Minutes EC meeting 13th April 2023

We agreed to share the presentations with online participants in the conference. The video recording is incomplete and includes views of the online observers. Brian has created a page to share the presentations and audio content to fulfil our commitment made at the conference. The page is not on the website and can only be viewed with a link which could be shared with those who registered for the conference online.
Covered by the agenda

CAF Bank £12268.22

PayPal £ 1821.29

Total £14089.51

We have renewed our subscription to Zoom for £143.88

Our Insurance is due for renewal at the end of this month and the premium will be £223

Maria Faraone has offered to host a future event at Oxford Brookes University.
Brian suggested that we might have local events, such as writing and film making workshops repeated at different locations such as Oxford, the North East, Cambridge, Brighton.
Candace had taken up the offer from the tribunal judge who spoke at the Liverpool conference to bring young showmen learn more about the courts and legal professionals.
Candace suggested we needed more strategic planning and suggested having an in-house standing youth council to discuss the direction ACERT should be going. We need to apply for funding and build a structure acceptable to fundraisers. She suggested devoting an EC meeting to a discussion of these issues.

General agreement that we need greater clarity about our objectives, and the need to include more young people.
One of our strengths is our responsiveness to events, such as request for expert witness to support Romanian Roma asylum claim (taken up by Colin)
Suggestion that Candace and Lisa might meet online to discuss how we might structure a discussion about the future direction of travel.

On 8th of March we celebrated International Women’s Day with powerful contributions from Violet Cannon of York Travellers Trust, who talked about Partnership with the Princess Trust and Youth Voice projects, Raine Geoghegan who shared poems and monologue for International Women’s Day and Declan O’Driscoll of The Traveller Movement who introduced their report Disrupting the School to Prison Pipeline.
The meeting was well attended and there was a stimulating discussion involving many participants. The network seems to be finding its role.
The next two meetings are 26th April and 7th June. In April, John Henry Philips, Davie Donaldson and Richard Kerridge will be talking about Romani archaeology, preserving Nawkin language and culture and including Gypsies, Roma and Travellers in the curriculum.

This is a key area of ACERT’s work which we should try to link into any restructuring plan.

Please note the changed date

Thursday 18th May at 6pm