And now the end is near, and so I face the final curtain ...

What a fabulous night we had on Thursday! Incognito sang “My Way” - along with many other show time and jazz classics and it was a great start to the entertainment.

Those of you who were at conference and the awards night, I hope you enjoyed yourselves and had a superb time. I know that I did. For anyone that is in any doubt, Allan and John (three cheers for such great sports) had no idea that the whole “come to the stage bit” was a set up, but they took part with great fun (although Allan is promising to get me back). I had no idea what Andrew Castle was going to use me for when he asked me to be his assistant on stage! Had I known, I would have had a bit of catching practice beforehand - all I can say is that 50% (and one of them backwards) with 800 people watching is no mean feat!

I can also explain the presence of the man in black (“fiddling with me”) half way through the awards. When I handed over the second trophy, the radio microphone dropped from the back of my dress all the way through and was dangling around my ankles (I kid you not) and the weight was pulling my headpiece off. I knew that there was a danger it would not work, so I needed assistance. There was no way I could detach it myself - either someone had to come on and refit it (bearing in mind it went on with someone actually under my dress!!!) I thought more likely I would have it taken off and use the podium mikes. This is what we did, but of course no one knew what was happening - a lesson to be learned! Neither David nor Andrew had the inconvenience of the ballgown and no where to clip the mike pack!

Luckily Caroline was able to relay my predicament to the backstage and they helped out - much to Andrew’s delight - who announced to the whole room, “Hey! Hands off she’s mine!” Embarrassment factor 100% but what a lot of fun! These really were "money cannot buy” memory moments!

I got through the handover speech without too much emotion (I was worried I would collapse like a jelly when thanking my family for their support), but all was well and Geoff now has the reins. Dancing to “Abba Inferno” was great and the 3am bedtime was one I haven’t done for a while.

I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of my Presidency. Our members are a wonderful group of people to represent and I have been proud to do so. I have been given so many opportunities that my memories and deeds for the year are priceless - thoroughly enjoyable and so many times I felt 10 feet tall.

My week actually started on the Sunday prior to conference as we had the Council committees and meetings before conference took place. A very exhausting few days. On Tuesday, Conference kicked off with the AGM where we held a moment's silence for the members we lost this year, passed a special resolution to recognise the use of new designatory letters IRRV (Dip) IRRV (Hons) and to re-establish the presence of “Fellow” status of the Institute (more info will follow on how to reach this status). And my final duty was to present an honorary membership to Bill Lovell. Bill had not been advised this was coming and was shocked by the announcement - so much so that he didn’t stop to put his jacket on and asked for us to retake the photos on Thursday night!

The conference went extremely well. Paul Howarth, who always pulls a crowd, was delighted with the number who turned out. It was only after his session that we realised 50 delegates who were due to be in a different conference in the BIC had wandered in to our session in error. I hope they enjoyed it!!! The Exhibition was busy with lots going on and plenty of people looking at products and doing the rounds. It seemed to me to be a great success.

On Thursday we presented a commemorative certificate to Dr Josephine Lim from Canada. Josephine is the current President of the International Association of Assessing Officers (IAAO) and was attending our conference.

Then there was the awards dinner. As I said on the night, congratulations to all winners and commiserations to the other finalists - but all must remember how well they did to get to that stage. I look forward to judging the awards again next year and seeing even higher standards!

A huge thank you to everyone who has supported me during the year and who have supported the charity. I think we are close to the £6,000 mark, but the final figure is not in yet, so I shall put an update as a news release with final figures when they are known - but thank you all so much.

It has been a great honour to be your President. I may be a bit quirky and informal at times but I hope I have shown some of the heart of the Institute during my year. It was my intention to try to bring the Institute HQ and Council out of the “mystery” and show you all what we do. If I have achieved a little of that, I have been successful. Thank you for reading the blog, I hope that you have enjoyed it. The blog like the year has been very individualistically me. I hope to continue on Council for a further term. I will be standing next summer, but - either way - I have some wonderful memories and to close in the words of the song…..

..To say the things he truly feels
And not the words of one who kneels
The record shows
I took the blows
And did it my way!


Take care of yourselves.

Much love

Julie

Conference photos!

And Julie's latest photos!

Latest from the President ...

I’ve just found enough time to do one more snippet before I head off to Bournemouth for the conference. I am granted one round up after Conference which I will look to do next week.

But to bring you up to date since the last blog, on 9th September - the Sussex and Surrey Association had a well attended meeting on take up for benefit’s looking at the Welsh experience. Prior to the meeting the executive met in order to present two certificates of service (awarded by the Law Research and Education committee in July) to Association President Ian Nisbet and Former President Colin Holden. I have to admit to a huge amount of pride in being able to sign and present Colin with his certificate, he had no idea it was coming and it was very richly deserved.

