Feline Fine

Hi, this is Bernard Crapper (apologies for using a friends log-in details) There has in the past been speculation about some details regarding the Benevolent Fund so I am posting the information below so you are all fully informed of what the Benevolent Fund stands for. This is a copy of the message I posted earlier in the season, but I understand some may have missed reading it and thought it would be useful to reiterate. I am appointed by the British Speedway Promoters Assoc. as their representative and the Speedway Control Bureau (formerly Board) as the Treasurer/Secretary of the Speedway Riders' Benevolent Fund. The Speedway Riders' Benevolent Fund was created in 1949 under a Deed of Trust to aid current riders and their dependants and others (including paraplegics) who are injured during speedway racing and covers tracks within England, Wales and Scotland. The Speedway Riders' Benevolent Fund's registered office is at ACU House, Wood Street, Rugby, Warwickshire CV21 2YX. Telephone number: 01788 560 648. Fax: 01788 546 785 and is registered with the Charities Commission - number 208733. The Ben fund is controlled by four trustees as required by law and the current trustees are Mr. Tony Noel, Chairman (ACU) Mr. Brian Bonney, (ACU) Mr. Chris Van Straaten, Chairman (BSPA) and Mr. Alec Harkness (Promoter). As mentioned above, I am Secretary/Treasurer). Our Chartered Accountants are Messrs Limehouse and Company of Rugby. The aim of the Ben Fund is to assist injured riders, etc and their dependants. Funds for this are collected in various ways: Firstly all tracks must hold a compulsory collection once per season and in addition collections are made at special meetings (six special meetings being the maximum allowed collections wise). On average we collect annually between twelve and sixteen thousand pounds from track collections. We also have invested money which we rely heavily on the interest to keep the fund bouyant. In addition we have donations from companies and other trust funds etc. It is normal on the past years payments to riders and paraplegics to award payments of monies ranging between £34,000 and £39,000 annually. This is why all donations (other than track collections) are very welcome and indeed essential to keep the fund bouyant and sustain the amount of help we can offer. The Government Deed of Gift Scheme is one way of persons pledging support to our charity and if you would like a form to enable you to support the Benevolent Fund in this way, please apply to myself, Bernard Crapper of 5 Farm Road, Abingdon, Oxfordshire OX14 1NE or telephone me on 01235 524 756. There will be a further method for persons returning self assessment forms which will be in operation in 2005 (watch this space for details). I apologise if you have not been fully informed in the past when your track is holding a collection of what the collection is in aid of, as all tracks are supposed to print details in their programmes informing you of both the details and workings of the Ben Fund. We give long term sustained support to paraplegics. Also any ex riders can apply to the trustees for help. In the past we have helped with education fees where a rider has died leaving dependants, IVF treatment for paraplegics wives (with successful results), wheelchairs, home modications, refurbishments and many other requests with life changing results. The Ben Fund should not however be confused or considered to be an insurance as we are governed by the Charities Commission and we must adhere to their rules and regulations. As a footnote I am saddened to read on the Charities Commission website that our records are overdue when they are in fact completely up to date and have been consistently, with the 2003 accounts being given to them shortly, once they have passed their official audit (commencing at present). I hope this has cleared up any misunderstanding or concern regarding use of the Ben Fund and would ask you please to give generously when you see any of the collectors on the terracing and if your circumstances allow, consider our Deed of Gift Scheme, for which our charity would receive 27% returned tax which you pay for each £1.00 submitted to us as a donation. The only proviso is that you must be a taxpayer of the United Kingdom. Whilst I have the opportunity, I would like to sincerely thank everybody at tracks who donate to the collection regularly and generously and also to my loyal band of collectors who travel around the country helping out at collections when and where possible. Kind Regards, Bernard Crapper

If I remember rightly the Ben. Fund can't collect at the Grands Prix due to the fact that a number of foreign supporters may donate and the fund only supports riders injured over here. Obviously the way it was explained to me was more in depth than that, but that's how I remember it. FF

Sounds like a great idea. I'll ask Bernard Crapper when the collections are due and where and post them on here when I know. Thanks for the suggestion. I'm sure the SRBF will appreciate it.

Badge Wearer, I will pass your comment on to Bernard Crapper as soon as I see him next.

