2022-10-31-accounts - North Eastern Railway Association

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Trustees' Annual Report for the period

From

Period start date Period end date Day Month Year Day Month Year 1 November 2021 To 31 October 2022

Section A Reference and administration details

Charity name

North Eastern Railway Association

Other names charity is known by Registered charity number (if any) 1164199

Charity's principal address c/o Darlington Railway Museum

Station Road Darlington Postcode DL3 6ST

Names of the charity trustees who manage the charity

Trustee name	Office (if any)	Dates acted if not for whole year	Name of person (or body) entitled to appoint trustee (ifany)
Andrew Neil Mackay	Chairman		Members of the charity
Christine Joyce Richardson	Treasurer		Members of the charity
John McCree Scott	Secretary		Members of the charity
Keith Richardson			Members of the charity
John George Teasdale			Members of the charity
Christopher John Henderson			Members of the charity
David John Williamson			Members of the charity
Christopher John Lawson		1/11/21 – 9/4/22	Members of the charity
Claire Williamson			Members of the charity
Alan Tully			Members of the charity
John Dilworth Carr			Members of the charity
Ian Watson			Members of the charity

Names of the trustees for the charity, if any, (for example, any custodian trustees)

Name Dates acted if not for whole year

TAR

March 2012

Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)

Type of adviser Name Address

Name of chief executive or names of senior staff members (Optional information)

Section B Structure, governance, and management

Description of the charity’s trusts

Type of governing document Constitution (eg. trust deed, constitution) How the charity is constituted Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO). (eg. trust, association, company)

Trustee selection methods Normally elected by members at the AGM. Exceptionally can be appointed (eg. appointed by, elected by) by the Trustees at one of their meetings.

Additional governance issues (Optional information)

The Association held an Annual General Meeting in April 2022 using You may choose to include Zoom technology. Members who attended were able to use the electronic additional information, where voting facility to take part in any vote on matters requiring their approval. relevant, about:

A ‘Memorandum of Understanding’ was agreed with the Signalling Record
policies and procedures adopted for the induction and Society on the sharing of archive material relating to Signal Box diagrams. training of trustees.
• the charity’s organisational Close contact is being maintained with Darlington Borough Council who plan to redevelop the North Road Station Site (including the building
structure and any wider housing our archive) as the “Rail Heritage Quarter”. Attention is
network with which the charity works. particularly focussed on the potential relocation of all archives on site (including our own) to a different building. A programme of digitisation
• relationship with any related activities is being carried out as mitigation for possible lack of access to parties. some material due to the site redevelopment.
trustees’ consideration of major risks and the system Risk Assessments were carried out for a Railway Walk which took place in and procedures to manage April 2022 and a Hybrid Presentation Meeting at York in October 2022. them. This was in response to the renewal of the Association’s insurance policy for 2022.

TAR

March 2012

Section C Objectives and activities

Section C	Objectives and activities
Summary of the objects of the charity set out in its governing document Summary of the main activities undertaken for the public benefit in relation to these objects (include within this section the statutory declaration that trustees have had regard to the guidance issued by the Charity Commission on public benefit)	The object of the charity is to advance the education of the public in the history of all the railways that have operated in the North East of England, particularly the North Eastern Railway, its constituents, and successors. The charity will achieve this object by: collecting and preserving historical records, regularly publishing a Journal, arranging a programme of meetings/exhibitions, encouraging the construction of accurate models of the railways, encouraging the writing of appropriate books and their publication, and working with public and private bodies such as Community Rail Partnerships and Train Operating Companies, Network Rail, Heritage Railway Associations and Associations representing railway staff.
	Darlington Archives TeamDuring the year 106 queries have been received and dealt with by the Archives Department based at McNay Street in Darlington and 39 through the webpage via the General Secretary, thus making a total of 145 Good progress has been made in ensuring the NERA archives are stored in archive-quality storage boxes, which should greatly improve the preservation of often unique material. This is an ongoing major task. Darlington Borough Council are planning to create a new archive by 2026, to include the NERA archive, but a pre-requisite is that all the NERA archives are in archive-quality storage boxes. As a backlog had built-up, during lockdowns, of newly donated archive material a need for more voluntary effort arose. One area that has been tackled is scanning of images in the archive, such that they can be loaded onto the Digital Archive available to all members. A team of three volunteer members, all remote from the archive premises in Darlington, stepped-up to do this and so far over 4,500 negatives have been scanned and uploaded. Enabling members access to these images across the Internet should help improve accuracy of models and articles. Advertising of Future Programme All the facilities and activities are available to the public and are advertised on the charity’s website (http://www.ner.org.uk) and on the Facebook page:@ The North Eastern Railway Association.