I then attended the IAAO conference (International Association of Assessing Officers) in Louisville (loah ville) Kentucky, home of the Kentucky Derby, the Louisville Slugger (a baseball bat) and Muhammed Ali.

Colin and I arrived on the Friday night via Chicago O’Hare where we had a five hour wait between flights. O’Hare domestic is not the best terminal to have an elongated delay but we did enjoy watching the passengers walk out to their planes, hand over their carry on bags (to be stowed in the hold) before being allowed to take off. We also watched arriving planes with their owners reunited with their carry-on on the tarmac!!!

We had been through three time zones by the time we arrived In Louisville and were a little disorientated as we gained 6 hours and then lost 1. Amusingly, our luggage arrived 3 hours before we did as it was loaded on an earlier flight!!!!

The conference opened with traditional singing from Kentucky followed by the motivational speaker, we then had the AGM of the association as a plenary session. The exhibition was in the main hotel and looked very different to our own as it is less “slick” but none the less full of interesting and exciting exhibits. We were delighted to see one of the company’s that is shortlisted in our performance awards there also.

We had Wednesday night to ourselves and decided to have a trip up the Ohio river on the Spirit of Jefferson. This was great fun and finished with a bit of a sing – a –long (or maybe it was just us) as we pulled in to dock.

The conference concluded with the gala dinner, the only real difference to our own being that the entire Council (or Board) sit on the stage looking out on the audience for the meal. I’m not so sure that would be favoured by our own Council members!

After the conference, Colin and I went to Washington DC via Chicago (where I met up with my long term penpal Angi who lives in Michigan. Angi and I have been writing since we were 17, we met up for the first time in Chicago, it was a great night!). Washington was a great as I remembered it 30 years ago when I lived there. We had a super time showing Colin the sights and wandering around in the sunshine and high 70’s temperatures.

Sadly while we were in the States we got the news that long serving member of the Scottish Association Executive Janette Proud had passed away. Janette had been suffering from cancer but she had such a fighting spirit and we had seen her at the Scottish Conference that it came as quite a shock. Her funeral was this Wednesday which was attended by over 200 family, friends and colleagues, I know that we will all miss her and send our condolences to her husband Dave and family.

I leave for conference tomorrow as we have a full two days of meetings beforehand, I hope to see many of you there and am looking forward to Thursday night when I shall pass the baton on to Geoff.

Take care

Julie

Scottish Conference

Well here we are, it is September and the trees are starting to turn from green. This is my penultimate blog entry with only three weeks left now until Annual Conference in Bournemouth and the handing over to a new President. I must say I have an inkling of what it feels like to be old father time on New Years Eve, with the bouncing baby new year waiting to get started! (not that Geoff is a bouncing baby – but you get the drift ...)

The end of August was a quiet with very little activity, which meant I actually managed to have some time in the office, which turned out to be a good thing as staff were on leave and we had the annual billing and the adjustment to rents to put through. The rents are being adjusted tonight but the billing went well so all seems to be in a much more stable position, phew!

Last week saw the Annual Scottish Conference in Crieff and what a great conference it was. I was transported back to Brighton 2 years ago as during the opening morning the fire alarm went off and we had to start the evacuation! Bizarrely the hotel staff attempted to restrain the delegates in to the room as they felt it was the safest place to be!!!!!!!!!!! Anyhow, we all got on with the day “un-singed” and had a great debate about Debt Relief (Scottish Debt Arrangement Scheme and LILA route to bankruptcy), Welfare Reform and on to the launch of the Committee of Inquiry in to Local Taxation in Scotland. We were delighted that the 4 MSPs representing the four main parties, all stayed after their session to participate in the press conference launch. Those of you in Scotland can hardly have failed to see the amount of press coverage that it generated (click on headline above to view the BBC article) and we are really pleased about that. We now must deliver the inquiry with some firm proposals for discussion and further debate in the halls of parliament.

The conference was not of course all work, work, work; we had a lovely dinner on the first evening with the past presidents of the Scottish Association and honorary members. We were delighted to have so many distinguished legends in the Institute with us including Ron Skinner, Eric Geddes and David Shepherd. David had been National President in 1968 and having retired some time ago it was lovely to meet with him and see that he was incredibly fit and well. David has promised to attend the Past Presidents' luncheon in July next year, I look forward to seeing him again at that time. The Gala Dinner on the Wednesday was a great event with the awarding of the best in Scotland entrant to the IRRV Performance awards (Well done Dundee!!), an interesting after dinner speech from Bill Jamieson who told us of the events that lead to the collapse of Barings Bank and how he had the inside track and was able to “break” the story and finally a great time dancing the night away with the Ceilidh band albeit with some dubious Scottish dancing!

