The Annual General Meeting of the Grimsby Town Supporters Trust took place on Saturday 15^th August in the Lower Findus Bar and, as so often seems to happen when the Trust holds events after a home game, a disappointing performance on the pitch ensured a small (but perfectly formed) attendance at the meeting.

The meeting opened with the Chairman’s Report, delivered by Dave Otter.

Many things have happened since then that will stay in my memory.  The initial public meeting on a fog-bound November night at the Memorial Hall that same year, the Official Launch in 2003, the many public events and the Keep the Mariners Afloat Campaign that was launched to help the Club when the tax debt was announced.

So what progress has the Trust made since that foggy night in November 2002?

We are, without doubt, what is termed a “slow-burn” Trust.  Our membership has hovered around the 250 mark for a considerable period of time.  Past and present Board members will readily admit to frustration at the apparent apathy of local fans in both supporting and joining the Trust.  Some people will, wrongly in my opinion, point to the lack of success on the pitch as being the major reason for this. 

The reason, I believe, is the very reason this Trust needs to grow in both numbers and significance.  Fans believe that, come what may, John Fenty will provide endless financial support.  I have no doubt that John will do that to the best of his ability but who knows what is around the corner?  I am sure that the supporters of what was Gretna FC will understand the inherent dangers of a Club relying on one benefactor.

So, the fact that the Trust is still in existence with maybe only a few, but very committed and capable individuals still on the Board (with a few more to be voted on this evening) is success in itself.  Add to that the way we have developed a solid and constructive relationship with the Club and developed our focus for investment on areas such as youth development (with £2000 being used to sponsor the Youth Team and a number of young pros being sponsored also) and I feel we all have something to be proud of.

As I said before, who knows what is around the corner?  And that includes me.  For a number of personal reasons I am no longer in a position to serve as your Chairman so I have great regret in informing you that, with immediate effect, I am resigning as both Chairman and a member of the Board.  It has been a great privilege to serve as Chairman since the launch of the Trust and I would like to thank all past and present Board members for their efforts and support.

I shall, of course, continue to support the Trust in whatever way I can.

I look forward to a bright future for both the Trust and the Club we all love.  Thank you for your support”.

Following the AGM, a Board meeting was held and Emma Blackbourn, another of the Trust’s founding members, was elected as the new chairperson. The GTST Board would like to thank Dave Otter for his exemplary service over the last seven years and whilst he is unfortunately unable to remain on the Trust Board, we are pleased to say that he will be continuing his involvement with GTST as our Official Spokesperson.

The Acting Treasurer Rachel Branson then delivered her report:

“First of all, I’d like to point out that whilst I’m currently acting as Treasurer, I’m doing it because it was either me or the Invisible Man. I’m not an accountant and my knowledge of accounts in general consists of a couple of years working as a financial accounts assistant and reading half a book called “Accounts Demystified” whilst on a train to Scarborough earlier this year.

Having said that, I do have a good understanding of the Trust’s day to day finances because I’ve been keeping the Cash Book, banking the cash and making sure it all reconciles to the bank statements for the last four years. So, as things stand, I am currently better qualified to do it than anyone else on the board.

Despite frequent appeals for help, we’ve had no-one in the post since the resignation of the treasurer early last year, as a result of which there was no-one to prepare the year end April 2008 accounts for audit. This dragged on until six months ago when I decided that I’d better have a crack at it or we could get into real trouble with both Supporters Direct and the Financial Services Authority.  So I studied the previous sets of accounts, read the demystifying book, got all the information together and submitted it to our auditors at the time, Weaver Wroot, in March.

I then met with Weaver Wroot at the beginning of June to review the accounts. At the meeting I was advised that, due to changes in financial law, it would cost us a four figure sum to do a full audit of the accounts, which just didn’t make financial sense, given that our turnover for that year was less than £4000. Instead they prepared unaudited financial statements for about the same price as we had paid for a full audit on the 2007 accounts.

Unfortunately, this was unacceptable to both the FSA and Supporters Direct, as we have to get a rule change approved before we can move from full audit to independent examination and we can’t backdate it. Our contact at Supporters Direct was however very helpful and put us in touch with Peter Osborne Accountants, who are a Trust-friendly company and who agreed to do a full audit on both the 2008 and 2009 accounts for a total of £500 & VAT.

This meant I had to get the 2009 accounts done pretty sharpish but they were sent off to the new accountants in the first week of July and they said they would have them done by the end of the month. In the meantime, with the help of Supporters Direct, I sorted out the wording for the proposed rule change regarding financial audit, which we will be voting on shortly. I hope the membership will vote in favour of the proposal as we could probably sponsor the whole youth team with the total amount of money we’ve spent on financial audits over the last six years.

Things haven’t gone quite to plan with the new auditors, as a result of which we don’t yet have the fully audited accounts to present. They have however produced an interim report, which I eventually received at about ten last night because they’d emailed it to the treasurer of the Newport County Trust by mistake.

I’ll be publishing the fully audited accounts on the website in due course, but there are two main things to note from the interim report. Firstly, we reported a loss of £1152 for the year end April 2009. I think this is the first time we’ve ever done that, but it’s no surprise, given that our turnover was just under £2000 for the year and we paid the Club just under £3000 through sponsorship of the Youth Team’s travel and accommodation and youth and first team player sponsorship.

