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Address to Brethren Annual Meeting
20 October 2009
I have already welcomed our Honoured Guests from other Provinces, some of whom have travelled a long way to be with us today.
It is now my pleasure to welcome the Brethren of this wonderful Province of Bedfordshire. It is very gratifying to stand here and look out over so many Brethren and I do offer you all my sincere thanks for your support in attending this Annual Meeting. I would also like to thank all Lodges for the welcome and hospitality offered to the Provincial Executive on our visits.
I congratulate all whom I have appointed, re-appointed or promoted this afternoon all very well deserved.
I was so pleased to appoint as our new Assistant PGM,
W Bro Gordon Staple. As most of you know Gordon has spent the last five years as Provincial Secretary where he has performed his duties with true dedication and has made numerous friends both within this Province and others. I look forward to working with him in his new role.
I must also pay tribute to the hard work done by our retiring Assistant PGM, Ron Vaughan. I am most grateful for his support and all his hard work during his term in office thank you Ron.
I also thank my Deputy, Bob Lovesey for his hard work and support thank you Bob
At the April Investiture Meeting of Grand Lodge I was delighted to witness five of our Brethren receiving honours. Our hard working Almoner, W Bro Ashley Green was appointed to PAGDC, our Information Officer, who also works hard, W Bro Russell Howard, received an Acting appointment to AGPurs, and of course our own VW Bro Graham Redman reappointed as Assistant Grand Secretary. There were also two promotions,
W Bro Geoffrey Hunt promoted to PJGD and W Bro Robert Westwood promoted to PAGDC.
My hearty congratulations to all these Brethren who have worked so hard for the good of Freemasonry in the Province and of course also Freemasonry in general.
I assume that the Provincial Officers and the Grand Officers will continue to work hard in the future as well!!
Last month saw the second Provincial Ball which was again a tremendous success raising funds for the 2015 Festival and the Friends of Prince Michael of Kent Court at Watford.
Last Saturday at The Rufus Centre in Flitwick the East of England Air Ambulance held an Open Day where I had the honour to present a cheque for £4000 on behalf of Grand Charity as part of the £180000. 00 donated to the Air Ambulance organisation nationwide this year. We were invited as supporters to have a stand on the day which was manned by several volunteers from the Stewards Lodge. I am pleased to say that several enquiries were received from members of the public.
Hopefully this will be the first of many such attendances at local fairs and fetes throughout the Province. Thanks to all involved.
We are already making plans for a presence at the Bedford River Festival next year.
In June we held another Cheque Presentation Evening where the total given away by Lodges was around £40000. 00, bringing the total over the eight evenings since 2005 to in excess of £360,000.00.
A tremendous achievement by your Lodges.
We have now embarked on our next Festival which as you all know will be in 2015 and is for the Royal Masonic Trust for Girls and Boys. I launched this in February/March of this year and the latest figure reported to me that has been pledged is around £214,000. 00 which is a wonderful start towards our target of at least £1million.
This is a very important charity to support Brethren and at the present time we have 8 girls and boys within the Province who were supported last year to the total of £64000. 00 and over the last 5 years support has been given totalling £113000. 00. The RMTGB spends around £9million a year in helping children less fortunate than others.
As you know the target for the Province is at least £1million but I know the Brethren will wish to far exceed this amount, will you not Brethren!! I urge those who have not yet made a commitment to have a word with their Charity Steward and honour the promise we all made in the North East corner of the Lodge. We none of us know when we will need assistance ourselves Brethren and Charity must begin at home some times.
We have had four years of supporting non Masonic charities.
Saturday 3 July 2010 will see the next Family Fun day again being held in Maulden by kind permission of W Bro Michael Hillson and I hope it will be as successful as the one held in 2008. This as you know Brethren is an occasion when the whole Family can join together which is something I am particularly keen to promote. I know a lot of Lodges have been organising events to include the Ladies and Families and I hope this will continue Brethren.
I am happy to report that the Teddies for Loving Care scheme, which incidentally was started some years ago (by a Province somewhere on the East Coast!!) are continuing to be a success. I believe around 1 million Teddies have been given to distressed children in A & E nationwide. This Province has distributed over 7200 so far between the L & D and the Bedford Hospitals. We know this scheme works Brethren from members who have first hand knowledge of their children (or possibly grandchildren or maybe that should be great grand children) have been taken to the Hospital and given a Teddy which in most cases gives instant comfort to the child (and of course the parents).
I am very conscious that my RW colleagues have been looking at their watches but I must say more.
I am happy to report that even in these hard times the decline in membership in this Province has slowed considerably and I do believe this is the case in other Provinces. Our losses this last year have unfortunately been a larger number of Brethren called to the GLA, also we have seen an increase in the number of Brethren excluded for non payment of subs, which, I presume is a result of the continuing hard times.
I did say last year Brethren that we must not just sit back and do nothing, we must all make our friends know just what Freemasonry is about, and some of them of course will have totally the wrong impression. Let us all look around us, after all I am sure we all know someone who would make an excellent Freemason go for it Brethren.
I hope you have all enjoyed your time here this afternoon and I am sure those who are dining at the Park Inn will continue to enjoy themselves.
As normal Brethren I am sure it will be raining when you leave the building, if it isnt, something has gone wrong.
I am just wondering which of my RW colleagues got the timing correct; no doubt I will be told how long I was on my feet!
Continue to enjoy your Freemasonry Brethren, thank you for your support, have a safe journey home and God Bless you all.
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