about barbless hooks. Why are we going for barbless hooks? Barry advised that this was a club decision and not a National Trust one. Phil explained that the committee felt that in view of the type of fishing Oxford Water was going to offer, barbless hooks were the way forward. We do not want to end up with damaged fish due to barbed hooks.
Any Other Business
Stuart Jeffs asked if there are any carp in Oxford Water. The committee confirmed that there are, along with big perch and crucians.
Trophies were presented to Rob Upton, Tony Rogers, Alan Hawkins and Roy Fenables.
Tim Hilsden thanked the committee for all their hard work in what has been a difficult year.
Graham Brigginshaw thanked Phil for his hard work and dedication to the club.
Meeting closed 2020 hrs.