7.30pm 20th May 2026

 

Present:

Tony Nash, Muriel Duckett, Matt Wright, Andrew Morrison, David Lockley, Sara Willis,John Haynes, Fiona Judge, Nicky Jefferson, Ros Lockley, Anne Twist, Gillian Beer, Rodney Beer,John McSweeney

 

Welcome –The Chairman, David Lockley welcomed everyone present.

 

1 Apologies:

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Ian Hasell, Jenny White, Anna Minott

 

2 Minutes of the AGM held on 28th May 2025:

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The minutes of the previous AGM had a few date amendments made and were distributed and proposed as correct by, Andrew Morrison and seconded by Matt Wright and signed by the Chairman and Honorary Secretary.

 

3 Matters Arising from the minutes:

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No matters arose from the previous minutes.

 

4 Chairman’s Report:

 

This was read by David Lockley as follows: The Palairet Hall has once again been a valuable asset for the Norton St Philip community. As well as the established events - Palairet Productions Friday Film Night, The Tuesday Drop In coffee morning, The Norton Women’s Group meetings, The NSP Parish Council meetings, Norton Chapel meetings, Evergreen Dance classes, the Ukrainian ladies fitness classes, the NSP Photography Club, the NSP Art Club and Yoga classes; the hall has recently started to host adult ballet and tap classes. We were sorry to say goodbye to Lindsey Shepherd and her Pilates Classes at the end of October after a staggering 23 years! But very pleased to welcome Samantha James who has taken on the Pilates classes with such expertise and who will be starting Chair Pilates sessions soon.

 

The Palairet Hall has also proved to be an ideal venue for numerous birthday celebrations,Christmas parties, a few wakes and the occasional Repair Café. Although we have not had the opportunity to act as the polling station for local elections over the last year, there was a good turnout for the village referendum on the Neighbourhood Plan held in the hall in July.

 

In August, we took advantage of most groups having a holiday to close the hall for two weeks and have the main hall redecorated. We have continued to pursue the installation of automatic doors to the entrance of the hall, but this has proved more difficult than we ever imagined. However, we believe we are now much closer to having the doors manufactured and fitted. Once that is achieved, we will have the entrance area redecorated.

 

The finances of the hall remain reasonably sound. Despite increases in energy charges, internet charges and water bills, we have not increased our hire charges for yet another year. We eventually received the good-will payment of £1,000 from the makers of the “Mother’s Pride” film which has enabled us to just cover our expenditure. However, we were very disappointed that we were not able to have a screening of the film in the hall.

 

I would like to record my thanks to everyone on the management committee for their hard work over the last year, particularly to Sara Willis for her work as Honorary Secretary (we will indeed miss her if she moves away later this year), to Andrew Morrison for his work as Honorary Treasurer and to Anne Twist for keeping our website up to date. Anne has also taken on the role of Bookings Clerk, and has developed our new online booking facility, increased usage, as well as taking on the issuing of the invoices for the hall hire. Thanks are also due to the Parish Council for its financial support towards the insurance and upkeep of the hall and to Oksana and her cleaning team for their weekly cleaning of the hall.

 

5 Hon Treasurer’s report:

 

Andrew Morrison presented a comprehensive profit and loss account. These accounts are based on an accrual basis. AM reported that there had been no external financial examination of these accounts because there is no legal obligation to do so as the income is below the limit to require this.

 

Income:

Income this last year was £10,348 against £16,119 from last year. The main users of the hall were Norton Chapel; Pilates; Oksana keep fit classes and a range of other smaller income users. £1,000 was received by the makers of Mother’s Pride film which used the village for filming. There was no Parish Council grant last year because the grant for the new doors was not spent in the previous financial year, so the grant was significantly reduced, this loss had been made up with new income from users.

 

Expenses:

Expenses were £1,050 against £1,502 last year. Cleaning has gone up from £1,118 to£1,903. Other utility bills have gone down. General repairs were £5,600 compared to £3,325 – this was accounted for by over £4,000 being spent on repainting the hall. SW clarified that the water expenditure which was nil last year was because a large bill was issued the year before which created a credit, which has now been used up. Gas & Electric have reduced since changing supplier and since DL sets the heating via Hive to come on only when necessary. The Metro current account is: £9,557 as at 31st March 2026 and the Metro deposit account was £12,706 (£206 being the amount of interest the account has accrued since the account was opened a year before). Debtors were £1,552, half of which was for March payments due and half delayed payers from January and February. Hall users now must pay in advance at booking. AM thanked AT for the work she has done since taking over the invoicing and DL for payments. He asked how long the bookings, website etc. took her. AT replied it was difficult to say – possibly 3-4 hours per week.

 

6 Election of the Committee for 2026/2027:

 

Position                                                Name                              Proposer                       Seconder

 

Chair, Elected member 1             David Lockley              Andrew Morrison       Anne Twist

Treasurer, Elected member 2    Andrew Morrison        David Lockley             Ros Lockley 

Secretary, Elected member 3    Sara Willis                     Nicola Jefferson        David Lockley

Elected member 4                          Nicola Jefferson         Sara Willis                    Muriel Duckett

Elected member 5                          Muriel Duckett             Nicky Jefferson          Ros Lockley

Elected member 6                          Matt Wright                   Muriel Duckett            Ros Lockley

Elected member 7                          Anne Twist                    Andrew Morrison       Sara Willis

PC Representative                         To be decided by PC

Drop In                                                 Jenny White*

Palairet Productions                      Anna Minott*

Pilates                                                  Sara Willis*

Art Group                                            Ros Lockley*

Norton Women’s Group               Gillian Beer*

Yoga                                                     Fiona Judge*

Evergreen Dance                           Anne Twist*

Photography Club                         John Haynes*

Parochial Church Council          David Lockley*

Norton Chapel                                John McSweeney

 

**representatives had all agreed in writing to stand again as user representatives.

 

7. Date of the next meeting of the Palairet Hall Management Committee

 

This was set as Wednesday 15th July 7pm 2026 in the Palairet Hall.

 

8 AOB

 

On behalf of the Trustees Tony Nash thanks the Management Committee for their work in keeping the hall in good repair and usage. The new Rector will become a Trustee when she starts however this would be in due course. TN requested a copy of the Insurance as the Trustees need a copy ofthis for their records. DL will chase Zurich and will send to TN.

 

NJ wanted it noted that it felt challenging that the PC hadn’t paid us as much grant this last year. DL reported that he had been told this was because of the PC’s financial situation and because we hadn’t completed the work on the doors. These works would be completed this year, after which we could ask the PC for a larger contribution next year.

 

MW reported that the new vacuum robot has been installed, which cleans the hall at 5 a.m. for an hour every day.

 

The meeting closed at 8.05