Status quo at the BPCA AGM and EGM

At their offices in Derby on 12 June, the British Pest Control Association (BPCA) held both their Annual General meeting as well as an Extraordinary General meeting. Both were pretty routine affairs.

AGMs tend to be formal affairs where companies present their accounts for approval, appoint auditors for the following year and elect officers and board members for the following year. The BPCA‘s AGM did just that.

The AGM was started by the President – Henry Mott – spot on time – 14.00 on 12 June 2013

On this occasion all of last year’s officers were returned unopposed with Henry Mott of Conquer Pest Control commencing his second year as President, Martina Flynn of BASF continuing as Immediate Past President and Jenny Humphrey of DRE Pest Control as Honorary Treasurer. Martin Harvey of Harvey Environmental Services was confirmed as Deputy President (a title amended to Vice President some 30 minutes later with the approval of the new Articles of Association).

New Executive Board members
Four vacancies on the Executive Boar were matched by four nominations meaning that all were returned unopposed. So, BPCA welcomes Kevin Brown of Rentokil Initial, Rob Long of Goodwin Pest Management, Tim Peeling of Prokill (unfortunately unable to attend) and Mark Williams of Ecolab.

Additional Extraordinary General meeting
This year’s AGM was supplemented with an EGM (Extraordinary General meeting). This was necessary to approve a revised merged Memorandum and Articles of Association as required by updated company law. The revision presented the opportunity to ‘tidy up’ this document and to introduce changes in the electoral procedure with the opportunity for the President to serve for three years and to provide for the election of more than one ‘Vice President’.

The requirement that companies seeking to join the association had to seek a nomination from an existing member was removed and the mechanism by which applications are processed and approved was also streamlined. The Rules and Regulations have been revised to reflect changes to the Memorandum and Articles.

Once the formalities were complete Henry Mott presented an overview of the Association’s activities during the previous year and its plans for the future. In terms of communication he described the success alexo, BPCA’s client-orientated magazine, which was celebrating its second birthday. Henry revealed that alexo was a finalist and had received a commendation for the best new product award, 2011, from the Society of Food Hygiene Technology (SOFHT). It was also nominated for the Trade Association Forum”s ‘Magazine of the Year’ award, for which it was highly commended. The new website has been very successful delivering a three fold increase (to 30,000) in customer referrals to BPCA members.

During the year BPCA launched an Affiliate scheme. Aimed at individual pest controllers it is free of charge and has already recruited 600 affiliates. BPCA anticipates that the 1,000th affiliate will have been recruited by the end of the year.

Awards proudly presented
The AGM is also the opportunity for BPCA to recognise excellence and achievement within the industry. This year three awards were presented:

• The Charles Keeble Award – for the best overall achievement in the Accredited Technician in Pest Control examination was awarded to Rachel Waterworth of Cannon Pest Control. Dee Ward-Thompson accepted the award on Rachel’s behalf:
• The John Bull Award for the best overall achievement in the Fumigation Diploma examination, was presented to Robert Smith of Farnham-based Smith Pest Control;
• The Del Norton Award presented annually as an acknowledgement of an individual’s contribution to the Fumigation industry was awarded to Mike Kelly of the Acheta Consultancy.