YOUR WORKING COMMITTEE

Have your executive and members a fairly clear picture of the personnel and organisation of the working committee of the Film Institute? If you have, will you still read this, just to check up on any alteration in either members of committee or policy, because changes from time to time must be made in both. If you haven't really any idea at all, then we would ask you to read this for these reasons:
(a) We of the working committee try to get to know you where possible (the annual conference is one place) and also your needs and problems, and we would like to think you thought of us in the same way; where possible, to get to know us, and our needs and problems, because we have them, too, and when they discussed and understood they are soon resolved.
(b) We want the societies to be established and flourishing; good membership means more capitation and so more money to spend on films which you in turn will enjoy, working a pleasant and profitable cycle where we all benefit.
Now to meet the executive of the Film Institute, which is known as the Working Committee:

The President, who is elected annually and can hold office for not more than two years, is Mrs Ngaere Nathan. This is Mrs. Nathan's second year as President of the Institute and a large number of you will know her through her series of visits last year and earlier this year. It is her hope to call on each member society in the Institute and to this end she has planned quite formidable itineraries. In the past our presidents have not had the time to travel and we are grateful to Mrs. Nathan, for her visits have been of great value as liaison between the working committee and the member societies. A foundation member of the Blenheim Film Society, Mrs. Nathan has been secretary from the beginning. She is also keenly interested in ballet and the theatre.

The Vice-President is Denny Garrett. He first joined the Wellington Film Society in 1951 and was soon appointed editor of their monthly bulletin, a chore he performed most expertly for five years. From 1953 until his election as President of the Institute in 1956, he was President of the Wellington Society. He has served on the working committee since 1954. He has lectured widely on film appreciation, served on the Wellington committee formed to assist the distribution of children's films and, most important, drafted many of the submissions of the Institute to the Department of Internal Affairs on the Cinematograph Regulations. He is interested in public speaking, the play-centre movement, books, paintings, Rugby and shaggy-dog humour. His transfer to Palmerston North as adult education tutor is deplored by the Wellington Film Society, but we hope, greeted by cheers in Palmerston North.

The Chairman is Hilton Power. Widely experienced in film society matters, he first joined the Wellington Film Society in 1946. He was secretary to the N.Z. Film Institute from 1947 to 1949. On his transfer to Auckland as an adult education tutor, he joined the Auckland society in 1950 and served on the committee. Returning to Wellington in 1954 he was reappointed to the working committee until in 1956 he went to the United States for a year under an adult education exchange scheme. He came back to New Zealand to assume the directorship of adult education in Wellington. His interests, he says, are films and loafing.

The Programme Organiser is Ray Hayes, who is so well known to societies that any introduction seems needless. Since the inception of the Institute he has been a tower of strength to the societies and the working committee and it is due to the efficiency with which he does a colossal amount of work that our programmes are shown so regularly. Ray is always willing to help on any queries re films and is calm and unruffled except on very rare occasions when he has been known to throw up his hands in horror or despair. This usually happens when a society wants him to do the impossible but after that first gesture he generally does it. He is chief films officer at the National Film Library where he combines business with pleasure. Asked if he had any other interests he said he hadn't any spare time for anything else.

Treasurer is Ron Ritchie, who has been a member of the Wellington Film Society since 1946 and treasurer for the last ten years. He has been active in organising Wellington's Winter Schools and Discussion Groups. He has been a member of the working committee of the Institute as treasurer since 1956. His other interests include books and W.E.A. activities and he is a qualified accountant and chartered secretary. In his spare time he is accountant for a manufacturing and distributing company.

Margaret Ritchie, the Secretary, is the wife of the above. She has been a member of the Wellington Film Society since its inception, having attended the W.E.A. classes on Film Appreciation conducted by Gordon Mirams, out of which the Film Society grew. Active ever since writing receipts, making cups of tea and addressing envelopes, she has given up the assistant treasurer's position and gone into business on her own account.

Don Yeates was appointed to the working committee last year to fill the vacancy caused by Les Cutts' leaving for England, and to bring to the committee the viewpoint of the smaller society. On the committee of the Levin Society since 1953 and secretary since 1955, he is a teacher in a Levin district school. Working committee nights are late nights for him, as he gets home off the "Dominion" car at 3.30 a.m., fortunately on Saturdays. Interests: Theatre, cinema, folk singing and cycle racing.

Laurie Lee, the latest addition to the working committee, has been a member of the Wellington Film Society for 13 years and has been a member of is executive, as editor of the monthly bulletin, "Sequence," for the past three years. He remembers seeing his first movie at the age of five and in quite a few years of film-going since then he has acquired a knowledge of films that has proved useful to both the Wellington Film Society and the New Zealand Film Institute. Laurie is Assistant Chief Computer of the Lands and Survey Department's Head Office, and among other spare-time interests is Director of the Computing Section of the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand.

THE ADVANTAGES OF INCORPORATION

On several occasions members of societies have asked, "Why do we need to be incorporated?" This is a hard question to answer in that the advantages are not obvious, particularly to a new society. The Incorporated Societies Act 1908 together with its amendments sets out the conditions whereby a society may be incorporated and on compliance with its requirements the society concerned is entitled to include the word "Incorporated" in its title. This then is the first advantage: The use of the word "Incorporated" is notice to the world that your society has attained a standard prescribed by law.

As part of these requirements is the minimum number of headings that must be contained in a set of rules.The second advantage is: The word "Incorporated" is notice to the world that the society has a set of rules by which it is guided. The structure of the society and its aims and objects are considered and approved by an officer appointed by the Government for this purpose. He is the Registrar of Incorporated Societies and as such he cannot approve any aim or object which is contrary to law. Hence the third advantage is: The use of the word "Incorporated" establishes the bona fides of the aims and objects of the society.

Two of the main points on which a Registrar must satisfy himself are that the rules for the handling of money are in order and that they cover the disposal of the property of a society if it is dissolved or wound up. So the fourth advantage is: The use of the word "Incorporated" indicates that the broad outline of the financial structure of the society has received official blessing.

"That's all very well," I can hear someone say, "but we can change our rules." So you can, but did you know that such changes must be notified to the Registrar?

There are four points which secretaries of incorporated societies remember:

     (1) Every society must have a registered office. This is usually address to which notices can be sent (but not a Box number). Some societies use their solicitor's office, some their president's or secretary's home, but wherever it is, if you decide to change it you must notify the Registrar.
     (2) Alteration to Rules must be submitted in duplicate to the Registrar for approval and the appropriate fee paid.
     (3) Every incorporated society must deliver annually a statement of accounts to the Registrar with a letter stating that the accounts have been approved by the society in general meeting. These are filed by him and anyone can search the files on payment of a small fee.
     (4) Consequently copies of or extracts from all documents held by the Registrar are available, again on payment of a fee.

You will see, therefore, that the fact of being incorporated assures people and companies with whom you may be dealing that you are a properly constituted and recognised body.

One last point - The 1956 Cinematograph Act, which deals with censorship and certificates, contains a clause headed "Film Societies" which starts: - "28. Any Incorporated Society, the object of which is to exhibit or arrange for the exhibition to members of the society of films that are represented to be of special interest from the educational or artistic or technical aspects of film production, may etc. . . ." In other words, the definition of a Film Society included in this Act makes it a pre-requisite of approval for a Film Society to be Incorporated.

- Ron Ritchie.