Cornwall Search Dogs
Trustee’s Report
For the period 1[st] November 2021 to 31[st] October 2022
Chairman’s Report
Cornwall Search Dogs (CSD) was registered as a Charitable Incorporated Organization in October 2020 with a Foundation Model Constitution. The Charity was founded by a small group of individuals, each with expert knowledge of emergency search and rescue. Their joint desire was to use skilled trailing dogs to locate missing persons and dogs in Cornwall.
Once again, this year the Trustees have volunteered their time generously and at the end of our second year, I can report that we’ve maintained our systems and governance, conducted numerous searches and built on our initial successes. Our work has aided the owners of missing pets and working dogs in Cornwall.
I wish to thank our teams of search dogs and handlers for their dedication and efforts over the past year. It has been a year in which the personal financial commitment of being a volunteer has risen sharply and I am grateful that our volunteers have maintained their support for our work. A crucial part of the CSD Team are our dedicated volunteer supporters, who have attended public events to build our profile in the community and also raise essential funding for us. In particular this year I would like to record our thanks to Paula Bridge who so generously shared her valuable knowledge, experience and also gifts with us during her time with CSD this past year.
On behalf of the trustees, I would like to repeat the Board’s gratitude to those property owners who have kindly given CSD permission to carry out essential regular training on their land. The opportunity to train across a variety of landscapes, especially in areas unfrequented by the wider public enables us to hone our dog’s skills quickly and effectively.
We are very grateful for the tremendous support we receive from the public, community funds, local organisations and businesses. Looking back on our second year we are very proud of what our team has achieved and that we have met so many of our strategic and operational aims for this year. We confidently expect to grow further in year three and beyond.
Andrew Whiddett
Chairman, Cornwall Search Dogs
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Structure
CSD currently has a board of 6 trustees. The Board focuses on its collective responsibility for ensuring the overall direction, effectiveness, supervision and accountability of the Charity. The Trustees have met quarterly to provide strategy and governance and conduct regular overviews of the charity’s activities providing leadership and guidance as required. We held our AGM and a Trustees’ ‘away day’ in October 2022. The Chair of CSD is a member of the Association of Chairs and the Trustees attended a Governance Workshop in December 2021.
Each Trustee of CSD also has specific oversight of areas of the Charity and its work. Operational and Training sub groups meet monthly and report to the Trustee’s meetings.
Operational deployments are overseen by an Ops Team of 2 trustees who deploy our 4 qualified search dogs as necessary to search for missing pets.
Training and recruitment of search dog teams is led by a designated sub group of 2 Trustees who have established a development and training record for existing and new recruits to CSD. During the year, the Charity recruited 4 trainee dogs and their handlers. Unfortunately, not all dogs and their handlers are successful in our training programme but we gratefully acknowledge the commitment of all our trainee dogs and handlers.
Fundraising is led by two Trustees supported by a number of volunteers. In the past year this team has benefitted from public donations, online auctions, societies and councillor’s events and grant funding, as well as being a nominated charity at sponsored events and donations from organisations and companies. CSD has attended a number of public events including the Royal Cornwall Show and two ‘Blue Light’ exhibitions to further awareness of the charity, as well as seeking new members and donations to support our work.
We have an established social media presence and we have 3,345 followers on Facebook, our posts now reach up to 107,000 people and 21,569 engagements per month. We have followers in 9 countries outside the UK.
The charity income, expenditure and balance sheet are set out on pages 6-10. Thanks to our supporters we are grateful to be able to report the charity has met its funding objectives for this year and is maintaining good financial health as a result.
Funds raised to date have been spent on specialist equipment and clothing for our ‘call out’ teams as well as team training. In particular we were able to fund 2 handler teams to attain a ‘Skills for Justice’ qualification in trailing which is recognised by Police in the UK as evidence of competence to assist the police to search for missing people. The charity has also expended funds on materials for marketing and promoting the aims of CSD. The board has also overseen the production of a leaflet for distribution to dog owners in Cornwall giving important advice on what to do should their dog go missing.
The Board maintains the following policies for Cornwall Search Dogs Health and Safety Lone Working Data Protection Reserves Safeguarding Whistleblowing
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The Board will continue to develop further policies as required to support the future development of CSD.
CSD is an entirely volunteer charity. It has no renumerated staff and no plans to recruit paid staff. This year our volunteers have contributed approximately 3,000 hours to the functions of CSD, such as search related activities, attending fund raising events and other support or administrative functions. This past year the increases in the price of fuel has been a significant added cost to all our volunteers who can have long return trips to call outs and so we are extremely grateful to all the donors that have supported Cornwall Search Dogs.
