Leicestershire Contract Bridge Association
Leicestershire Contract Bridge Association
News
The fourth edition of Club Focus, produced by the EBU, is available as a PDF document from the following address: www.ebu.co.uk/cf/documents/Currentedition.pdf
Thanks to the combined generosity of the LCBA and the EBU, arrangements have been made to provide at least one free copy of the new (2007) Laws of Bridge in hardback to every Leicestershire Bridge Club (ie all which are affiliated or which have a team in the League). Larger clubs will get two copies. Further copies are available from Robert Northage at a discounted price. Enquiries regarding discount copies or the delivery arrangements for the free copies should be directed to Robert by email or by telephone 
01509 412 189. The new Laws will apply from August 1st and we will offer some guidance to the changes in July.
The EBU has announced a TD training programme to be held in Leicester, as follows:
| Saturday 27th September | Essentials | £33 |
| Saturday 25th October | Book Rulings | £38 |
| Saturday 22nd November | Judgement Rulings | £38 |
| Saturday 5th December | Assessment | £43 |
If you want to improve your skills as a Director then why not attend one or more of these? The EBU website tells you a lot more about each of these courses.
As usual, Robert Northage and John Wilcox represented Leicestershire as the nominated shareholders. The most significant part of the meeting was an EGM held for the purpose of deciding whether or not to give approval in principle to the P2P initiative. Almost every county expressed reservations about the plan before the vote which was 52 in favour, 31 against and 2 abstentions. This is an interesting majority because it would not be enough to approve the consequent bye law changes which will be brought forward to a vote in October 2009. Thus, P2P work will now have to proceed on two fronts: technical work to ensure implementation of the decision but also personal work to persuade at least some doubters that P2P is going to be deserving of their support. You can read more abut P2P elsewhere. Also of interest was a decision that the April 2009 Northern Easter Festival venue has been switched from Blackpool to Buxton.
Our AGM was held on Wednesday June 4th at the Leicestershire Golf Club. We had a good attendance with many of our prizewinners present to receive their awards from our guest of honour, Frank Travers. Frank is Chairman of the County Bridge Club where he has made notable contributions over many years. Our Chairman, Hugh Cairns, reported that the year gone by had not been hugely successful for Leicestershire players in major competition, with two notable exceptions. One, the County first team had won the inaugural play off between winning teams in the five regional inter-county leagues and two, the team of Nick Stevens (captain), Paul Bowyer, Jim Mason, Duncan Happer, Ben Green and Dick Pathan reached the final of the Gold Cup. The County was in good financial health and he was fortunate to be supported by a lively committee who ensured that local competitions were very well run. Competitions remained healthy in general with a slight rise in entries.
The EBU have now centralised their membership and subscription records so now all subscriptions should be paid directly to the EBU at Aylesbury.
The EBU will then send the LCBA their share of this subscription. Pat Beasley, the LCBA membership secretary, has direct access to the new on line data base for LCBA members which is updated daily allowing immediate checking of the payment status of individual members.
The combined fee for Leicestershire and the EBU is £21.00 (reduced to £6.50 for those aged under 25 on January 1st 2008).
Payment may be made by posting a cheque made payable to the EBU to
Broadfields,
Bicester Road,
Aylesbury
HP19 8AZ
or via a credit or debit card by telephoning the EBU 01296 317201.
RHN and JSW