As always it was an excellent conference, set in the beautiful surroundings of Crieff Hydro and, although I was sad to say goodbye as President to the Scottish delegates, I really hope that I will be invited again some day to speak to the conference as it is such a hard working and enthusiastic group. Many thanks to all chairs and “questioners” who put the speakers at their ease, but were challenging and thought provoking in their own right.

Colin and I fly out for the IAAO conference in Kentucky on Friday and we are spending a few extra days leave on the end, so my final update will be during Bournemouth conference week if I get time …. Or perhaps Geoff will be so kind as to let me do a round up even after I have passed the chain over!

Some photos from Scottish Conference ...

Above : Julie at the Students' Presentation

Above : Julie with the Provost of Perth & Kinross & Brian Jeffrey, Scottish Association President
Above : Julie hosted a dinner with former (and current) IRRV Scottish Association PresidentsAbove : The IRRV launched its committee of inquiry on local taxation at Scottish Conference. We were pleased to welcome MSPs from the main four political parties to Conference - from the left - Alasdair Allan MSP (SNP), Jeremy Purvis MSP (Scottish Liberal Democrat), Andy Kerr MSP (Scottish Labour) and Derek Brownlee MSP (Scottish Conservatives) Above : Julie with Conference Overall Sponsors - Gandlake - Rob De Felice and Carol Hill
Above : The Equita Presidential Penalty Challenge at Crieff!Above : Julie with Brenda Miller and Jane Crawford of Dundee City Council, winners of the "Best in Scotland" performance award

Latest from Julie ...

Saturday 18th July saw me, Helen Robinson and Moira Hepworth (along with about 900 others) do the sleepwalk, in PJs at midnight around Haywards Heath. We were extremely lucky with the weather and it was dry for the hour and three quarters it took to get round. Thank you all who sponsored us we raised over £900 and with gift aid that is well over £1000. Thanks so much.

Prior to the walk we launched the President’s shoot out challenge (which will now run as a theme at the two main conferences in Crieff and Bournemouth to raise some more money). The photo's may look impressive and I did score 5 penalties, but it was our Chief Exec who was in goal! Thanks to all who turned out at a very wet Olympos in Burgess Hill to see us get this underway.

After I completed my events, my step-son Matt and a group of friends went out to do the three peaks challenge (Ben Nevis, Snowdon and Scafell within 24 hours). They have raised over £1000 for their efforts and have added it to our total. Thanks guys so much - you were really tired at the end but I know you enjoyed yourselves.

The total for the charity currently stands at around £4,500 but I know we can do so much more. Thanks again everyone and a reminder of the “Just Giving” site : www.justgiving.com/julieholden1

Greetings bloggers!

Another busy few weeks since the last update.

I have been darting around the country concluding the visits for the performance awards shortlist and what a tough job it has been this year. I have been very fortunate to be involved with the inspections for about five years, but this year I had two categories and the standards were high, high, high! The board met on Friday to determine the finalists to be invited to the performance village in Bournemouth. Gary will be emailing out the results of this round today or tomorrow and by midweek the list of finalists will be on the Institute’s main website. For those that hove got through, see you at conference and well done! Those who are not through, remember that you had already beaten off a lot of entrants to get to that stage and you did well to reach the visit round. For those entries that did not make the visiting round, look at the submissions of the finalists and we hope to see you back again in future years!

I have also visited two more associations since the last update, we had a great day at the races on 20th July with the East Anglian Association in Great Yarmouth (wonderfully nostalgic for me as I spent my teenage years in GY and started my local government career at GYBC back in 1988). The following Friday saw us at the beautiful setting of Broome Park in Kent for the South Eastern dinner. Sponsored by Rundles, we had great fun playing the tables following dinner at a casino evening. Murphy’s law is that we were losing until we decided it was time for bed, bet the lot (to go out with a bang) and of course won!!! It was another 45 mins before we were able to drag ourselves away having finally lost the accumulated huge pile of chips on the blackjack table. My thanks to the executive committees of the two associations, for their hospitality, as they hosted really enjoyable events.

The following week was a light Institute week, but I did host two lunches, one for the senior officers at the VOA, where we said goodbye to David Park who is retiring from VOA after many years service and during that time has been a tremendous support to the Institute. We will miss David and wish him well for the future.

The second lunch was more of a “launch”, the Institute has been accredited as an awarder of the Recognised European Valuer (REV) standards. We had a press release and launch to mark the event. Hopefully it will not be long before the first award is made to an individual Valuer.

