AGM MINUTES
Meeting name
Venue
Date
England Hockey Annual General Meeting
Ellizabethan Room, Bisham Abbey
15 March 2016
Lead
Sue Bodycomb
Note taker
Helen Davies
Start time
1900
End time
2055
THESE MINUTES ARE SUBJECT TO APPROVAL AT THE 2017 AGM.
1. Apologies for Absence
The President of England Hockey, Sue Bodycomb (SB) welcomed members to the 2016 Annual
General Meeting, held at Bisham Abbey, Marlow and introduced the members of the board to
the attendees: Royston Hoggarth Chair, Sally Munday CEO, Ian Wilson Finance and
Administration Manager, Jon Cockcroft Commercial Director, Andy Tapley NED, Mike Stoddard
NED, Katy Roberts NED.
Those in attendance
CLUBS
Ashford (Middlesex) Hockey Club
Banbury Hockey Club
Bedford Hockey Club
Bracknell Hockey Club
Cannock Mens Hockey Club
Canterbury Hockey Club
City of Peterborough Hockey Club
East Grinstead Hockey Club
Gosport (Borough) Hockey Club
Lansdown Hockey Club
Leighton Buzzard Hockey Club
Lutterworth Hockey
Marlow Hockey Club
Sheffield Hallam Hockey Club
Wimbledon Hockey Club
LX club
HOCKEY ASSOCIATIONS
Bedfordshire
Cheshire
East
Hertfordshire
Midlands
North
Southern Counties
Staffordshire
In addition 24 members had appointed the Chair to act as their proxy.
Apologies were received from the following Clubs/Associations.
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Clubs
Alnwick Hockey Club
Aldershot and Farnham Hockey Club
Bognor Town Ladies
Cambridge Nomads Hockey Club
Cambridge South Hockey Club
City of Manchester Hockey Club
City of York Hockey Club
Corsham Hockey Club
East London Hockey Club
Edgbaston Hockey Hockey Club
Honiton Hornets Hockey Club
Kingsbridge & Salcombe Hockey Club
Kingston-upon-Hull Hockey Club
New Forest Hockey Club
Oxford Hockey Club
Plympton Grammar School Old Boys Hockey Club
Torbay Hockey Club
Wimborne Wayfarers Hockey Club
Hockey Associations
Cambridge County Hockey Association
Durham County Hockey Association
Lancashire Hockey Association
North Hockey Association
Somerset Hockey Association
Yorkshire County Hockey Association
2. Approve the minutes of the last Annual General meeting held on 17 March 2015
SB advised that these had been circulated with the papers and asked for any comments on
accuracy.
Laurie Alcock requested that future minutes showed an attendance register as well as a non
attendance list.
The minutes were approved as a true record of last year’s meeting
3 Receive the Directors’ Annual Report
SB summarised the past year saying that it had been a very sad year for England Hockey, with
the recent loss after a very brief illness of Tony Moffatt, who was a stalwart of the RCC, the
North and Yorkshire. SB also said that her thoughts and feelings went out to the Wilson family
who had recently lost both Graham Wilson, a lifelong committed hockey player, supporter and
journalist and Tom Wilson a young member of Old Loughtonians Hockey Club.
SB moved on to the European Championships that were held in 2015 at Lee Valley Hockey and
Tennis Centre and congratulated the Executive Team for taking on at short notice the Men’s
Champions Trophy, to add to the portfolio of events to be held this year, including the Women’s
Champions Trophy.
SB had recently attended the U14 Schools finals at the Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre
and commented that it had been a very exciting few days, the young people showed a huge
amount of enthusiasm for have for our sport along with the prestige of playing at the new home
for hockey, the Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre.
SB thanked the attendees of the AGM for coming to the meeting and handed over to RH who
thanked SB for her introduction.
RH introduced himself to the members and said that it was a great time to be in hockey, he
congratulated the previous chair, Phillip Kimberley on the work that he had completed and
commented that he had set the bar high. He thanked all those who had come to the meeting
saying that their effort was appreciated and is of importance to England Hockey. RH handed
over to SM.
