Letter to the FRA Chairman

[rgal]

Here is the text of an e-mail that I have sent to Tony V.

Dear Tony Varley,

Firstly, thank you and the rest of my elected committee for the work you have done in relation to the ballot on FRA affiliation to UKA, as well as the rest of committee business that you are involved in.
This missive is to ask if the results of how everyone voted in the aforementioned ballot are going to be made public? By this I mean the actual members who voted and how they voted, rather than the overall outcome. The ballot paper contained both the name and the membership number of each person, it seems reasonable to assume that computing will be used to make sure that votes are not counted twice. I expect that you folk will have two columns on a spreadsheet containing the names and membership numbers, the columns corresponding to the Yes/No options on the ballot form. Thus, enabling the spreadsheet to sum the columns as you enter the votes beside the name & number of those members who voted.

There have been postings on the FRA website forum suggesting that members’ names and membership numbers were on the ballot papers to ensure that FRA members did not vote more than once. I choose to dismiss this idea, for it would mean that my elected committee did not trust me, or trust other members of the FRA. Personally, I would find the idea that my elected committee did not trust me as being an indefensible sleight. Furthermore, if it was the case that the committee did not trust the integrity of the membership, this would lead to the hilarious syllogism:

The FRA committee does not trust the ordinary membership of the FRA.
The FRA committee is drawn from the ordinary membership of the FRA.
Therefore, the FRA committee does not trust the FRA committee.

Now, obviously I cannot conscience that such a state of affairs pertains within my FRA committee. This leads me to the conclusion that all the personal detail on the ballot papers was there to help with the computing of the result. And as there is no reason for anyone to be anonymous there is no reason not to publish the way that those who voted, actually voted. After all, at an AGM or EGM, everyone votes openly with a show of hands. Also, people can then check that there own personal vote was entered correctly: a win-win situation for all concerned.

Looking forward to see how everyone voted.

Yours sincerely,

Ronnie Gallagher

[Wheeze]

Ronnie, what, exactly, was the point of that?

[eccentric]

wtf????

[rossendalemark]

interesting . I suppose it will open up another debate.

[FellShoeShuffler]

Don't you think Tony has a hard enough job or what?

[Swoop]

Here is the text of an e-mail that I have sent to Tony V.

Hopefully it will be placed in the spam folder and deleted!

[rgal]

Ronnie, what, exactly, was the point of that?

Self-evidently, it asks for the results, including who voted and which way they voted, to be made available. Also, it points out that the use of computers to work out the results seems the best rationale for having all the membership details on the form.

[daz h]

Ronnie do we really have to start bickering about trust and the commitee
they do a bloody good job
whats the problem, jeez this is gonna get nasty if we cant have trust

carry on commitee your doing a great job

[rgal]

Don't you think Tony has a hard enough job or what?

Well, perhaps you have failed to understand what I wrote, obviously use of computing will make Tony's job much easier. Also, refer to the reply to Wheeze.

[rgal]

Ronnie do we really have to start bickering about trust and the commitee
they do a bloody good job
whats the problem, jeez this is gonna get nasty if we cant have trust

carry on commitee your doing a great job

Nowhere did I write that I do not trust the committee. Quite the opposite, in fact.