Without our volunteers and supporters our work would not be possible. It was therefore with sadness that this year we have marked both the retirement and subsequent passing over the Rainbow Bridge of one of our founder dogs, Cocker Spaniel Maisy. Maisy and her owner Jenny had extensive operational experience before they became founding members of CSD. From 2020 until this year, Maisy was active in numerous successful searches including her first one for CSD which was for a fellow black spaniel missing after being involved in a collision with a car and her last deployment was during Storm Eunice. We were all very sad that Maisy’s retirement was so short and we sent our condolences on losing a dearly-loved pet to her handler and family. Maisy had a paw in selecting her successor Indie and we look forward to welcoming Indie to the ranks of operational dogs this coming year. We expect she will fill Maisy’s huge pawprints and continue her life saving work.
Cornwall Search Dogs Founder Maisy
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Objectives and Activities
CSD is a volunteer service to the community in Cornwall. Our Charitable purposes are described in our Governing Document and are reproduced below.
1. The preservation and protection of health and the saving of lives by providing a dedicated and trained emergency search service consisting of appropriately trained dogs and volunteer handlers to assist and support the emergency services and voluntary rescue services in the search and rescue of missing persons in Cornwall.
2. For the benefit of the public to relieve the unnecessary suffering of animals by the search for lost dogs.
This year CSD has again been concentrating on delivering purpose 2, although we have this past year proven the operational credibility of our dogs and their ability to trail human scent in accordance with purpose 1.
This past year Cornwall Search Dogs received 53 requests for assistance from Dog Lost Cornwall on behalf of members of the public in Cornwall. As a result of those requests and following assessment of the circumstances of the reported loss, our search dogs attended on 43 occasions, advice being provided where we did not attend. 32 dogs were recovered following action by CSD.
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CSD Call Out Response 2020/2021
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Requests for Help Attended Advice only Dog Recovered
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53 requests this year is an increase of over 12% from 2020/21 and the Trustees anticipate that demand for services to search for missing dogs will grow commensurately in 2022/23.
In addition to deploying expert teams of search dogs and handlers, CSD also provides advice and links to mine shaft rescue, local dog trapping and (currently limited) drone resources to further assist in the recovery of a stray pet. The charity has established important collaborative relationships, working as a team primarily with Dog Lost Cornwall and also other dog welfare groups to ensure our service under purpose 2 is delivered in a timely and appropriate way. We also have a growing
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network of relationships with the blue light services in Cornwall including HM Coastguard and the RNLI.
Risk
Trustees update the Charity risk register every 6 months or sooner if new risk emerges. The Board considers mitigation and risk management and is satisfied that it has addressed the primary risks in its first year.
The Trustees consider the following to be its most serious risks.
Insufficient funds raised to carry out its public benefit services
2022/23 Cost of living may impact funding and donations received.
Mitigations: Further development of fundraising strategy, training appeal, creation of fundraising committee, investment into marketing.
Loss of key dog/handler team
Mitigations: Maintaining core of 4 fully trained units. Pipeline of succession training new recruits every 6 months.
Loss of key person on the Board
Mitigations: Trustee skill audit completed, succession plan established, trustee recruitment plan (1 additional Trustee to be recruited in 2022/23), continue with quarterly meetings.
Plans for Future Periods
CSD search dogs are trained and assessed to criteria set by Mantrailing Scent Dogs and accredited by UK Rural Skills.
In order to deliver Objective 1, CSD search dog teams need to satisfy the relevant statutory agencies such as Devon and Cornwall Police or HM Coastguard, that we are suitably skilled, qualified and resourced to undertake searches for missing persons.
Our Strategic Plan for the next reporting year to October 2023 includes assisting three more of our dogs in training to attain nationally recognised accreditation with Skills for Justice’s (SFJ) Trailing Dog Handler Award. This will be achieved through a demanding 6-month programme of specialist training and assessment with The British Mantrailing Academy in Essex. The SFJ Award is already recognised for trailing dogs working on missing person searches with Essex, Surrey and Sussex Police and we are engaging with Devon and Cornwall Police so that we can offer this skill and accredited resource to the people of Cornwall as soon as practicable in 2023.
As part of our fundraising strategy, any funding for specific purposes or training, such as the SFJ accreditation, is treated as restricted funding and is not used for the general purposes of the charity.
In the next year the Trustees intend to revitalise plans to form a volunteer fundraising committee, which will help drive funding for the charity in what the Trustees already anticipate will be a very challenging period financially for the voluntary sector.