Louisec, Was this rider hurt when riding abroad?

Nah, you're never Bernard. He knows how to spell!

I say more respect for riders who put their team above their individual aspirations. Nothing more annoying or irritating than watching someone do poorly for their club, but then excel in individuals! Mark has the right attitude imho.

Message from Bernard Crapper Hi Lol, I'm glad to see you're still in fine fettle and that chair number two (purchased by the SRBF) has not proved too fast, seeing as it is the super streamlined model!

Message from Bernard Crapper Dear Mr. S. Bear (McKay), Regarding your recent posting, I feel the following points need to be clarified:- The Charities Commission Annual Returns are required to be submitted by all charities and I can assure you ours are completely up to date except for the year 2003, which will be with them shortly once the Trustees are happy with the audited accounts. There is always a delay in the previous years accounts due to the overlap from the end of one season to another. I would also like to mention that we work very strictly to the guidelines as set down by the Charities Commission. I have of course telephoned the Commission to inform them of their error in showing a lack of returns and will chase this up again. Our accountants diligently ensure our returns are sent off and everything is done according to requirements. Nothing less is to be expected. Regarding payments to riders etc, the Speedway Riders Benevolent Fund (SRBF) is a benevolent and not an insurance and any monies paid over and above what is deemed a benevolent payment (in other words "large payments") could incur the injured rider or recipient losing other benefits from Social Security monies. You say that we hold large reserves. This is correct. In the past we have had to rely heavily and remove sums of money from our reserve to cover current requests. Also, in years to come if anything were to happen to Speedway racing in general we must guarantee that there is monies available to cover the future (severely injured riders and/or their dependants) and the Trustees are very conscious of this. The trust which governs the SRBF, which you quite rightly state was made in 1947 has very definitive rulings and we remain governed by the contents of the same. A point which you may not have considered is that we are also answerable to the Inland Revenue and I can assure you that they would not allow any reputable and established charity from disobeying their strict rules. You raise a valid point concerning the British Grand Prix, or any FIM event to which there is a high influx of visiting supporters' from other countries. One could not do a collection at these meetings due to the fact that the SRBF is set up solely for riders who are injured whilst competing on British tracks and there is no reciprocal arrangements with any foreign equivalent of the SRBF (I am not aware of the existence of any), and it could be argued that monies taken in this country at these type of events is done under false pretences as riders who get injured in similar events abroad are not covered and would receive no benefit from the SRBF. Regarding the inclusion of benevolent fund details in track programmes, all programmes for the meeting where a collection is to take place should have a section containing an article on the aims of the SRBF. Indeed, failing to print such an article should incur a code of conduct fine, as it always used to do. The SRBF have no involvement with the production of the programmes and is completely in the hands of the programme compiler at the various tracks, but as mentioned above our details must be recited. I personally have sent numerous (hundreds) of copies of suitable insertions to be placed in the programmes, only to find that they have been discarded and not included. There are of course certain tracks whose promoters always put an insertion in. As far as representatives are concerned, other than the Chairman, Trustees, Secretary and Treasurer we used to have both a representative from the Speedway Riders Assoc. and a Speedway Rider representative. Now it would appear that no-one is willing to do the job and if they did at the most they would be expected to attend only four selective committee meetings per year. As regards your suggestion for the airtek fences, we would very much welcome this. However, a point which has missed your scrutiny is the fact that each club is run individually as a business and the SRBF cannot stipulate how a promoter sees fit to spend any sponsorship allocated to his track. With respect to your letter, this was placed in front of the Trustees at our recent meeting as I was not prepared to give details of the Trustees, other than their names, which is there for all to see at the start of this thread. It was agreed that anyone, including yourself, who wished to contact the Trustees write to: The Chairman Speedway Riders Benevolent Fund ACU House Wood Street Rugby Warwickshire CV21 2YX We have sadly not had much interest in the deed of covenant, although this facility has been in place for some time, however donations are at present good and anyone wishing to make a donation / bequest can help us further by filling in a deed of gift envelope and we can increase the donation by a further 27%. I trust you will find I have answered all of the points you felt necessary to raise and would, in closing, like to state that the Benevolent Fund is a seriously run organisation and has been since its creation and is governed by very astute, professional businessmen and has the advantage of also having a big band of enthusiastic volunteers. Our next Trustees Meeting is due to be held in early October. If you have a specific enquiry please inform me by the middle of September so that I can put it forward at our meeting. Please note I have very limited internet access and am at present relying upon friends to inform me of any issues raised, so would be grateful for your assistance, if possible, by contacting me via my address as posted in the original message. Bernard Crapper.

