NRA Journal - Summer 2004 - National Rifle Association

opportunity to thank on your behalf those regionalmembers of the General Council who are becomingmore involved than in the past and who will be ableto work with a Secretary General, whose primarymanagement task is membership.Belonging to the NRA is to support the GoverningBody for the privilege of participating in fullboretarget shooting which is for those already keen, anobvious benefit, in practice.The income from membership is also for providingfor achieving our Charter objectives of encouragingmarksmanship, particularly among the young, forexample. This is why some of the membership incomehas always gone into the facilities at Bisley and needsto, for the foreseeable future. The NRA has alwaysneeded Bisley in order to function. I make no excusefor emphasising that every committed fullboreshooter should be a full or associated member of theNRA.We are not looking for more income from membershipfees in the foreseeable future, so the more memberswe have on our membership registers, the less eachwill need to pay.Progress of ChangeIn the last few months I have become increasinglyaware that there has been quite rightly a sense of reliefthat we are over the financial worst. This has broughtout frustration and released many pent up wishes ofmembers who would like this or that to be done in adifferent way, or even to go back to some so-called‘normal’. The fact is that we shall only have a futureand progress if we manage our affairs in a differentway. While we are in this process of change we mustaccept that we can only work within the art of thepossible and that change takes time to settle down.Unfortunately, we have lost some momentum byneeding to change the key role of Secretary Generaland this means that there will be an inevitable delayin considering our medium term plan.The new Board of Trustees, the Council, was electedonly last September and has been settling down to anew role. I take this opportunity to thank themembers who have taken on this sometimes onerousand certainly, responsible, role involving personalrisk. I do not want the Trustees to be seen as someremote body. Their task is to be objective and to avoidreflecting on their own shooting disciplines andprejudices. Without prejudice to their absolutediscretion in the matters of governance andmanagement of the Association, they generally restrictthemselves to the reserved functions which werelisted last year of which control of finance is the mostimportant. The Trustees largely follow therecommendations of Bisley management, that isNational Shooting Centre Limited and of the GeneralCouncil and its Committees, whilst co-ordinating abudget plan, developing a long term strategy for theAssociation and taking initiatives for consideration.Most matters of interest to members are therefore dealtwith in practice by the General Council, whom youelect to represent your personal interests, shootingdisciplines and regions. The voluntary support whichmembers of the General Council, its Committees andShooting Discipline Sub-Committees is the life bloodof our future. We, as a sport, are not alone in needingenormous volunteer support and I do hope thatmembers will continue to come forward to help withthe work.In turn, we are asking our Bisley management to workto new ways and targets under the leadership ofJeremy Staples. We owe it to him and to them to givethem as much support as possible and respect thatthey are there to serve us as best they can within theresources available.As some of you who are participating know, thisweekend we are holding the second Spring intoAction Weekend and I am pleased to say that entriesare up at 123. We thank our shooting and range staffand particularly Fred James for enabling this meetingto develop.Away from Bisley we have the new challenge ofranges being managed for the MoD by Landmarc, acommercial company. We are very aware of some ofthe impositions which are being made. Our policy isto press, at all times, for a better deal for our clubsand to build up a good working relationship as timegoes on. The difficulty is that Landmarc/MoD havetheir own paymasters, tight budgets, newemployment and health and safety considerations.This is the way it is with many sports and activitiesin the current political, regulatory and economicenvironment. The reality is that we shall have toaccept the changed circumstances, but must find waysto working to new patterns. Joint club conferenceplanning and, perhaps, ways for individual membersto join in might be found.Firearms LegislationSince last year we have been faced with the prospectof a Firearms Legislation Consultative paper. TheHome Secretary has unfortunately disbanded theFirearms Consultative Committee although some ofits members, including our friends, are being treatedas one of the informal focus groups which the HomeSecretary has apparently approached in the name ofcombating gun crime.We shall keep close watch on developments with thehelp of our MPs who are on our General Council, theBritish Shooting Sports Council and other shootingbodies with whom I am in direct contact. In particular,for target rifle and pistol we have a common interestwith the NSRA. Their Chairman and I have alreadywritten to the Minister of State to set out our position55