Chairman Jean Latham welcomed 56 members and two visitors to the February meeting. A minutes silence was observed for Mary Jones, a former member who was in both the choir and drama group.

The ballot regarding a change of format for the Christmas party proved to be in favour of having no changes. Minutes of the previous meeting were read and passed, followed by subsection reports.

The Federation reported that they are having problems finding a suitable venue for the annual lunch and were disappointed in the lack of support for the carol service.

A visit to Liverpool is in the pipeline and a board is in circulation for members to register their interest.

The national AGM to be held this year is not attracting many members as is such a distant venue.

Thank you letters have been received from both Birmingham Children’s Hospital and Little Hearts for donations from our own carol service. A trip to Bath is being arranged for later in the year. All members interested should contact Jean Dunn. The speaker for the evening was Mr D Cochrane, who explained with the aid if slides, how both male and female convicts, were transported to Botany Bay, now Sydney Harbour, Australia for the most trivial offences. Raffle prizes went to Brenda Adkins and Wendy Crickard while competition prizes were awarded to June Pardoe and Pat Archer.