Fortunately the weekend on call, although
reasonably busy, didn’t result in me losing too much sleep and so I was able to
shake off the jetlag quite promptly.
The main BEVA item this week was the
Council Review Meeting, http://www.beva.org.uk/aboutus/MeetTeam/Council,
which was held at Trinity Hall in Cambridge.
As a Liverpool graduate I am unfamiliar with the City of Cambridge and
its collegiate system. My only visit to
Cambridge as an undergraduate was on a rugby tour and all that I can recall is
the pub, the kebab house, the rugby pitches and the fact that we won…. which
was a surprise as the players who appeared on the pitch on the Saturday
afternoon were definitely not the ones we were drinking with the previous night;
I think we’d been entertained on the Friday evening by the 1st XV
“drinking team”.
However, what a remarkable scholastic city,
steeped in history and tradition.
Although not all Council members shared my enthusiasm – “There’s nothing
makes me want to vote socialist more than f…..g Cambridge,…” exclaimed in the
best Lancastrian accent – guess who?
We welcomed 4 new members onto Council at
the meeting, namely Gayle Hallowell, Ben Sturgeon, Hannah Yeates and Jon
Pycock, who’s doing his second stint on Council – his first one being about 10
years ago. It was really encouraging in advance
of Congress in September that we had sufficient people who applied to join
Council that an election was required – did they all think, “If Harrison can do
it then anybody can”. For those of you
who weren’t successful this time or others of you considering Council, I
strongly encourage you to apply next year – you really will get a lot out of
it. I urge more practitioners to apply,
particularly female ones - after all that’s the vast majority of members, which
the Association represents. If you think
Council’s full of “old, male, tweedy farts” (see Blog 7), put your money where
your mouth is:
Topics discussed included:
The
Association’s Operational and Financial Reports
-
The total membership stands at
2678, only a fraction up on last year.
-
Membership subscriptions can
now be paid by monthly direct debit.
-
There is a NEW concessionary
rate for those earning < £15K or on parental leave or studying full time for
a full time veterinary related qualification.
-
The Scientific Programme for
the 2015 Congress is almost completed.
-
The BEVA Database and Website are
being re-built
-
The BEVA offices at Fordham are
undergoing some renovation works in 2015.
The
Role of The BVA
-
The BVA have asked for feedback
from the divisions on its structure and governance.
Do
we want to be Doctors!
-
I’d rather “vet” something than
“doctor” it!
Following the meeting, we had our Christmas
dinner, again at Trinity Hall, which included all Council Members and partners
and the BEVA Office Staff and all had a late, great night.
The following day I attended the Winter
Clinical Workshop at Duxford Airspace, Cambridgeshire, http://www.iwm.org.uk/visits/iwm-duxford,
what an inspired choice of venue. The
meeting covered predominantly “Regenerative Medicine” and its use in
orthopaedics – New Treatments for Lame Horses – Do They Work? It was a really informative day and was fully subscribed with over 75 attendees.
Over Xmas – the BEVA offices closed down
although I’m lead to believe that DM is “beavering” away behind the
scenes!
However, no such luxuries at TCEH –
although this year Luise and I are both off over Xmas as we both worked Xmas Day
and Boxing Day last year. We were both
out till early evening on Christmas day and the kids were Home Alone. They said it was the best Christmas they’d
ever had – they watched the television all
day.
Compliments of the season to you all and
I’ll catch up in the New Year.
AH
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