Minutes from the General Meeting held on the 30^th Mar 2023. Oaklands Hotel from 19:00 – 21:00

Present

Kelvin Allen, Duncan Holmes, David Todd. Tony Gibbons, Tim Ellis, Colin Howlett, Martin Burgess, Alan Kirby

Apologies received from, Martyn Page, Time Colman, Simon Slater, Nick Cheeseman, Steve Burgess

The following members have stood down following the AGM and subsequent discussions.

Andy Hindes   Has stepped down as a Director and taken on a Technical Advisory Role

Steve Lane      Has stepped down as a member and taken on a Technical Advisory Role

Andy Feetham

Nick Simpson

Richard Ayers

Richard Miles

Kelvin opened the meeting and welcomed the attendees, as we look to set out a new vision and strategy for BASG.

Tony made comment that anglers don’t understand what BASG is and they still require information on fishing venues in the Broads. In response Kelvin expressed his frustration that as a organisation we had failed twice to delivery such a solution and without members and volunteers help this can’t be achieved. So it is not our intention to attempt this again, unless there is a change in attitude across the angling community.

Alan raised the point that is the BASG actually needed within the Broads community, in response to this many felt that BASG has strength in holding the strategic bodies to account over recent months and is an area in which it should focus on moving forward.

The meeting focused on members brainstorming the key objectives as we look to form a new Broads Angling Strategy.

I’ve only captured the headline objective as written down during the discussions, these will be developed further in the coming weeks.

 

Sustain	Education	Access	Climate Change	Environment
Citizen Science			Saline
		Enforcement
				Predation
				Fish Welfare
				Fish Rescue
Closer to Stakeholders
			Species Adaption
Representation EA/BA/NE
Holding Authorities to Account
		Slipways
		Access for Angling
Brand Awareness
Positive Lead
				Prymnesium
EA Relationship
	Educations to Visitors
	Anti Angling
				Invasive Species

Kelvin raised the issue of the retention of the company assets at Rollesby Broad and whether these now could be justified in the reformed BASG with its more strategic approach. It was felt that despite there being a legal precedence for retaining these assets and therefore having riparian fishing rights in the Broads and its consequences with Fish Legal representation.

The ability to both support and sustain what are seen as public asses, really demonstrates the dilemma facing angling in the Broads and any public willingness to pay for such use. It was agreed that we had little choice but to initiate the termination of the lease, in order to remove the asset and it liabilities by June 16^th 2023.

Action KA to issue termination letter 10^th April with 3 month notice.

This led to a wider discussion on Broads access and how any asset can be sustained by its users. It really comes down to strategic issue of the wider Broads permit, which we attempted to resolve last year, but failed to bring the angling community with us.

Regards

Kelvin Allen

Chairman