On Saturday 19th February the North & East District held its Annual District Meeting at St John at Hackney. It was lovely to have more than 40 ringers join the ringing, service and tea and we are grateful to the Hackney band for all the work which went into arranging the afternoon (and especially the tea). Particular thanks go to Chris Weavers and Rev’d Erin Clark for the ringing at Bethnal Green, Rev’d Christa Brodie-Levinsohn for leading the service at St John at Hackney, Hadley Hunter for playing the organ and for accompanying the choir, the choir themselves for enhancing the service with additional music and Stephen Jakeman for organising the complete event with the church.
We remembered members lost in the last year with Betty Sutcliffe, Pam Roth and Glyn Williams all remembered for their contribution to the Association and as friends to many.
We elected 7 new members and ratified the election of 1 member prior to a peal. One of these new members started ringing because he was the project manager for Ringing Remembers! We reviewed the secretary’s report, training report and accounts from 2021, noting the move from virtual at the start of 2021 to face to face at the end of the year influencing each report.
The officers for the District were re-elected for the year except that Tue Sando stepped down as Training Rep but Guy Wells and Hans Rashbrook continue in post. Martin Sutcliffe requested to step down as Bell Restoration Committee Rep but agreed to stay in post while potential candidates request information from Stephen Jakeman. When we have volunteers we will hold an election within a District meeting.
The Programme was adopted as the plan for 2022. This will soon be visible as events in the calendar: https://www.bellringing.london/calendar/. For more information regular Middlesex ringers should join the email group by sending a mail to: mcaldg+subscribe@googlegroups.com. A quarter peal fortnight from May 21st until June 7th is planned, including the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee holidays. More information will follow but do think about what you could ring at your tower and when you would ring within this fortnight.
Stephen Jakeman provided an update on Bell Restoration activity with the main active project being Harlington and the one which needs our support in their fundraising being Hampton. We raised £163 from the raffle and £100 from the tea, all of which goes to the Bell Restoration Fund.
Lucy Chandhial noted that young ringers (up to age 29) should be aware of the new Young Change Ringers Association (https://www.ycra.org.uk/) and that if anyone would like to volunteer to arrange anything for young ringers within the district (or Association) this would be great. Recently some N&E ringers joined a young ringers event at Barnes with Surrey Young Ringers and Surrey are happy to team up more often for this sort of event.