Trustees' Report
Year ending 31 October 2025 u3a Watford Park Reqistered Charitv No. 1123484
The Trustees present their report and accounts for the year to 31'[1] October 2025
Structure, Governance and Management
The charity is controlled by Trustees who serve for three years following election at the AGM. This Executive Committee {EC) meets monthly.
The committee for the period were as follows;
Ronald Duckling {EC member and acting Co-Chair- Elected as an ordinary member in January 2024 and co-opted as chair and later as co-chair)
Angela Franklin (elected Co-chair)
Andrew Robertson (Vice Chair)
Ingrid Brady (EC Member, Joint Membership Secretary and later acting Secretary)
Colin Miller (EC member and Joint Membership Secretary, but resigned during the year) Tim Rhodes (Treasurer)
Alan Rose (EC member and Social Secretary) Alison Kallsen (EC Member and Speaker Secretary)
Janet Reynolds (EC Member and Webmaster) Zoe Mowbray (EC Member) Laura Mead (EC Member and Membership Secretary) Rosemary Wingham (Co-opted EC Member and acting Secretary)
At the 2025 AGM, we were unable to find a volunteer to be Chair so it was agreed that we would try sharing the role. Angela Franklin was elected as Co-chair and Ron Duckling (already an EC Member and Minutes Secretary) was co-opted as the other Co-chair. It was hoped that Angela would go on to be elected as Chair at the 2026 AGM. However, the experiment did not work well and it was found that the role of chair is difficult to share. Angela has decided to step down at the 2026 AGM for personal reasons.
Laura Mead was elected as an EC Member at the 2025 AGM with a wish to take over the role of Membership Secretary once it became available. With the resignation of Colin Miller in Feb 2025 on grounds of ill health, Ingrid Brady decided to relinquish the role of Membership Secretary to Laura as from Feb 2025.
Ingrid Brady was co-opted as Secretary for a second year at the Feb 2025 EC meeting, but for personal reasons will have to leave the EC after the 2026 AGM. We are fortunate that Rosemary Wingham came along during the year to take on the role of Secretary from Ingrid and Rosemary was co-opted as Acting Secretary at the October 2025 EC meeting. She was to be formally proposed for election to the post at the 2026 AGM but is now unable to take on the role so we have a vacancy for a Secretary.
As a result, we finished the year with a full committee and all officer roles filled, and we now have a nomination for the role of Chair at the AGM in January 2026.
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Trustees' Report Year ending 31 October 2025 u3a Watford Park Rec:iistered Charity No. 1123484
We were forced by our venue to move our monthly meeting date from a Tuesday to a Thursday and it was feared that we would lose members as a result. In fact, it was true that some people were unable to make the new dates, but others were able to attend who previously could not, so attendances at monthly meetings remained at the same level as before.
Achievements and Performance
The closure of the Outings Group, Theatre Group and the very popular Garden Group and its committee during Covid caused us to elect a Social Secretary, Alan Rose, to organise and oversee events. This has proved very successful and he arranged a number of educational coach trips and theatre trips for members. Consequently, the number of events has increased significantly. In addition, other non-committee members have organised events, particularly Marion McCrindle, the previous chair, who has arranged a series of London walks and theatre events, both in London and more locally. Disappointingly, although the Watford Colosseum has reopened after refurbishment, it is unlikely that we will be organising future visits for members. Although the venue provides a wide range of performances and events, the booking arrangements are difficult to use. Booking is only possible using a telephone app and tickets must be stored on a mobile telephone. This is not suitable for our age group, many of whom do not have a mobile telephone or, if they do, are not comfortable with using it in this way.
We also provided two garden trips, organised by members of the defunct garden group and Andrew Spanner repeated the coach trip for a week at a different Warners hotel, which included day trips out to cities and towns in the vicinity of the hotel.
Our monthly meetings continue to be well-attended and we are grateful to our Speaker Secretary, Alison Kallsen, for some excellent speakers providing interesting and educational talks. Most of the speakers for the next year are already arranged so we expect to retain that high level of interest in the monthly meetings.
We also had our annual variety show, organised by the Entertainers Group, and hosted by Alan Rose, which provided a wide range of performances, giving its members a chance to display their many talents.
Membership
The membership continues to rise slowly and we have had discussions to agree a way of increasing membership further, to try to reach the almost 500 members we had during the preCovid years. We want more members to boost membership of our interest groups without increasing membership numbers to the point where we would have to turn people away from our monthly meetings. The membership at the end of the financial year was 422, although we do expect that some members will not renew for a variety of reasons.