We were able to do this because we’d started the year with around £6500 in the bank, a lot of which we’d accumulated whilst waiting for Neil Woods to tell us how he would like us to invest in the youth set-up. So, even though we made a loss in the last financial year, we were able to help out the youth team when they needed it by using the previous years’ profits and the same is true in the current financial year, which we’ve entered with just under £3500 available, so about £700 of that has already gone on sponsoring five of the youth team this season.

The other main thing to note from the 2009 accounts is that we have been advised by the new accountants to write off on the balance sheet the 22,000 shares we own in Grimsby Town. It does make sense because the amount listed as “Shareholders’ Funds” on the balance sheet should be the monetary value if you dissolved the company, but who would pay us £22,000 for our shares? At present they have no real monetary value and that is unlikely to change unless we experience a meteoric rise to the Premiership, get a new stadium with fantastic soundproofing and start stealing headline acts from the KC Stadium. 

The decision has therefore been taken to write off their monetary value on the balance sheet, but this does not change the fact that we are still a significant shareholder in GTFC and we will continue to purchase shares for as long as our members wish us to do so.

The final point I would like to make before I finish boring you is that we now need to make a concerted effort to both increase our membership and find other income streams. Because we’ve had such a small Board for the last couple of years, we’ve done our best but for the most part we’ve been treading water and haven’t been able to do much to attract new members or indeed retain our existing ones and we haven’t had the manpower to undertake other fundraising activities.

We have become increasingly reliant on membership fees as a source of income and it currently amounts to about 78% of our income.  Given that about a third of our membership are lifers, who have made a one-off payment, and another third are concessionary members, we’re looking at a total membership income for the year of about £1200. Take away audit fees and general expenses and there won’t be much left to invest in the youth system once we’ve used up our past profits if we don’t start bringing in new members and raising money through other activities. So, in the acting treasurer’s opinion, that has to be the new Trust board’s priority for the coming year”.

Following the Treasurer’s report, and taking into account proxy votes already received and the votes of the members present, the three proposals listed below were all approved by the membership:

1.       To accept the financial statements for financial years 2007/08 and 2008/09

2.       To reappoint Peter Osborne Accountants as Auditors to GTST

3.       To amend rule 86 regarding financial audit

The Board election results were then announced. As there were only five applications to join the Board and fourteen vacant positions, James Bull, Will Douglas, Ian Fitzgerald, Chris Smith and Ian Townsend were all automatically elected to the GTST Board. The candidate manifestos of four of them appear below (the fifth will be published shortly):

James Bull

Having witnessed the football club’s alarming decline over the last decade, and especially during the course of the last 3-4 seasons (mainly at a distance as I used to live in Peterborough), I feel it is time to step up and make a contribution, however small, in supporting its recovery and hopefully its return to a more stable and successful existence. The Supporters Trust provides an important and positive voice for fans in this regard, supportive of the club, but not slavishly so, and one which is heard, and hopefully listened to, by the club’s management. With a couple of friends and fellow GTST members, I am in my second year of sponsoring Neil Woods and the coaching staff of Town’s successful youth team and I hope that our involvement has and will continue to raise the Trust’s profile further as an active supporter of the club. I believe in what the Trust has done and is trying to do and will do everything I can to support this in whatever capacity I am able to.

Will Douglas

I am a life member of GTST and Grimsby Town FC has been part of my life since the age of five when my grandfather started taking me to matches at Blundell Park. Despite living in London all my life, supporting Town just stuck. I get to as many games as I can – usually travelling away to the Town matches closer to London. I truly value my beloved Mariners. Their survival and – I hope – success matter greatly to me. I do sincerely want to help safeguard the future of GTFC for without it, the local community and indeed my own life here in London would be greatly diminished.

I helped to administrate the mailing list of the Grim Exile newsletter for many years so I know I can offer commitment and reliability in this Trust context.

Ian Fitzgerald

I have supported Grimsby Town for as long as I can remember (exiled in Derbyshire for the last 14 years). I was involved in the formation of GTST and have been an active member since the launch. I’m keen to join the board of GTST to help the trust meet its stated objectives. I strongly believe in the idea of football clubs being owned (if not run) by democratic supporter organisations (ideally in the UK this should be by a supporters trust). I also believe that the people entrusted to run the football club should be responsible to the supporters. Whilst Grimsby Town are currently lucky to have a chairman/owner who supports the club, I believe that GTST should do as much as possible to own a bigger share of GTFC on behalf of its members.

Chris Smith

I am a recognised fan of nearly thirty years standing and a lifetime member of GTST, who continues to contribute regularly to Trust funds. I am committed to the best interests of Grimsby fans and the Trust and in actively promoting the Trust and youth team sponsorship. I regularly contribute articles to both the GTST website and other fan sites to help raise interest in the Trust.

As a Trade Union member, I have a strong record of representing members’ interests and have already been in constructive dialogue with GTFC, representing the fans’ interests.

I am also a supporter of the non-league game and I think professional clubs can learn much from the game at that level.