Gay Outdoor Club Limited Annual Report and Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 December 2021 ## **Gay Outdoor Club Limited** Company registration number 8020133 Charity registration number 1158873 # **Annual Report and Financial Statements Year Ended 31 December 2021** ## **Trustees’ Report** ## **Reference and administrative details** The Gay Outdoor Club Limited is a company limited by guarantee. It is known as the Gay Outdoor Club, frequently abbreviated to GOC. Company registration number: 08020133 Charity registration number: 1158873 Registered office: 27 Old Gloucester Street, London, WC1N 3AX The following persons served as Trustees during the reporting period, they served for the entire year except where noted: Mr P.B. Blackburn Chairman Mr J. Donald Miss A. Evans Mr C Marshall Resigned 11/04/2021 Mr O.P. Morris Resigned 31/10/2021 Mr I. Rose Secretary Mr R. Sheldon Treasurer Mr E. Voelcker Bankers: Lloyds Bank Plc, Tonbridge, Kent; The Bank of Scotland, Dava, Moray Accountant: Oasis Accounting Ltd, 49 Verdayne Avenue, Shirley, Croydon, CR0 8TW Page 1of 4 Gay Outdoor Club Limited Annual Report and Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 December 2021 ## **Structure, governance and management** The Gay Outdoor Club existed as an unincorporated club from 1974.On the 4th April 2012 it was incorporated as a company limited by guarantee and on the 16th October 2014, it was registered as a charity. The charity is governed by the articles of association of the company which were last revised on the 28th September 2014 (that revision amended the objects clause at the request of The Charity Commission). Trustees of the charity, who are all unpaid members of the Company, are appointed by the members at the annual general meeting. Trustees are all subject to re-election each year. Trustees are also Directors of the Company. A further three members perform tasks nationally but choose not to serve as Trustees. The club operates through 30 local groups, covering every part of Great Britain, and six specialist groups which organise specific activities not normally offered by the local groups. Each group has one or more member to coordinate it and all events are organised by the groups. In most years, the ‘Annual Outdoor Gathering’, during which the AGM is held, is organised by the Trustees. In 2021 however, our South Midlands group took on the whole organisation of this complex weekend event, consulting with the Trustees as necessary. All of the activities of the club are organised by members on a voluntary basis. We do not employ any paid staff to do this. In particular, no remuneration or expenses was paid to any Trustee except for the re-imbursement of payments made on the charity’s behalf or of necessary travel costs when travelling on the business of the charity. We do, however, pay our webmaster (now our former webmaster) as a contractor, to maintain and upgrade the website as required. ## **Financial review** Taking into account that the club does not experience significant periods of negative cash flow and that income is reasonably predictable, the reserves policy is to aim for reserves of between three and six months of total turnover. As we stated in our report for 2019, our reserves had grown to an amount greater than that set out in our reserves policy. At the board meeting held in April 2020, the trustees decided that it would not make sense for the club to invest its reserves in trying to promote the club during a period when we were unable to operate. We did, however, take the decision to compensate its members by reducing the cost of both membership fees and magazine subscriptions by 50 per cent for the period from 13th April 2020 to 12th April 2021. Early in 2021, with the club having only been able to operate intermittently, the trustees agreed to extend this concession to 12th April 2022. The trustees aimed, once we began to emerge from the Covid crisis, to expend a significant portion of its excess reserves on revitalising and promoting the club, and possibly expanding its activities. In order to do this, we set up a marketing committee under the leadership of former treasurer Edward Voelcker, who had rejoined the board following a period of working outside the UK. The committee began by developing policies on diversity and inclusion, in order to help the club appeal to a wider spectrum of the LGBT community. As this process took rather longer than we had hoped, we are only now beginning to use some of our reserves to actively promote the club. We expect to report on this next year. Page 2of 4 Gay Outdoor Club Limited Annual Report and Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 December 2021 The position with the club’s website remains much as it we stated in our 2019 report. Although there are problems with the booking system, there are no ways of dealing with these that fit in with the website’s overall architecture. As a result, we are making minor upgrades on an ongoing basis, but we currently have no plans for any major investment in our online infrastructure. The charity has no reserved funds and does not act as custodian trustee for others. ## **Public benefit statement** The charity trustees have complied with their duty to have due regard to the guidance on public benefit published by The Charity Commission in exercising their powers or duties. ## **Objectives and activities** The Objects of the company are: _To provide or assist in the provision of facilities in the interests of social welfare for recreation or other leisure time occupation of any individuals who have need of such facilities especially, but not exclusively, gay men and women with the object of improving their conditions of life._ The charity achieves its objectives by organising events, which are primarily outdoor recreational activities. ## **Achievements and performance** During 2021, the Club organised more than 400 events. Although this is well below the almost 600 events that we ran in 2019, as we were unable to operate for the first three months of 2021, we believe that the numbers are quite encouraging. One area of concern is that only 13 of these were of more than one day’s duration. As we emerge fully from the pandemic, we will need to look to increase this number. As usual, walking accounted for the largest number of events with 368, which broke down as easy 121, moderate 232, and difficult 15. This includes 20 mountain walks, most of which were classed as difficult, the remainder as moderate. Social with 26 events and cycling, with 13, were the next largest categories. Camping & caravanning, climbing, caving and skiing made up the rest. Swimming, which contributed nearly 50 events in 2019, was completely wiped out. At this point, we need to note that when we emerged from the first lockdown in July 2020, because of restrictions to inhibit the spread of Covid-19, we had to change the way in which the club operated. We had to abandon our policy of ‘Turn Up and Go’ which had been one of the club’s unique selling points for many years. Instead, we had to restrict GOC events to people who had registered on the website as members, (either fully paid up or on a free trial). In addition, a member wishing to attend a particular GOC event then had had to book their place in advance. This enabled us to meet the requirements (a) to restrict the number of people taking part in any given event and (b) to keep a record of those attending each GOC event. Although these restrictions were gradually eased over time, especially in respect of numbers, the restriction to members only and the requirement to book in advance remained in place throughout this reporting period. We are extremely grateful to our group coordinators and event leaders for their efforts, not simply to get things up and running again when lockdowns ended, but to accommodate as many participants as possible, for example, by splitting a walk into two or more groups, with a maximum of six people in each, with the groups departing at 30-minute intervals. Page 3of 4 ## Gay Outdoor Club Limited Annual Report and Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 December 2021 Following the launch of our new website, we have continued to improve and develop it as the main repository for information about the Club and its activities. In addition, around one third of members opt to receive a professionally printed magazine which is paid for by a separate subscription. In order to meet the costs of running the charity, participants in our various activities are encouraged to join as members. On 1st January 2021, the club had 1214 paying members, 61 complimentary members and 78 members on a free trial, making a total of 1353 active members. By 31st December 2021, there were 1397 paying members, 59 complimentary members and 128 members on a free trial, bringing the total number of active members to 1584. This represents an increase of 17.1% over the course of the year, which is most encouraging. We believe that this increase is due in part to the new website and the changes that we’ve made in our joining procedure, as well as to the fantastic work being done by our group coordinators and event leaders in increasing both the number and the range of events that we put on. Approved by the Board on 25th June 2020 and signed on their behalf: P. B. 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