Mr. S. Bear. I will let Bernard Crapper know of your post. I am sure he will be happy to answer any queries you have on this excellent establishment as soon as he is able.

Hi Lol, Thanks for your message, it's much appreciated. Best wishes, Claire

Excellent idea, I'll pass it on for you.

Have spoken to BC today who said that he will be talking with the Trustees of the Ben Fund tomorrow and will enquire about getting merchandise in to raise funds. Apparently they did have badges etc but sadly they didn't sell very well at all. Being a charity they do have to be careful about selling products, but he'll let me know tomorrow what they say.

FlyinRyan, if you feel that strongly about the Breeze Block comment (which was naughty) then have you not noticed the "Report" button next to the "quote" button, for reporting what you believe offensive posts so that the mods are made aware of it and (if applicable) remove it? I should imagine with all the postings which are being made at the moment they probably are missing some posts.

Just like Cheetahawk I admit I am not a fan of Havvys and was not happy to hear that he had been given a place in the Team GB squad (although I kept my thoughts on this point to myself). However, I can honestly say that he impressed me tremendously last night in Poole and the decision was well and truly justified.

Sir Lunchalot, Just my opinion, but I think it matters that if PK was in second place, he'd be using every trick in the book to pass Anderson leaving gaps where realistically Scotty could have passed him. Instead, he was given an open invitation to hit the front of the field, meaning that he could instead just concentrate on going flat out for the win, leaving our boy eating his dust instead of breathing down his exhaust pipe to make a mistake

Well said Tomcat. We most certainly were robbed and I hope Hans Anderson is made to suffer financially for what he did tonight. It was completely disgraceful and made professional Speedway look like a mickey mouse sport, especially bad after such excellent coverage over the last few days. Who would blame Scotty for holding a grudge over that last heat? I say the less we see of Hans Anderson riding in the UK after that the better! Lets hope our sport won't be associated with the "fixed results" tag certain other sports have had to put up with, now betting is allowed.

Hi Shazzybird, was just going to say that I would ask BC and let you know, but Nevsy has been a star with some of it, so I'll just confirm about the ben fund merchandise. I know he got the tee shirts especially made for the collectors (and the hats) but am sure he would happily get more made if there is a demand for them, but may have to be a slightly different colour so that the collectors still stand out!

Have to agree with almost everything everyone has said. Can't rate this meeting high enough!! The highlights in my opinion were:- AJ - what an absolute star. I always knew he was a good rider, but boy is that guy talented (and fearless!). Lucky Coventry fans getting to watch him race every week! Polish Team - Loved the determination and grit they showed tonight. Tomasz Gollob seemed like another rider completely when interviewed to how he used to appear. It was great watching him laugh and smile and appear really likeable actually. And the other poles too were great value for money. Hope they found somewhere to sleep! Swedes - All seemed "up for it" but didn't realise Antonio Lindback was quite that "wild"! Is he like this all the time? If he's not careful he's gonna get a reputation like Nicki P's once this world cup is through! (and it's easier to get a reputation than shed one!) Mad Guy - That translator/manager person with the Poles was hilarious. When he was allegedly translating what Greg Walasek was saying but Greg only uttered about three words and the guy was going on and on for ages - his enthusiasm was contagious! I think a big heap of praise should go to everyone connected with the meeting, from Poole Speedway who hosted the event (good job, but would have been good at most venues), to all the teams involved (including the Czechs who still played a big part despite their low score) to Sky TV who did a blinding job of filming the event (barr that long advert break). I can't wait for Saturday to come around now. Whoever wins will certainly have been made to earn it!

You know I'm only jealous coz I can't go I like you really!

Sirmatty, I think you'll find you've got Lot 5, Row E at the Rear. You're tickets will have LO5ER on them for short!