** Important Consultations at Rotorua and Cambridge **

Your regional committee has arranged two meetings to consult with bridge envoy Allan Morris (Chair of NZ Bridge Foundation) on the question of NZ Bridge's direction on the Management/Governance situation.

These meetings will be held on Sunday 22 January, 10am at Rotorua Bridge Club and 2pm at Cambridge Bridge Club. Club representatives and/or interested parties may come to either or both of these meetings.

Although many clubs have already written to the board, this is a further opportunity to have input into the process, so we hope lots of people will take advantage of it.

Here is some more information from Allan:

As advised the Board is supportive of this initiative. We have also had a preliminary discussion with Alan Turner who is also supportive. A number of people have asked “will the board listen and action what comes out of these meetings”. Whilst we cannot answer for the board we think it would be foolhardy for any future board not to listen to its constituency.

Agenda:

• Objectives of the consultation
• Overview of present situation
• Summary of Club and other correspondence
• Discussion on “right track/wrong direction”
• "Governance model” what does it mean to you
• What is important to you in the short, medium and long term
• Ideas for improvement
• Open discussion

We appreciate that this is not the easiest time of year to have these meetings, but we hope that as many of you as possible can take part.

It would be helpful if we had some idea of likely numbers, but you can just turn up on the day.

Look forward to seeing you there.

Kind regards,
Rona Driscoll
Chairperson, Waikato Bays Regional Committee

Postscript: Ten days prior to these meetings the Board circulated the attached documents which contain a lot of valuable information for this discussion. They are:

• The Arrowside Report of 2015 which found the Board short of best practice of roles definitions and responsibilities
• An overview of the rationale behind the move for change

Also germane is a statement from Arie Guersen, chair of NZ Bridge, that after 30 years service to the game he has decided to step down from further involvement with the Board and will not be standing in the forth-coming elections.