fairydollpink Posted July 3, 2014 Share Posted July 3, 2014 I am looking to change my preschool constitution from PLA to another that enables staff to be on the committee and not be too demanding on how many parents should be on there too. I find it impossible to get parents to join the committee,even when I threaten them with closure, so am looking to put down in writing that a certain number of parents,staff and 'outside' people make up the committee. I do realise we need parents input but its so hard to get any to sign up,the age old problem. Has anyone changed their constitution from the PLA and is willing to share with me? Time is running out and the chair and treasurer (who are parents) have as usual left everything to me to do on top of my every day work! I am slightly panicking so any help and advice will be gratefully received. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diesel10 Posted July 3, 2014 Share Posted July 3, 2014 correct me if I'm wrong but I wouldn't have thought that staff could make up a committee as they would be the employer and the employees. I would have thought you maybe need to be owners / partners. Someone is coming to talk to me about the incorporated charities that you don't need to file accounts to companies house tomorrow. So I might know more then. Filing to companies house would be no good for us, as this is the first time in eight years that we have been up to date with the charity commission. We finally did it at 6pm on Monday (the last day). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynned55 Posted July 3, 2014 Share Posted July 3, 2014 (edited) You need to amend your constitution so it includes a bit about staff being on there as committee members. The PSLA constution now allows staff to be on committee. So I would suggest you do one of two things- either go onto their website (if you are a member) and have a look at their newer one- it will also tell you how to go about changing your constitution. We have always been PSLA members but have never run under their constitution we have always had our own. We do not have the thing about staff members being on committee on ours so not point in showing you it- ours was different because of our admissions. or and depending on what yours says about changing it is how you will have to go about amending the constitution. Ours says this constitution maybe changed if: (a) Two thirds of the members present at a General Meeting vote in favour of changing it. However just looking through my laptop I have just found this from 2008- not sure where it is from. "This was done in response to the Charities Act 2006 introducing new provisions into the Charities Act 2003 which means that charity trustees are now able to be remunerated for providing goods and services to a charity of which they are a trustee without obtaining special permission from the Charity Commission each time. Before a member of staff can sit on a pre-school committee certain requirements have to be met. The Charities Act 2006 has also altered the law relating to the ability of charities to purchase Trustee Indemnity Insurance. Previously charities that did not have an express provision in their constitution allowing them to purchase this type of insurance had to convince the Charity Commission that it was in the interest of the charity to be allowed to take out such cover." It is referring to the changes in PSLA constitution. HTH diesel10- will you come back and tell us what info you can glean from your meeting re change over? Something I am very interested in Edited July 3, 2014 by lynned55 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thumperrabbit Posted July 3, 2014 Share Posted July 3, 2014 My PLA advisor told me only a couple of weeks ago that staff can be on the committee now providing you have the most recent constitution However she did say you really need to have parents (or others) to be the 3 officers - as diesel says otherwise the staff could be hiring and firing themselves, giving themselves pay rises and everything!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diesel10 Posted July 4, 2014 Share Posted July 4, 2014 Sorry, I did know that the PLA constitution allows a member of staff to sit on committee but I don't think they can have a named job. I did have a chat today with a local trainer re incorporation and he advised us that although this would limit the liability of our trustee's, we aren't that big a business to worry about it. ie, we have a 25 year lease (from the council) on our building, and only pay £165 per year rent, we only employee 8 staff, no debts, we pay extra for trustee liability insurance. We keep a redundancy fund, If we did change it would trigger an inspection, change bank accounts, utilities. We keep bringing up the 'what if' which could end in the trustee's being sued and the insurance not covering it. He deals with a lot of charities and keeps up to date with info and could only come up with if someone died while working. Although as long as the pat testing, policies, risk assessments were up to date, he said that the insurance should pay out. It may be something for one day, but only if I can find a spare day each week for a year to sort it out! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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