The call on the East Meon Good Causes Fund grows ever less insomuch as we received no requests for grants this year. This has brought forward a conundrum, that in the wake of such scandals as Oxfam and other leading charities, the rules, regulations and reporting to the Charities Commission has become or is about to become ever more onerous and although as a small charity we do not have the same burden as others, it still represents a good deal of (voluntary) work for the amount of disbursed funds (none this year!)

As it is a voluntarily run scheme and we all feel ourselves 'time poor' these days, the Good Causes Fund Trustees (the current Chairman and Committee Members of the East Meon Garden Club) have decided to ask the members at the Annual General Meeting on Monday 1st October to approve them actively seeking one or more recipients for the residual monies and then dissolving the fund and de-registering with the Charities Commission.

This does not mean that we shall no longer undertake charitable endeavors. In future the EMGC Committee will nominate a charity or good cause for which they intend to raise money and link it to an event so it can all be pre-approved by the membership, such as this year, raising funds for the Rosemary Foundation.

Also, should we find ourselves in the situation that we have more money than we reasonably need to run the East Meon Garden Club and sustain it through any unforeseen fallow patch or emergency, the Committee would undertake to ask the Membership for permission to donate to a nominated cause.

I look forward to us discussing and voting on this topic at the AGM on Monday 1st October 2018.