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SM said that she would like to place on record her thanks to her fellow Board members and the
Non-Executive Team, for the time that they volunteer and particularly to the Board for constantly
challenging and keeping the Executive Team on their toes. SM introduced staff members who
were in attendance at the meeting, Helen Davies Executive Assistant, Kirsty Goldie-Brammer
Facilities and Club Manager, Bev Blackburn Adult Participation Manager and Joe Daniel Clubs
& Facilities/Young People & Students Administrator.
SM highlighted the annual report and said that it was set out against England Hockey’s strategic
objectives to become “a nation where hockey matters”. The virtuous circle was explained to the
members, International success feeds increased visibility and these combined help to grow
participation and with more people playing, more people will feed into the talent pathway and
there will be more International success and commented that we are starting to see some of the
results. In order to facilitate these, a good infrastructure needs to be in place, consisting of
facilities, coaches, umpires etc.
Increasing Participation
Since 2011 clubs have excelled in the last 12 months
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62% growth of under 16’s since 2011.
37% primary schools offer some form of hockey
11,000 inter school hockey events as part of the school games
5% increase in senior players
Growth in adult teams
250 clubs ran back to hockey with 2,600 players
First flyerz festival at Olympic Park
National club competitions culminated in clubs playing at Olympic Park
SM would like to place on record her thanks to those who are going out of their way to grow
hockey in England
International success
 Men and Women gained Olympic Qualification
 Women won Euro Hockey Gold
 U21 Men won Gold at The Sultan of Johor Cup in Malaysia
 Bronze for U21 Men and U21 Women in a six nation at Breda, Holland
 Masters – 8 teams won gold at the Euros
Increasing the Visibility
 Over 36,000 attendees at The Unibet EuroHockey Championships
 All the England games were broadcast live on BBC including the Women’s finals
 300 volunteers
 Growing our social media following (Facebook and twitter)
 Growing the website with the work in PR all increasing the visibility of the sport
Enhancing the Infrastructure
This area includes the development of the clubs, coaches officials, facilities and volunteers
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Club strategy links 7 key strands, a series of national workshops have taken place
Investment in facility development / refurbishment of hockey pitches
Trained over 1800 new L1 umpires, 9,000 people registered at the online umpire
education site
NPUA umpires continue to have strong success on the International stage
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A revised pathway for coach development, launched in May 2015 with new courses
offered will continue to roll out in 2016
Stronger National Governing Body
 Very grateful to the Government for the supply of 60% of our income
 New sports strategy launched in Dec 2015 and England Hockey is working closely with
Sport England
 Application submitted to UK Sport for performance funding through to Tokyo Olympics
 Sponsorship is key and delighted to announce continuation of Investec’s support
 Achieved the intermediate level of the Equality Standards.
 Compliance work continues with safeguarding and anti-doping, both areas are
increasingly important in the world of sport.
SM passed over to IW for the financial report
The meeting approved the Directors’ report
4. Receive the Finance Directors’ report and approve the Financial Statements and
Auditor’s report
IW presented an overview of the Income and Expenditure Account to 31 August 2015
highlighted the following in the financial statements:
Context
 Current funding cycle 2013-17
 UK Sport expecting increased contribution
 Sport England signalling “mixed economy” approach
 Sponsorship market very difficult
Income and expenditure
 Turnover increased from £9.5m to £10.9m
 Euro income of £2.3m
 Event hit financial targets
 Surplus of £117k
 1% of income
 £60k towards future major events
Balance Sheet
 Reserves up to £1.77m- about 70% of our reserves target.
 £120k put aside for future major events
 Cash balances £3.5m
 Creditors of £3.2m due to Euros
Forthcoming Changes
 FRS 102 is a change to accounting standards
 Changes to the I&E account in 2016
 Need to restate 2015 accounts
The President invited questions from members. There were no questions.
Approval of the Finance report Proposed by Ben Rea and seconded by Laurie Alcock
Votes in favour: 46
Votes against: 0
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The meeting approved the Finance Directors’ report
5. Approval of resolution to authorise the Board to re-appoint HaysMacintyre as Auditors
and to approve their remuneration.
Votes in favour: 46
Votes against: 0
The meeting formally approved the reappointment of Hays Macintyre as Auditors and
approved their remuneration.