Bad news for me back at the office; the Surrey Police authority had lost their judicial review bid against the capping of their budget, so we are required to rebill for this year’s council tax, I had visions of my August bank holiday basking in the sun (well I could dream) - but instead it looks like we will have to be in the office doing the rebilling!!!! Can I just say what a bunch of stars my revs and bens officers are (you know who you are) that are wiling to come in that weekend (their choice) to do the programming and runs.

I have been lucky that I have managed to last the year without a cold or other illness (touch wood) so I suppose something had to give. I woke up one Friday morning about four weeks ago with blurred vision (it’s a bit like looking through thick fog) in my left eye. This was after a week of driving all over the country and some long days in the office so I thought I was just tired. By the Monday morning it had gotten to the point that I felt I needed to go to the GP. Coincidentally it was my wedding anniversary and hubby and I were planning a nice meal out. However GP had other ideas and referred me immediately to the eye hospital in Brighton. With fears of hours in the A and E waiting room, we hastily had a bag of chips on Wivelsfield station, maybe not the most romantic way of sharing our anniversary, but one we shall remember!

It turns out (two more trips to the eye hospital and an MRI scan that resulted in a performance visit being moved back, later) I have an inflamed optic nerve (long word ending in “itis”!) and it should get better on its own. It is a little better this weekend but I have been avoiding driving any distance and being on the PC too long, so apologies for the delayed update!

I have to go back to the consultant on 6th October, hopefully it will have healed by then and I will get the all clear (pun intended), so that is something in my diary after Conference anyway!

A very light August (thank goodness with rebilling) to follow and then an incredibly busy September. May the sun shine down on you whether you are at home or abroad during the next few summer weeks

Take care

Julie

Photographs from Warsaw ...

Dzien Drobneh! That’s Polish for Hello!!

The last couple of weeks have been quite eventful - apologies for slight delay in updating the blog with words!

19th June was the Welsh conference in Llandrindod Wells. It was very topical with speakers covering a range of areas and it was particularly welcoming to see Dr Brian Gibbons AM from the Welsh Assembly Government taking time from his schedule to address the meeting and talk about the good work that the extra money for take-up initiatives has reaped from the benefit services across Wales.

21st June saw me heading off for Warsaw to the International conference, the morning after my niece’s 40th birthday party (happy belated, Gail!). In our rush to leave the hotel we managed to leave my laptop behind (which was luckily recovered by said niece’s husband - thanks Chris!) which meant I was without the ability to prepare blog while away other than in old fashioned long hand format and as I have been busy with other things I haven’t had a chance to write it up, so here goes …!

We arrived to a lovely spring evening and, having added a couple of days leave to the trip, we were able to enjoy a day sightseeing before the conference started. Sadly the morning of our first full day “off” was rainy and low cloud making everything quite chilly. So besides a trip to the shopping centre we didn’t really do much sightseeing, but the cloud did roll out during the evening and our welcome reception on the 40th (yes 40th!) floor of the hotel did provide some lovely views. Later that evening we ventured to the old town for some dinner and were tempted into a restaurant by a gentleman dressed as a Polish Hussar! He obviously works on commission, as when greeted with 18 of us looking for somewhere to eat he literally jumped for joy!

We had great fun trying to communicate with the staff (our Polish was not quite as good as her English - but you get the point!) our meal preferences and it was a very giggly evening (from all concerned) to say the least.

The Conference itself was Tuesday and Wednesday, with speakers from all over the world talking about property rates and picking up the effect of the recession. The Institute was well represented by Richard Harbord, Carol Cutler, Tom Dixon, Geoff Fisher and Barbara Culverhouse, alongside speakers from Hong Kong, Brazil, China, Canada and - of course - Poland.

The conference concluded with IPTI president Jerry Grad and myself rounding up with a few comments on the papers and overall theme. On the Wednesday evening we had a dinner with the IPTI colleagues and afterwards went in search of the ice bar. It wasn’t quite Scott of the Antarctic, but the original group of 14 whittled down to 10 by the time we reached the bar and then it was great fun … Donning duvet type cloaks we entered what can only be described as a meat locker with ice statues in the corner. It was -8c in the room. We all had a vodka shot (cherry, yummy!) and then threw our glasses (which were ice not glass) on to the floor!!
This is obviously a Polish tradition - it was funny and there are photos to prove that we all had a very merry 15 minutes or so in the room.

Most of the group left the following day, but I had a meeting with the Polish Minister who wanted to talk about property tax reform in light of the conference, it was a good liaison and hopefully Geoff Fisher and myself represented the Institute well. We flew home Friday after spending Thursday afternoon in the old town and in Warsaw’s museums. It is a beautiful city and well worth a visit.

