Present:…. Ed Binsted ( President ), Colin Barker (Chairman), Brian Gibbs, Cliff Salmons, Paul Tarrant, John Yates ( General Secretary )
The Chairman opened the meeting at 14.15.
Apologies for Absence had been received from Andrew Broadbent, Colin Clelland, Shayne Ford, Tony Knight, Barry Wilson, Cedric Pettitt, and John Armstrong

Item 1.......... Convening Notice
The Convening Notice had been circulated to members in March 2008. It was proposed by Brian Gibbs, seconded by Paul Tarrant and carried unanimously that the Notice be approved.

Item 2.......... Minutes of Previous Meeting
The Minutes of the 53rd Annual General Meeting had been circulated to members with the Convening Notice. It was therefore proposed by Colin Barker, seconded by John Yates and carried unanimously that the Minutes be approved and signed by the Chairman.

Item 3.......... Approval of Accounts
Jaine Best the auditor of Accountably Ltd was not invited to the AGM as it was not felt to be necessary given the lack of any prior notified questions regarding the accounts. The finances of the Institute improved further this year as a result of both the Competition and the Dinner again generating surpluses. The venue for the Dinner was again the Vintners’ Hall which was oversubscribed and sponsorship from Logoplaste, Quinns, GSF and SIG made the event successful both financially and as a function. Colin Barker explained that because the further improvement in the finances had been primarily due to the hard work and extra effort of John Yates, Brian Gibbs and himself, it had been decided to recognise this by making special one off payments to them. These payments are shown as Administration Costs - Honorarium It was proposed by Ed Binsted, seconded by Cliff Salmons and carried unanimously that the income & expenditure account be approved.

Item 4………. Membership Fees
Membership fees have not been increased for two years and the view of Council is that the current fees are lower than comparable organisations would charge for the benefits offered by the BBI. In view of this and the need to cover the Institute’s increased administration costs it is recommended that fees be increased from 1st May 2008 to £50 for individual members and £200 for corporate members It was proposed by Brian Gibbs, seconded by Cliff Salmons and carried unanimously that membership fees should be increased as recommended.

Item 5………. Appointment of Accountant for the current financial year
It was proposed by John Yates and seconded by Paul Tarrant and carried unanimously that Accountability Ltd be re-appointed as auditor for the current financial year.

Item 6………. Election of Council Members
In accordance with paragraph 5 of the Constitution, David Batey, Brian Gibbs, Colin Clelland and Shayne Ford are retiring at the Annual General Meeting to be held on 10th April.
They have all indicated their willingness to stand for re-election.
It was proposed by Ed Binsted and seconded by John Yates and carried unanimously that they be re-elected.
Paul Tarrant was co-opted onto Council

Item 7………. The National Chairman’s Report
Around this time a year ago I had the pleasure of reviewing and reflecting upon the changes the BBI had made over the previous year. I am pleased to report that those changes were well received, and I report on some of our usual activities.

Competition - Waters and Soft Drinks
The year was a difficult one for those who fell into the above category with British summer time living up to its usual mixed bag with maybe a bit more rain than usual. However this did not deter you from entering and we had a similar number of companies taking part as in previous years. I would like to thank our esteemed judges for their time, also David Batey and Barry Wilson, our Competition Co coordinators, and trust they will be available this year for the Ale and Lager Competition.

Dinner
This year we celebrated our 50th dinner on the 19th November and the decision to return to the Vintners Hall proved to be a fitting venue for the occasion. As on our first visit I am pleased to say that we had a full house, and were entertained by a string quartet from the Guildhall School of Music and comedian Ian Irving supplied entertainment. Our guest speaker was Ed Binsted, Managing Director of Binsted Group who provided us with both a potted history of the BBI and a some forthright views on the current state of our industry. I believe that many of the problems that we experienced on our first visit were addressed; however we do know that there are some areas we can still improve on and I am sure the Dinner committee will sort these out over the coming months. I would like to thank Andrew Broadbent for his efforts in co-ordinating the event and our thanks also go to the table hosts and the sponsors - GSF, Logoplaste, Quinn Glass and SIG and I am pleased that some of them will be supporting us again in 2008

Visits
Once again through the efforts of our Visits Coordinator Brian Gibbs and our Scottish Section Co Coordinator Colin Clelland, we had a varied and busy calender. Our thanks go to those companies who open their doors and give their time and hospitality. The Council are keen to try and offer a varied programme and if any members have venues that they think would be of interest then please contact us; we would especially welcome any members in the North of England who could give support to our Section Co-ordinators. The membership value comes from the opportunity to have access to facilities and network with people that are normally unable to give the time due to there workload

BBI Achievement Award, sponsored by Krones.
It is highly appropriate that I should mention our winner this year, David Kaye Managing Director of Krones UK who will be retiring in May 2008. David and his company have been great supporters of the BBI over the years. For several years the Northern Section was run by members of David’s team Nigel Hall and Don Kelly to name but two, all have been great servants for the Council. So a big thank you to David Kaye and we trust we will see him at some of our functions in the future.

Administration
John Yates has once again overseen most of the BBI activities along with other personal commitments, and this has put a bigger burden on him than usual. However as always he has managed to bring it altogether and our thanks go to him. The coming year John will be handing over much of the administration to the Binsted Group who have carried out the work in the past. John will continue in his role as General Secretary which will include overseeing the transition, which I am sure, will run smoothly.

General
The year saw us attend the Total show and our thanks go to Fullers for supplying the beer for the PPMA stand. This year we will be at the Interpack show once again using our friends at the PPMA, and we would invite you all to visit us on their stand where you will receive a warm welcome. We say goodbye to Bill Farrant from the Council as he takes up a new role in the USA and It therefore gives me great pleasure to welcome back Cliff Salmons and Ed Binsted onto the Council and Ed has agreed to take up the role of President. I am sure they will both be a great asset to the Institute. My final thanks go to Tony Knight and Shayne Ford for their continued support as Council members.

Colin Barker

Chairman of The BBI

Meeting closed at 14.56