FBHVC Turns Spotlight on Youth at AGM & Conference

Published: 10/09/2013

19 October 2013.

A distinctly youthful theme pervaded the Federation of British Historic Vehicle Club’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) and Conference, held on 19th October at The Hunt House, home of the Rolls Royce Enthusiasts Club. As Sandy Hamilton of the Morris Minor Owners Club quipped during his presentation, “many of us assembled here today are almost ready to drop off the twig. It is important that we encourage younger blood into the historic vehicle scene so our transport heritage is preserved for future generations”.

Club delegates packed into the lecture hall at Paulerspury, over 90 in total representing 64 clubs. “It was an excellent turnout”, according to FBHVC secretary, Rosy Pugh, “and audience participation during the AGM in the morning was extremely good”. chairman, David Whale used the opportunity to pay tribute to 2 directors retiring at the meeting, David Hurley and Colin Francis, both of whom have given long and dedicated service to the historic vehicle movement.  Bob Owen replaces David as legislation director and Tony Davies moves to events from trade & skills. Tony’s former position goes to newcomer, Karl Carter, who joins the Federation having recently retired as operations director at British Sugar.

Refreshed from lunch, delegates then enjoyed presentations from Rolls Royce Enthusiasts Club on their extraordinary archive project (see FBHVC News, Issue 4 2013) and from new legislation director, Bob Owen on the latest status of legislation effecting historic vehicles. The rest of the afternoon was dubbed…” Encouraging younger enthusiasts” and what a breath of fresh air it was.  

First up was Elaine Massey of the Steam Apprentices Club and her passionate presentation of the work of SAC in encouraging youngsters into the world of steam was positively inspirational. She even brought along son, Jason who strode confidently up to the microphone to give three or four minutes of his personal experiences as a steam apprentice. Next Sandy Hamilton of MMOC introduced a quartet of young men, Matt Tomkins, Matt Coles and Andy Wilson. By their own initiative these three had set up a youth section within MMOC. As you would expect, clever use of internet and social media were much in evidence but tinkering and fettling still
featured strongly. Despite some dubious initial reaction from the old guard, their enthusiasm and inventiveness seemed to have won the day and the section is now a valued contributor to the Morris Minor community.

Once again audience participation was excellent and at the conclusion the concensus seemed to be that it had been a valuable day.