On the Saturday we picked up the new puppy, who is a delight and watched while he terrorised our three year old Golden Retriever, but they have quickly settled in to a sibling rivalry relationship!

The following week saw the start of the performance awards visits for myself and Chief Executive David Magor. We drove through the most awful storm on the M6 - I have never seen rain like it! We were down to 10 miles an hour! The visits are proving that the standards are as high as ever and whittling down the entrants to a small number for the final is not going to be easy!

Then last week was the council round and annual reception. I do hope those who went enjoyed themselves and had a good time on the Monday evening. We were at the London Transport Museum and it was really good. The band Perfidia worked really well in the atmosphere and it was an excellent evening.

The day was long as we had Committee meetings from 10.00 that morning and Council the following morning followed by the Past Presidents’ (and honorary members’) luncheon in Simpsons on the Strand. I very almost got to speak to one of my favourite authors Terry Pratchett as I was leaving. He was only two people in front of me (having been addressing a separate luncheon) at the restaurant, but as it was tipping with rain everyone was standing on the entrance steps and wouldn’t get out of the way, by the time I had “excused - me” free of the crowd he was just a figure in a black hat hurrying down the road. Ah well ….almost!

That about brings you up to date, I am in the office this week mostly, waiting to see whether I have to re-bill for Council Tax as Surrey Police Authority have had their capping order laid by Parliament. There should be a judicial review hearing and then we will know whether or not it is required, whoever said life in local government was dull????

Final reminder - the sleepwalk is this weekend, if you would like to sponsor me please visit my just giving website : www.justgiving.com/julieholden1

Many thanks to those that have already done so - we are doing very well against the overall target, but a little more will be most gladly accepted. If you are coming down for the walk, see you there!!!

IRRV Annual Reception 2009

Julie hosted last night's IRRV Annual Reception at the London Transport Museum. Julie's full report on this will follow in due course, but, meantime, here are a few photographs from a highly successful reception.

Greetings bloggers!

Well it has been a very busy couple of weeks! I see it is three weeks since I last updated the blog, so here goes:

Where have I been and what have I been up to?

W/C 25th May

A rare chance to put my feet up on the Monday (bank holiday) but as I had only returned from Seville on the Sunday it wasn’t much of a weekend - still it was a chance to catch up on the washing and ironing pile which had reached mammoth proportions!

I was in the office most of the week with a trip to the LGA for the Benefits POG meeting on Wednesday and a teleconference for the publication sub committee on Thursday.

On the Saturday it took me nearly 3 hours to get from my home to Twickenham as I had picked a day when the Rugby was on and the roads were closed - great combination! The 56 miles was great for the first 45 - the last 9 – not so good!! Note to self - check sporting features before setting out in future.

Sunday 31st I was off to Harrogate (so no weekend for me!), I had also volunteered to run the Sunday School for church where we talked about Pentecost and had great fun pretending to be the wind and then talking in different languages (well saying hello anyway - I think we came up with about 10 “languages” that we could say hello in – the kiddies liked G’Day best and kept saying this is faux Australian accents, although they gave the Chinese a good run for its money too).

Sunday afternoon and most of Monday was spent with the merry gang of the Performance Awards Panel. For those of you who entered - you will now know if you have made it to the long list (visiting stages). There were some crackingly good entries and it was tough to whittle the visits down to a manageable level. There are some great innovations and ideas out there and I will admit that I thoroughly enjoy being involved with this process (I have been a visiting panel member for about 5 years although this is my first time on the decision making group) and really look forward to finding new ideas and opportunities that I can take back to my own LA. This year has not disappointed! I shall report more as we go through the year as obviously I can’t discuss too much at this point.

Tuesday 2nd June saw the start of the Collection and Enforcement conference. Record numbers of delegates in the hottest week of the year so far. The programme, speakers and event was the best I have attended. I enjoyed it and once again picked up lots of tips and thoughts as to the development of my own services at TDC.
I have learned a very valuable lesson not to prompt a question from certain members of the VOA. Those of you who were in the audience and heard the questions after Robert Brown’s paper will know what I mean, I can only advise that I am on the lookout for an opportunity to get my own back!

Wednesday night I drove home and was in the office Thursday before flying off to Northern Ireland for the Belfast conference on Friday. We had an informal dinner with the executive on Thursday night which was lovely and honorary member Billy Jenkins presented me with a lovely Tyrone Crystal bowl engraved with a remembrance for the visit.

The day conference on Friday was again attended by some great papers and involvement from the floor. The conference attracted practitioners and Councillors and therefore the views and pressures were diverse. It was an excellent day, with updates on legislation, A2B benefit take up, potential reform of rates and discounts and even the future role of water rates.