We continue to use the Simple Membership computer system and its associated website for
managing our membership systems, communications and our interest groups. The system has proved robust over the years and is providing useful facilities for all members. Unfortunately, not all of our members are happy working online, just as many still resist online banking and insist on the use of cheques for payments.
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Reaistered Charitv No. 1123484
u3a Watford Park
Trustees' Report
Year ending 31 October 2025
We are still finding that people are reluctant to volunteer, even for simple tasks such as setting out chairs at monthly meetings. We have been fortunate in filling committee roles, apart from the Secretary, but have struggled to find helpers for non-committee activities, and particularly for leaders and hosts of interest groups
Interest Groups
We currently have almost 60 interest groups covering a wide range of subjects. Our Interest Group Coordinator (David Silver) was successful in setting up some new groups, and had interest from members for many more. Unfortunately, as mentioned above, there is a reluctance to volunteer to run or host groups. David had decided to stand down, but has now agreed to continue in the role and has had some early and welcome success. Interest Groups are at the heart of the u3a and it is important to provide a varied and interesting range of such activities for our members into the future.
As mentioned last year, we do find that new recruits to the u3a see us as a service, asking what we can provide, rather than asking what they can do to help. The ethos of the u3a is that we learn from one another, which is the principle which we try to impart to our members, and particularly those who have recently joined.
Policy Development
During the year, we started a complete review of all policies and procedures and almost all have been updated to reflect current circumstances. This task will be completed early during the following period.
External
Watford Park u3a continues to work within the local u3a cluster and is a member of the Chair's Forum. Unfortunately, the old Hertfordshire Network of u3as ceased to exist during the Covid years and has not been resurrected. Whilst the Third Age Trust has done some welcome advertising, it is still word-of-mouth which brings members to our u3a and we believe that a wider advertising campaign would benefit the u3a movement as a whole. I recently wrote to the Third Age Trust to ask them to consider a more widespread advertising campaign.
Ron Duckling -Acting Co-Chairman 23 January 2026
Note: For security reasons we will not publish an actual signature on a public document. C1� 6 ) "livs- t--Q2_ o folo r r 2 o 2 c,
u3a Treasurer's Re ort to the Annual General Meetin Financial Year 2024-25 Re istered Charit No. 1123484 Watford Park Income / Expenditure report for October year-end 2025 Recei ts (Main Funds) Membership subscriptions Membership DD (Total men71)cJi-sl?ip subscriptions) Gift aid CAF interest Other (incl donations) Suspense (Sub total Main Funds) { Events) All events YTD 6,973.00 1,967.60 8,940.60 1,610.79 51.28 0.00 152.00 /0 Main 64.84 18.30 14.98 0.48 0.00 1.41 10,754.67 61,952.80 61,952.80 Total income 72,707.47 Payment (Main Funds) St Lukes Speakers OH9 (Newsletter) CAF cheque charges CAF fees TAT capitation fee TAT CLA media licence TAM magazine Web site / Membership system Interest Group support Assets (expensed) Assets (depreciated) Zoom (virtual meetings) Non asset legacy payments EC expenses Prior period adjustments Suspense (Sub total Main Funds) (Events) All events YrD 2,002.72 1,470.56 1,270.40 22.80 60.00 1,628.00 69.37 128.00 622.68 17.50 175.30 1,128.00 386.16 0.00 540.32 40.00 79.50 /0 main 20.77 15.25 13.18 0.24 0.62 16.89 0.72 1.33 6.46 0.18 1.82 11.70 4.01 0.00 5.60 0.41 0.82 9,641.31 56,318.04 56,318.04 Total Expense 65,959.35 C T QknJoJ Net income / expenditure (operations) Net income / expenditure (overall, unadjusted) 1,113.36 6,748.12 C)g 20? Balance at Bank 29,108.12 Net income / expenditure (operations) Net income / expenditure (events) 1,113.36 5,634.76
Watford Park u3a 31 October 2025
1123484
7 to 9
31 October 2025
Dominique Alter MAAT - Association of Accounting Technicians Dominique Rose Limited 119a Oakwood Road, Bricket Wood St Albans, AL2 3QB
The accounts have been prepared on a receipts and payments basis but do not include a separate statement of assets and liabilities as required for receipts and payments accounts. The Treasurer has confirmed that, at 31 October 2025, the charity held a CAF bank balance of £29,108.12 and petty cash of £40, giving total cash funds of £29,148.12. The charity also held equipment and other items for its own use, which were not valued, and the trustees confirmed that there were no material liabilities.