Section C

Objectives and activities

Summary of the objects of
the charity set out in its
governing document
Summary of the main
activities undertaken for the
public benefit in relation to
these objects (include within
this section the statutory
declaration that trustees
have had regard to the
guidance issued by the
Charity Commission on
public benefit)

The object of the charity is to advance the education of the public in
the history of all the railways that have operated in the North East of
England, particularly the North Eastern Railway, its constituents, and
successors. The charity will achieve this object by: collecting and
preserving historical records, regularly publishing a Journal, arranging
a programme of meetings/exhibitions, encouraging the construction of
accurate models of the railways, encouraging the writing of
appropriate books and their publication, and working with public and
private bodies such as Community Rail Partnerships and Train
Operating Companies, Network Rail, Heritage Railway Associations
and Associations representing railway staff.

Darlington Archives TeamDuring the year 106 queries have been
received and dealt with by the Archives Department based at McNay
Street in Darlington and 39 through the webpage via the General
Secretary, thus making a total of 145
Good progress has been made in ensuring the NERA archives are
stored in archive-quality storage boxes, which should greatly improve
the preservation of often unique material. This is an ongoing major
task. Darlington Borough Council are planning to create a new
archive by 2026, to include the NERA archive, but a pre-requisite is
that all the NERA archives are in archive-quality storage boxes.
As a backlog had built-up, during lockdowns, of newly donated
archive material a need for more voluntary effort arose. One area that
has been tackled is scanning of images in the archive, such that they
can be loaded onto the Digital Archive available to all members. A
team of three volunteer members, all remote from the archive
premises in Darlington, stepped-up to do this and so far over 4,500
negatives have been scanned and uploaded. Enabling members
access to these images across the Internet should help improve
accuracy of models and articles.
Advertising of Future Programme
All the facilities and activities are available to the public and are
advertised on the charity’s website (http://www.ner.org.uk) and on the
Facebook page:@ The North Eastern Railway Association.

TAR

March 2012

Additional details of objectives and activities (Optional information)

You may choose to include further statements, where relevant, about:

The charity continues to be run by volunteers and their contribution across the full range of our activities has been essential to the success of the Association during the year.

policy on grant making.
policy programme related investment.
contribution made by volunteers.

Section D Achievements and performance

Summary of the main achievements of the charity during the year

Four issues of our North Eastern Express journal together with four accompanying supplements were published.

Membership The membership currently stands at 641 of which 112 are digital only, meaning those members can receive copies of the North Eastern Express journal online instead of by post, thus saving the cost of postage.

Publications and Sales

A programme for the publication of future books has been developed by the Trustees. This includes agreed datelines, book size and quality of the final printed version.

Sales have continued to progress and have been improving due to the increasing availability of publications and eBooks for sale via the Shop section of the website. Sales stands at NERA live events and Model Railway Exhibitions recommenced because of the lifting of Covid restrictions.

Main Activities

Nine presentations were arranged via Zoom Video technology. The presentations allowed a worldwide audience to participate directly from the comfort of their own homes.

The programme of Railway Walks re-commenced at the end of April 2022, with a walk from Robin Hoods Bay to Whitby. It was well attended by members and their guests.

We returned to a face-to-face/hybrid meeting for a presentation held in October at York. Three separate talks took place on the day, and included the British Transport Police, based in York.

TAR

March 2012

Section E Financial review

The charity holds a reserve fund of £40,000 which is adequate to meet all its obligations in the event of winding up. It has four designated funds for archive acquisitions, membership development and IT development, and publications. At year end, the total value of the designated funds was £32,885

Brief statement of the charity’s policy on reserves £32,885 Details of any funds materially No fund is in deficit in deficit

Further financial review details (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant about:

the charity’s principal sources of funds (including any fundraising).
how expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity.
investment policy and objectives including any ethical investment policy adopted.