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| CORNWALL SEARCH DOGS Year 2021/2022 | CORNWALL SEARCH DOGS Year 2021/2022 | CORNWALL SEARCH DOGS Year 2021/2022 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Receipts and Payments Account | ||||||
| Year start date |
Year end date | |||||
| For the year from |
11/01/21 | To | 31/10/22 | |||
| Receipts and payments |
||||||
| 2021/22 | 2021/22 | 2021/22 | Last Year | |||
| Unrestrict ed funds |
Restricted funds |
Total funds | Total funds |
|||
| £ | £ | £ | £ | |||
| Receipts | 1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
|||
| Donations, legacies and similar income |
||||||
| Just Giving | 764 | - | 764 | 1,417 | ||
| Public Donations | 5,824 | - | 5,824 | 2,037 | ||
| Amazon Smile | 47 | - | 47 | 24 | ||
| PayPal | 1,541 | - | 1,541 | - | ||
| - | - | 450 | ||||
| Sub total | 8,176 | - | 8,176 | 3,928 | ||
| Grants | ||||||
| Ecclesiastical | 1,000 | - | 1,000 | 3,970 | ||
| Cornwall Council CharityFund |
170 | - | 170 | - | ||
| Cornwall Communityfund |
3,000 | 3,000 | ||||
| Sub total | 1,170 | 3,000 | 4,170 | 3,970 | ||
| Fundraising (gross) | ||||||
| Tins | 328 | - | 328 | 923 |
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| Online Auction | - | - | 1,689 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Other fundraising activities(inc.Quiz) |
4,824 | - | 4,824 | 1,194 | ||
| Sale of merchandise | 150 | - | 150 | 655 | ||
| Sub total | 5,302 | - | 5,302 | 4,461 | ||
| Investment income | ||||||
| Bank interest | - | - | - | - | ||
| Bank carried over | 4,262 | - | 4,262 | - | ||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| Sub total | 4,262 | - | 4,262 | - | ||
| Total Gross Income | 18,910 | 3,000 | 21,910 | 12,359 | ||
| Asset and investment sales, etc. |
- | - | - | - | ||
| Total receipts | 18,910 | 3,000 | 21,910 | 12,359 | ||
| CORNWALL SEARCH DOGS | ||||||
| Receipts and Payments Account | ||||||
| Year start date |
Year | Year | Year end date |
|||
| For the year |
01.11.21 | 31.10.22 | ||||
| Receipts and payments |
||||||
| 2021/22 | 2021/22 | 2021/22 | Last Year | |||
| Unrestrict ed funds |
Restricted funds |
Total funds | Total funds |
|||
| £ | £ | £ | £ | |||
| Payments | 1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
1st Nov 21 - 31st Oct 22 |
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| Charitable Payments |
||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Insurance | 224 | - | 224 | 247 | ||
| Materials and equipment |
5,369 | - | 5,369 | 676 | ||
| Printing and photocopying |
- | - | - | |||
| AGM and trustee expenses |
55 | - | 55 | - | ||
| External Training costs |
4,020 | 3,000 | 7,020 | 5,560 | ||
| Accommodation and travel expenses |
2,025 | - | 2,025 | - | ||
| - | - | - | ||||
| Sub total | 11,694 | 3,000 | 14,694 | 6,483 | ||
| Fundraising expenses |
||||||
| Event entry fee | 109 | - | 109 | 30 | ||
| Marketing and merchandise branding and wreaths |
1,186 | - | 1,186 | 1,421 | ||
| Just giving fees and eBay |
218 | - | 218 | 162 | ||
| Sub total | 1,513 | - | 1,513 | 1,613 | ||
| Total Gross Expenditure |
13,207 | 3,000 | 16,207 | 8,096 | ||
| Asset and investment purchases, etc. |
- | - | - | - | ||
| Total payments | 13,207 | 3,000 | 16,207 | 8,096 | ||
| Net of receipts/(payments) |
5,703 | - | 5,703 | 4,263 | ||
| Cash funds last year end |
- | - | - | - | ||
| Cash funds this year end |
5,703 | - | 5,703 | 4,263 | ||
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| Statement of assets and liabilities | Statement of assets and liabilities | at the end of the year | at the end of the year | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01.11.22 | 01.11.22 | 01.11.22 | Last Year | |||
| Unrestricte d funds |
Restricted funds |
Total funds | Total funds | |||
| £ | £ | £ | £ | |||
| Cash funds | ||||||
| Bank current account | 5,703 | - | 5,703 | 4,263 | ||
| Bank deposit account | - | - | - | - | ||
| Cash/Floats | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| Total cash funds (Agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) |
5,703 | - | 5,703 | 4,263 | ||
| Other monetary assets |
||||||
| Tax claim | - | - | - | - | ||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| Sub total | - | - | - | - | ||
| Non-monetary assets for charity's own use |
||||||
| Stock | - | - | - | - | ||
| Other | - | - | - | - | ||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| - | - | - | - | |||
| Sub total | - | - | - | - | ||
| Liabilities |
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| Accounts not yet paid | - | - | - | - | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Expenses incurred but not invoiced |
- | - | - | - | ||
| Subscriptions not yet paid |
- | - | - | - | ||
| Other liabilities | - | - | - | - | ||
| Sub total | - | - | - | - | ||
| Contingent liabilities and future obligations | ||||||
| Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees | ||||||
| Signature | Print Name | Date of approval |
||||
| Andrew Whiddett | 06.12.22 | |||||
| Jenny Pickles | 06.12.22 |
Declarations
The Trustees confirm that they have complied with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 to have due regard for the to the public benefit guidance published by the Charity Commission for England and Wales
The Trustees declare that they have approved the Trustees’ report above.
Signed on behalf of the Charity’s Trustees:
Andrew Whiddett Tracy Simpson Chair of Trustees Secretary
Date 6[th] December 2022.
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