6. Approval of the resolution to increase the England Hockey affiliation fee by 1.5% for the
2016/17 season. (Free affiliation for new teams in their first season was approved at the
2013 AGM and will continue until 2017)
Votes in favour: 42
Votes against: 4
The meeting formally approved the increase in the affiliation fee by 1.5%
7. Confirmation of the election of the President of England Hockey
SB was unopposed and therefore re-elected as the President. She was thanked for the great
job that she has done over the last three years and congratulated on her re-election.
8. Confirmation of the election of a Vice-President of England Hockey
Chris Todd’s term of office had come to an end. He stood unopposed and was therefore reelected. Sue Bodycomb thanked Chris and congratulated him on his re-election.
AOB
SB opened the floor and James Jarrett (Hertfordshire HA) asked about the recent rule change, he
commented that its quick announcement and implementation was very frustrating and asked why
the rules were put through with such little notice and half way through the season? Sally Munday
confirmed that the changes had been received from the FIH and that after testing with umpire
associations, clubs and leagues their decision was a unanimous one to roll out the rule change
immediately. The Board take making changes mid season really seriously and usually wait until the
end of the season so this decision to implement the change immediately was not taken lightly.
Rob Oakley (Bedford HC & Bedfordshire HA) asked if England Hockey was documenting injuries
as there is a current perception that there are more injuries occurring. IW said that England
Hockey had, about a year ago, started working with a number of clubs to capture injury information,
he said that England Hockey would welcome any injury data and requested that people contact him
if they are happy to supply it. SM requested a quick show of hands as to who thought that injury
reporting should be mandatory, the majority of the room were in agreement, Mike Shepherd
(Lansdown HC) felt that implementing this requirement was adding more bureaucracy and if the
clubs were signed up to ClubsFirst there should be an accident book. Neville Wrench (Southern
Counties HA) suggested that for the higher level matches an extra line could be added to the
match report form requesting any accident information. RH told the meeting that this is on the
Board’s agenda and the Board is aware that data is required. Andy Tapley said that at
international level all injuries are captured and that gives some form of a meaningful sample. Peter
Leaton (City of Peterborough HC and East HA) said that data is needed so that younger players
understood the small risks involved.
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Neville Wrench asked what provision England Hockey were making to face the revised funding and
big swings of money away from some schools. SM confirmed that the longer term strategy of
increasing participation and in particular young people’s participation was still an important factor.
The good news is the government have made a commitment to the school sport premium through
to 2020. In her spare time Sally Munday also sits on the Board of the Youth Sports Trust and their
raison d’etre is to empower growth through sport and there is now comprehensive evidence that
sport improves academic performance and with this evidence England Hockey with their peers and
other NGBS can influence Government. There is also the need to support our clubs so the young
people get the opportunity, and this two pronged approach is definitely on the Board’s radar.
Simon Longhurst (East Grinstead HC) voiced concerns with Hockey continuing as an Olympic
sport and asked what the FIH and the governing body were doing to ensure that it is in the right
place. SM confirmed that hockey was in the bottom 5 after London and the FIH had not seen this
coming, they have now developed a more proactive Olympic committee and are doing things to
safeguard hockey’s inclusion including trialling Hockey 5s at the Youth Olympics. At the 2013 FIH
Congress the FIH launched the Hockey Revolution to reposition hockey across the world, they are
currently rethinking the International calendar as a result of the review in 2012.
Ben Rea (Wimbledon HC) requested that the photos in the annual report are captioned.
Rob Oakley requested that the competitions review will consider a Badgers Cup.
Sander Meysen (Gosport Borough HC) asked about the ambassador scheme and international
players visiting clubs. SM highlighted that England has over 850 clubs and the players get an
incredible number of requests for player visits. It is also part of their contract with UK Sport that
they have to do a minimum number of visits every year and 3 of the top 10 athletes across all
sports for doing school visits were hockey players with Alex Danson being the number one.
Imtiaz Sheikh (The LX club) asked what was being done to increase the amount of masters’
content on the EH website? Deb Wilkes explained that Steve Floyd is now the masters programme
manager and it is being addressed.
Simon Longhurst asked for a release of the website analytics data and JC agreed to share any
data.
SB closed the meeting at 8.55pm
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