Section F Other optional information

Section G Declaration

The trustees declare that they have approved the trustees’ report above.

Signed on behalf of the charity’s trustees

Signature(s) A N Mackay J M Scott Full name(s) Andrew Neil Mackay John McCree Scott Position (e.g., Secretary, Chair, etc) Chairman General Secretary Date 26 November 2022

TAR

March 2012

Receipts and payments account for the year to Receipts Subscriptions Gift Aid Archive Services Publications sales Events and tours Donations Interest received Second hand sales Legacies Grants Miscellaneous income Payments North Eastern Express Publications Show expenses Insurance Archivepurchases Archive expenses Archivepremises Web and IT Administration expenses Members meetings: Events and tours Publicity Donations to others Miscellaneous Expenses Net receipts(payments) Assets and liabilities Bank balances	31st October 2022 2022 2021 Difference £ £ £	31st October 2022 2022 2021 Difference £ £ £	31st October 2022 2022 2021 Difference £ £ £
Subscriptions	£17,403.93	£17,210.52	£193.41
Gift Aid	£2,425.11	£2,578.49	-£153.38
Archive Services	£20.00	£57.00	-£37.00
Publications sales	£6,740.69	£20,718.34	-£13,977.65
Events and tours	-	-	-
Donations	£1,461.13	£1,272.78	£188.35
Interest received	£59.41	£8.50	£50.91
Second hand sales	-	-	-
Legacies	-	-	-
Grants	-	-	-
Miscellaneous income	£262.34	£414.00	-£151.66
	£28,372.61	£42,259.63	-£13,887.02

North Eastern Express	£14,068.12	£12,414.01	£1,654.11
Publications	£2,758.82	£5,480.03	-£2,721.21
Show expenses	£85.55	-	£85.55
Insurance	£401.64	£227.74	£173.90
Archivepurchases	£5,261.89	£1,299.64	£3,962.25
Archive expenses	£475.80	£229.34	£246.46
Archivepremises	£2,570.00	£2,570.00	£0.00
Web and IT	£779.00	£910.84	-£131.84
Administration expenses	£72.30	£695.23	-£622.93
Members meetings:	£36.95	£50.00	-£13.05
Events and tours	-	-
Publicity	-	£250.00	£250.00
Donations to others	-	-
Miscellaneous Expenses	£513.30	£781.44	-£268.14
	£27,023.37	£24,908.27	£2,115.10

Net receipts(payments)	£1,349.24	£17,351.36	-£16,002.12

Bank balances	£97,095.44	£95,746.20	£1,349.24

Independent examiner’s report to the trustees of

North Eastern Railway Association - Charity Number 1164199

On the accounts for the period 1 November 2021 to 31 October 2022

Respective responsibilities of trustees and examiner

The charity's trustees are responsible for the preparation of the accounts. The charity’s trustees consider that an audit is not required for this year under section 144 of the Charities Act 2011 (the Charities Act) and that an independent examination is needed. It is my responsibility to:

Examine the accounts under section 145 of the Charities Act,

To follow the procedures laid down in the general Directions given by the Charity Commission (under section 145(5)(b) of the Charities Act, and

To state whether particular matters have come to my attention.

Basis of independent examiner’s statement

My examination was carried out in accordance with general Directions given by the Charity Commission. An examination includes a review of the accounting records kept by the charity and a comparison of the accounts presented with those records. It also includes consideration of any unusual items or disclosures in the accounts, and seeking explanations from the trustees concerning any such matters. The procedures undertaken do not provide all the evidence that would be required in an audit, and consequently no opinion is given as to whether the accounts present a ‘true and fair’ view and the report is limited to those matters set out in the statement below.

Independent examiner's statement

In connection with my examination, no material matters have come to my attention which gives me cause to believe that in, any material respect:

The accounting records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of the Charities Act; or

The accounts did not accord with the accounting records; or

The accounts did not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair’ view which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination.

I have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached

Signed CW Jagger FCA

Date 29 November 2022