Procedure for Election of President

[<<] [>>] by Ian Vincent
20th August 2009 (CqE Official News)

The procedure for electing the next CA President has been announced, in the agenda for the AGM, as being a postal and electronic ballot of Individual Associates. However, concern has been raised by the Chairman of a Member Club, who believes that, under the Constitution, Member Clubs should also have a vote.

This point was considered by the Executive Committee when it was faced with a contested election, for which there is no precedent, at least under the current Constitution. The problem it faced was that the Constitution does not provide for this situation, which was probably not envisaged when it was drafted. The Committee decided that the procedure for individually elected members of Council should be used, primarily because there seemed to be no obvious way to combine separate votes of clubs and individuals to achieve a single result. The Candidates and their Sponsors agreed to this as the best that could be done in the circumstances.

The Executive Committee acknowledges that this is not an entirely satisfactory outcome, as Member Clubs have been excluded without there having been a full debate, and undertakes to ask Council to propose amendments to the Constitution, for the election of the President and other officers, to cover this situation should it arise in future. It would welcome suggestions as to what these should be. However, it asks the Members of the Association to accept the procedure for this election. Should the election be unable to proceed in the face of a sustained objection, it would fall to Council to fill the vacancy, which would be a much smaller franchise.

Ian Vincent
Hon. Secretary