Flying home was a peaceful experience, although a little bumpy (the weather was terrible), but the Thursday flight over had about 60 children from St Francis Primary School in Lurgan aboard, so anything by comparison was going to be quiet! To be fair the children were well behaved on the flight, if a little over exuberant on reclaiming luggage at the terminal!

Sunday saw the first of the rehearsals for this summers Pewmongers production (who said weekends are for sleeping???????), so bang went another day!

Monday – Thursday were office days, but I had meetings for various other reasons every evening, including an executive meeting on Wednesday night where Sussex and Surrey decided its programme for next year. We are sticking with the four meetings schedule we had this year, but we are also going to arrange some informal social get togethers, maybe a quiz in a pub or night at the dogs, just some opportunities to meet other members across the counties (we cover three counties) and to engender some more interest in the local association on a different level. So watch out on the website and your email boxes as we try to arrange events for you.

Friday was a trip to my old stamping ground of Dorchester (I worked for West Dorset DC for 3 years in the 90s) to attend the Wessex AGM at Kingston Maurwood. I was due to leave there and return to Worthing where David Magor and Gary Watson were taking each other on at a mock VT for the Sussex and Surrey Association. Both events were excellent although sadly due to timing going a little awry (technical hitches) at Wessex I was a little late leaving and got caught up I early weekend traffic so I did not make it to the meeting in Worthing. I did catch up with the parties concerned however later that evening and heard all about it!

My thanks to David and Gary, Richard Guy, Bill Lovell and Ian Nisbet for taking roles at the “VT” and making it not only instructive but also an enjoyable afternoon.

Saturday and Sunday I finally managed to catch up with some friends that I haven’t seen for a while as it was our village fete, Mum and Dad popped down as well and helped out. Sunday afternoon I managed to deliver a birthday present (2 weeks late) to another friend and have a brief catch up with her.

This week sees me in the office until Wednesday when I shall wend my may to Llandrindod Wells for the Welsh Conference and then this weekend it is off to Warsaw for the International conference

Finally a happy first wedding anniversary to my friends Sarah and Steve, sadly “Presidenting” has meant I have seen little of them this year, but hope you had a lovely day!
I’ll update again after Warsaw - until then enjoy the sun …

Northern Ireland Presidential Visit

Two additional photos of rather better quality (thanks Colin!) added 20th June - of Julie addressing the conference and at presentation with Northern Ireland Association :

Original uploads - 16th June :

Above : Presentation to Julie by Northern Ireland Association. From left - Colin Wilkinson, Julie, Michael Martin and Billy Jenkins.
Above : Northern Ireland Conference 2009.

Above : Conference top table - from left - Julie, Zoe Anderson (speaker), Colin Wilkinson and Alderman Arnold Hatch (NILGA).

Above : Julie addresses the IRRV Northern Ireland Annual Dinner guests.

North Wales AGM - photo!

Julie presents a Certificate of service to long serving member of the Association Colin Bailey

Hola pur Espana

I am writing this blog update from the General Council of The European Group of Valuers Associations (TEGoVA) Spring meeting in Seville. The IRRV is a member of TEGoVA and the Chairman is the Institute Council’s own Roger Messenger.

Then reason for my attendance at the meeting was to receive the accreditation of the Institute to award the Recognised European Valuer status. The IRRV is the only Institute in the UK to have received this accreditation and we are pleased to be able to offer this international standard to qualifying valuers to give them a Europe wide recognised practicing standard.

The Seville trip was three days of meetings (Thursday – Saturday) and there was a banquet on the second night where we wandered the streets of Seville to find the Pallacio Libjia where the banquet was held. Amusingly our own provision was held up temporarily by a procession of children who were having their Holy Week celebrations. Now, of course, Holy Week in the Christian Church is held the week before Easter, but in Spain (corresponding with the week of the ascension) the school children have their own processions. These processions include the carrying of large platforms that need about 8 teenagers to stand beneath and raise them high above the crowd as the process. The platforms contain effigies of the Virgin Mary or symbols such as the Cross. Behind these “platforms” march bands or simply hoards of children. It was a little bizarre as, once you clear one of these processions, you come upon another one!

Chairman Roger Messenger, having complained that there was no marmalade to be found for breakfast (and after all this is Seville), was duly presented with three jars by the Leandro from the Spanish delegation at the banquet dinner!!

