Good afternoon to our dignitaries, special guests, ladies and gentlemen and members.
This afternoon is my 2nd year of standing up here to give you the State Secretary Report for our 69th AGM.
Firstly the magazine is a big part of my role, as said, in the magazine sent out in September, we apologize for the June issue not making your email and letterbox’s. That was completely out of our control but I can tell you now there are people chasing organizations at this moment helping us find a new magazine distributor.
I can’t express how much of an honor this is for me, to stand up here in front of you and tell you some of the exciting results of the past 12 months.
The Club’s major activity, The Good Friday Appeal, was a fantastic effort of raising ………………….. Sorry, I didn’t hear that? Did I hear you say $420,000.00! Well that is a fantastic effort and I think we owe all the volunteers a big thank you. Of course, we all know that this was a very pleasing amount despite a depressed economy and the floods in January.
However, this is not the only activity we raise funds for?
For example over the past 12 months, we have also given to:
1. Department of Human Services $1000 for a Wheelchair
2. Eastern Health $952 for a Handheld Doppler Unit
3. East Wimmera Health Services $995 for a Handheld Doppler Unit
4. Medical donations for two individuals $437 for equipment
5. Uncle Bobs Club Child Development Centre $400 for Christmas gifts
6. Monash Special Development School $1990 for Second Skin Suit
We now are entering our 70th year of being THE UNCLE BOBS CLUB and I AM EXCITED.
We have started.
This year, I had the pleasure of attending the launch of the 80 faces tram for The Good Friday Appeal. John Baxter and I both wore our UBC polo shirts. You would be amazed at the recognition that was given toward the club. Hence we now have a group formed in Shepparton. We have also started other groups in Epping and Sunbury.
We have a great opportunity to carry on the club tradition, but we need to look at our operations and attract some new ideas to get the young people of today onboard. We need to raise the profile of the club that way we can keep the club alive and so that we can continue to contribute to the Good Friday Appeal. Whilst on the matter of Good Friday, did you know that just in a few volunteer sheets returned we have learnt that we had over 200 volunteers for the day? Only 20 of these were UBC club members. Which means that we have an opportunity to start signing up new members on the day. We have approximately 1350 club members on the books to date. We need this number to grow.
As we mentioned at the last General meeting, Club funds now have to be utilized in some form to run the club’s operations. When the club began, a BOB or shilling was a considerable amount of money per week. I am not a financial wizard, but I can tell you that 10 cents today is nowhere near worth as much. This means that we need to start getting our own UBC tins into the market place.
In addition, when I say that, I mean it! I want to see or hear from the office that a branch/group requested UBC tins in their area. There is no reason we cannot have this UBC tin in place from Good Friday to December all funds going to UBC, to help our local areas of need. Then from December to Good Friday all funds in the tin to go to Good Friday Appeal. With our tins we can decide where the money goes and help in all areas not just the Appeal.
So what I am trying to say is we need to get out more and sign up more members so that we can have more opportunity to raise more funds. You see this weekend we had to knock back a Bunnings Sausage Sizzzle mainly because we had our AGM today but also because we don’t have enough people on our list that we can call on when we get the call with only a few days notice. I don’t know if you have been reading how much money a Bunnings Sausage Sizzle brings in but for a day and 8-10 people we can raise over $1000.
A reality check is our country people, that do a terrific job of fund raising, are like me getting older. We have to start looking at these younger people city and country, get on board with them by using the Internet, having our newsletter delivered by email not in the mail so that we can communicate quicker and be more modern to their needs. These young people that I have met are saying that they are Uncle Bobs Club member and we don’t only collect on Good Friday we collect all year round for all sick and disabled kids of Victoria.
So my final comment is we are turning 70 years old lets take that wonderful tradition that has got us this far and expand it, lets get more members LETS GET EXCITED. Thank you.
Daryl Gates
Honorary State Secretary
