Rob from NC has done a brief write up...

For all those who couldn't attend Saturday's meeting, just a quick overview of the event. It was well attended, with approximately 100 people there by the end, well populated by Northern Canaries but others were present including the Canaries Trust and representatives of other Supporter groups such as the South West Canaries.

Ben Kensell and Lynette Hannant (head of exec office) attended from the Club.

We welcomed them and introduced them at the start and thanked them for coming and for the continued availability of club personnel for such events in the north. The fist Northern Canaries event with the Board of Directors was in Burnley in 2002, and we acknowledged in front of all present that in 20 years of Northern Canaries, we have always had a proximity with the Club that has given us a platform to recognise progress (and we congratulated Ben on Stuart Webber's contract) but also to raise concerns when we have them.

Ben spoke for around ten minutes and acknowledged the problems of the scheme. He admitted that the principal mistakes were firstly a lack of consultation and secondly, communication. He held his hands up, apologised and committed to making changes.

No changes were proposed at the meeting, that's not unsurprising, and all present understood that I think.

Those present were asked to complete forms stating the advantages and disavantages of the current scheme and crucially, what they propose in order to rectify things.

There was then a Q&A session where a variety of questions were asked including, but not lmited the loss of the points system, and the guarantee for tickets that the previous scheme gave, the cut off point at ten games, the difficulty and inability to get home tickets, difficulty in sitting together, unfairness of the cost to families and so on.

People including many Northern Canaries but also supporters based in the South West, Belfast and Norwich spoke with fairness, calm and sometimes with clear emotion when raising their concerns, but always I think with a sense of respect and acknwoldgement for the fact that we do have a Club prepared to attend this sort of event.

The points and suggestions raised are all going into the mix when the feedback from the other consultations in London and Norwich are obtained and we will all be hearing about any changes in due course. There may even be additional discussions with supporter group representatives before that point, which Northern Canaries will of course be delighted to contribute to if asked.

We are very grateful to the Club for their participation, to Burnley Cricket Club for such a warm welcome and loan of a room at such short notice and of course to all Northern Canaries and others who attended.

Posted By: DrDublin, Sep 23, 10:45:27