Prior to going to Seville I had a couple of days visiting different parts of the UK to continue with attending AGMs. Thursday last week I was back in Southport for the Lancashire and Cheshire AGM, this was a well attended meeting which saw Linda Price become President of the Association for the second time taking over from Claire Jenkins. Following the meeting we had a delightful lunch where we were joined by some former members and partners of members. It was a lovely luncheon after which I drove to North Wales for an overnight stay before the North Wales AGM. The hotel was absolutely charming and is winning the stakes of the Presidential year for best local hotel. If you find yourself in St Asaph I cannot recommend the Tarlady Hotel highly enough.

The meeting itself saw me able to carry out one of the most pleasurable of duties for a President when attending the local associations, that of presenting a certificate of service to long serving member of the Association Colin Bailey. Colin had stood down the previous year as Treasurer after many years service to the committee. Being able to honour the support that many local members give at a local level is a source of great pride to both the Institute and myself personally. I do urge you to please put in to Council for recognition of these long serving “unsung heroes” of the Institute. We want to honour them - however if you don’t tell us who they are it is not possible.

Tuesday saw a meeting at Doughty Street to help firm up the new diploma qualification framework and syllabus. I am pleased to say progress was made and we remain on track to deliver this new qualification this autumn.

Wednesday lunchtime was the turn of the Benefit Faculty Board to meet by teleconference. The meeting agreed to take forward the research projects previously identified and noted the progress on gathering the background and existing material that is available in the public domain. The board also noted that following a review of co-options two new co-optees would be joining the board from the July meeting.

That is about it bringing you up to date. I should get home Sunday evening and can relax on the bank holiday before it is back to work on Tuesday. Before my next blog update the IRRV June exams will have taken place. I want to wish all of you (and my teenager at home - Matt - doing his A levels this summer, already under way) the very best of luck, I know that come August we will have some great results for all of you!

Until next update, take care!

Northern Counties Seminar

Above : Seminar Dinner

Above : Julie addresses the seminar

Greetings Bloggers ...

The sun is finally shining on a Sunday afternoon, birds are singing and the spring flowers are pushing their way through the earth in to bloom…. bliss. Sadly not a lazy Sunday afternoon for me, as I have only recently returned from Yorkshire this lunchtime and I am hoping to catch up on some work before going back to the office tomorrow.

Keele Week was good fun and also a lot of hard work for students and teachers alike. While the students were revising for the examinations, a different group came together to undertake the management course. The course was lead by Carol Cutler, Richard Harbord, David Magor, Allan Traynor and myself. We asked the four groups to develop a recession busting action plan for a fictional authority (Oxbourne BC) and then lobbed in a few set backs along the way (such as a local business with 5 000 employees going bust). At the end of two and half days the four groups came together and presented to the “board” their plans. All were insightful and there were a lot of very good ideas put forward that had merit. The winning team were “red team” and they have each won a conference package prize, although as we are changing the format a little this year, there will be no presentation from the winning team at the annual conference. I found it valuable and the comments from the delegates all seemed to have found some elements very useful.

Keele was rounded off with the Thursday night dinner held in the renovated rooms in Keele Hall and a fantastic evening was laid on. Of course the “entertainment package” was well worth waiting for with Britain’s got no talent, proving this point with attempts on the world record for eating Ferrero Rocher chocolates - a gallant failure from Phil Triggs who only managed two (but counted these on his abacus all the same), Susan Boyle-Chapman made an appearance and wowed the judges but it was Fraud lecturer John Rosenbloom who won the night with a (quite good really!) rendition of Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Boxer” following an arbitrary decision from the Institute’s own controversial judge Mr David “how did Simon Cowell make his millions?” Magor.

Following the contest “Fern Cotton-Lee” and “Holly WilloWatson” handed over to “Almost no Girls Allowed” to belt out their recent hit “Promise.” I think the less said about certain male council members’ affiliation for heels and long wigs, probably the better. I have posted some pictures to “prove the point” for those of you of strong constitution who were not present!

This week I have been able to have a couple of days at work (as a bank holiday got in the way) where we had our use of resources challenge from our external auditors. It is certainly going to be tough to maintain our high score of last year, but once we all got together and started brain storming the progress and outcomes delivered, it was pleasantly surprising as to how much we have done in the past year. Fingers crossed that the auditors thought so anyway!

Thursday afternoon I left work early to drive up to Chester-le-Street for Friday’s Northern Counties seminar and informal dinner. The seminar had over a hundred delegates and it really seemed a worthwhile day, discussing aspects of the recession and other topical Revs and Bens matters (despite the IT proving challenging all day with the mic’s not sure if they wanted to work or not! Reg Bascombe (Northern Counties President) did an excellent job of handling the unpredictability of these presentation aides! The venue for both the seminar and dinner was the Riverside Ground, home of Durham County Cricket in Chester-le-Street. It was the most gorgeous setting with Lumley castle up on the hillside overlooking the ground.

