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Queensland Highland Pipers' Society |
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Proposed Incorporation of the Society At the meeting on 27 October 2008 a vote will be taken on whether to incorporate the Society. For the information of members, the existing rules and the proposed new rules are available at the links below. Existing rules Proposed new rules More information about incorporated associations can be found at the following links: Associations Incorporation Act Associations Incorporation Regulations Fact Sheets The vote will have to be passed by a majority of 75% of those present and voting at the meeting in order to go ahead. If decided to go ahead, we also have to appoint a person to actually make the application to be incorporated. The effect of this would be to make the Society a legal "person" in its own right and to give some protection to members and the committee from anyone seeking to take legal action against us as individuals. It also makes some transactions easier - for example if we wanted to acquire land or accept a legacy under a trust in the future.There is a fee of $108.40 to pay when we apply and also small annual fees to stay registered. We also have to make an annual return to the State Government. If, as proposed, we simply take our existing name and objects and put them into the "model rules" provided by the government, the procedure should be simple and quick. The model rules provide quite a good mechanism for managing an organisation such as ours - they are actually a bit more flexible than our existing rules (alhthough also a fair bit longer!). The only compulsory officers are a President, Secretary and Treasurer and the size and composition of the committee can be varied from year to year as required. In the past, an incorporated association needed to have public liability insurance but under recent changes we can decide for ourselves whether we do so, as long as we stay farly small in terms of assets and income. Also, there are much simpified audit requirements for a small incorporated body, so many of the reasons that have made us hesitate about incorporation in the past are no longer relevant. Many organisations like ours have incorporated in the last few years because of the protection it provides - for example most pipe bands are now incorporated bodies. When the subject was discussed at the annual meeting there was considerable support for the move. The proposed new rules adopt the government's "model rules" with the insertion of things like the objects, financial year etc. |