We were staying at a charming hotel in Beamish where suits of armour greeted you as your first visual as you walked through the door and on Thursday night (as we were waiting to go to the dinner) we were besieged by about 200 youngsters having their school prom. To say that some of the girls outfits looked like they had fallen off a Christmas tree would be an understatement! But they all looked like they were determined to have a great time and there couldn’t have been any limos available for hire in the area as getting out of the car park due to the presence of umpteen limos was quite a challenge. Some as big as coaches! We were even treated to an appearance by “The Stig” as one young man was dropped off by the helmet clad driver in his silver Porsche! (See picture below).

Saturday saw us wend our way down to Hollins Hall for the Yorkshire and District Annual Dinner. This successful association put on a great evening through the hard work of the executive officers lead by President Lisa Rawson and Social Secretary John Clark. With dinner (including an enormous yorkshire pudding – well what else would you expect ?), all speeches, toasts, the quiz (we came second, pipped by one point, much to the Chief Exec’s chagrin) and raffle out of the way, we did get down to some serious dancing and had a great time on the dance floor until the wee small hours. My thanks to the association for entertaining us so well yesterday. We had a great time. Lisa raised over £250 for her charity the Bluebell World Children’s hospice in Sheffield - thanks to the generosity of the guests.

This week sees yet more AGMs and trips to the west of the country and in to Wales. I look forward to bringing you up to date on these and other matters as they unfold!

"The Stig" and Durham CC ground

Photos from Keele

With thanks to Sue Williams-Lee! Above : Not many girls allowed!

Above : Susan Boyle - Chapman!
Above : One ferrero ... two

Latest update from Julie!

Pitter pat little April showers….. I hope that you are all managing to dodge the rain drops that seem to have swept the country over the past few days.

I have decided that being Institute President means that you move too quickly to be rained on anyhow!!

Since my last update I have started the AGM attendances for the associations. The first (as they seem to be first with most events) was the East Midlands on 15th April. Leicester I am afraid was a mass of road works, but I picked my way along to the glorious old town hall building, it is so nice to still see some of these housing local government as so many offices are modern buildings. Leicester Town Hall was undergoing a lick of paint but all the same it was a friendly and familiar feeling.

The Friday after, I attended my own AGM of Sussex and Surrey Association. We run our AGM as a normal meeting as well as having the President speak and election of officers we also have a guest speaker for a topical subject. This one saw Geoff Fisher SVP give an update on the 5 “R’s” (Recession, Revaluation, empty Rates, Regeneration and Rent service). Geoff felt that the change to the values on revaluation may well mean that the poundage (multiplier) will need to drop steeply to keep the overall contribution to the fund even. He remains quite confident that we will have a transitional relief scheme for the new list however … oh joy!

Monday 20th was a teleconference for the LTR faculty board. Despite various people calling in from laybys and “borrowed” offices, it was a good meeting and we were able to discuss some of the current issues affecting the revenues world. Particular concern was raised over the anticipated legislation concerning deferment of rates. The board has prepared an initial briefing paper to send in to CLG raising queries that we hope will be addressed when the legislation is finally released in July. Failure to address issues such as what happens if someone on the deferment scheme vacates during the period, and how should the pool be accounted for and contributions made in respect of these deferred amounts could lead to a real quagmire for administrators. We hope that the department will address all of our issues!

Tuesday 21st saw me arrive a little late for the London and Home Counties AGM due to my misjudging the time to take the changed route on the Thameslink train in to the City. Luckily they delayed the start of the meeting until my arrival and we finished almost on time! The meeting saw the installation of former Council Member Peter Scrafton as Chairman for the year.

Wednesday morning I was off to South Wales (Swansea) for lunch with the executive and AGM. Determined that I would not be late I gave myself an hour and half more than the journey time, thinking I could get a little retail therapy in before, however the accident on the M4 leading in to London meant that it took me 2 hours to get on to the M4 when this would normally be 50 minutes. I arrived in Swansea with 15 minutes to spare and the shoe shopping was therefore abandoned!

I listened to the Budget for part of the journey but it was the following day before I read the paper and picked up on the matters that affect us. I was very puzzled at the Chancellor's comment that LAs have had no increase in caseloads although the benefit expenditure has gone up. I am sure that all of our statistics disprove this. I may well be writing to the Chancellor to point this and a few other inconsistencies out!

I think that brings you up to date. I am off to Keele this week (students have been there since Saturday) for the spring revision course. Clearly this is a major week for our students preparing for the June exams and I shall enjoy spending a few days with them. Of course I wish them all the very best of luck in the forthcoming exams, but then hard work and dedication (demonstrated by all students that I meet) pays off too!!

London and Home Counties AGM - pictures